A Marine-Center Micro Wedding at the Seymour Center, Santa Cruz

Portraits Along the Oceanfront Science-Venue Coast

After the ceremony came family photos and couple portraits along the bluff and the paths around the center, while the light held over the water. The Seymour Center sits on a coastal point overlooking Monterey Bay, and for years it was home to Ms. Blue, an 87-foot blue whale skeleton on display outside, one of the largest mounted specimens in the world. The skeleton ran through the portrait session as a constant presence, a reminder that this is a working research lab, not a rented event space. The scientists are in the building next door; the ocean is not decorative.

Jamie and Oscar pulled everyone together for the wide family shots with the bay behind them, then the two of them continued along the bluff for their couple portraits before the evening moved indoors.

Dinner, Cake, and Dancing at the Marine Center

As the light went, dinner was served and the reception settled in, the tables set, florals down the center, the coast just past the windows. Toasts went around from their closest people, and they cut their cake together in front of everyone.

Then came the first dance, and then the dancing that carried the evening the rest of the way. A close, happy crowd on the Santa Cruz coast, celebrating the two of them as the night went on.

The marine-center micro wedding held its character through dinner and into the dancing, the same building where the blue whale skeleton runs along the outdoor path, the coast still audible through the walls. When the ceremony is on a bluff above Monterey Bay, the Santa Cruz aquarium wedding reception inside the center feels like the right next room.