The mega popular University of Washington cherry blossom trees always draw insane crowds when they bloom in March each year, and it’s understandable why!

Those delicate petals are gorgeous but when set against a backdrop of century-old brick buildings in the Quad at the UW they take on a whole new level of romance. When Bridget & Andrew asked me if I’d be willing to plan for their engagement photos at the cherry blossoms it meant that we had to cover a lot of logistical details. Because of the popularity of the cherry blossoms, finding room to move (let alone pose for photos) in the quad during the day can be really challenging, so our only option was to show up at the crack of dawn, hoping that we’d have the luxury of fewer people around as a result. The super early wake up call was all worth it! We started our session at 7am and by the time we were wrapped up and ready to go home an hour and a half later the quad was already packed with cherry blossom admirers.

If you want to utilize the cherry blossoms for your engagement photos make sure you plan to be there before sunrise and follow the UW’s cherry blossom twitter account for updates on how the bloom is looking.

Since it’s impossible to predict peak bloom until just a few days before we had to be flexible on which day we’d do the session, but I’d happily take on that extra planning and patience anytime when this is the result! If you’d like to plan for family or couples photos at the cherry blossoms at the UW click the contact button at the bottom of this post. Thank you to Bridget & Andrew (and Maximus the German Shepherd) for waking up early with me for this one!