Chelsea Hotel Photoshoot: A Honeymoon Photo Session in NYC

Some couples want their session to cover half the city. These two wanted one building — and when the building is the Chelsea Hotel, one is enough.

They had just gotten married and chose New York for their honeymoon, two music lovers making a pilgrimage to a city they adore. The Chelsea Hotel wasn't a backdrop they picked from a list; it was the point. This is the hotel where Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe lived their "just kids" years, where Leonard Cohen met Janis Joplin in the elevator and wrote a song about it, where Dylan, Hendrix, and half the history of American music passed through the lobby.

For a couple whose love runs on music, there was nowhere else this honeymoon photoshoot in NYC could have happened, and they booked a balcony room specifically so we could photograph on it.

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The Balcony and The Iconic Chelsea Hotel Neon Sign

The Chelsea's wrought-iron balconies are some of the most recognizable architecture in the city, and having one to ourselves changed everything. We started there in the late light — the two of them wrapped together over 23rd Street, the red brick and ironwork behind them, the neon HOTEL CHELSEA sign glowing a few feet away. A note for anyone planning their own Chelsea Hotel photoshoot: the hotel's photography policy confines sessions to your own guest room and balcony, so booking a balcony room isn't a splurge, it's the whole strategy. It's also what makes these photos feel rare — this isn't an angle you can get from the sidewalk.

A Chelsea Hotel Photoshoot Session That Was Theirs

Here's the thing they told me early on: they love lounging at home together. That's their happy place — not a grand gesture, just the two of them in a beautiful room with nowhere to be. So instead of fighting that, we built the whole intimate couples session around it. Slip dresses and a vintage gold gown. Flowers on the bed. The marble bathroom with its clawfoot tub, champagne in hand. Matching white robes and the kind of laughing-at-each-other frames you only get when two people are genuinely comfortable. By the end of the session it barely felt like a photoshoot at all, which is exactly when the best photographs happen.

As a photographer, sessions like this one are a gift. Two brides on their honeymoon, in a room steeped in seventy years of art and music, being entirely themselves — there's nothing to direct, only moments to catch. The queer love stories I get to photograph in this city are some of my favorite work I make, and this one, in this building, is high on that list.

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Why a Honeymoon Photoshoot in NYC Is Worth It

Most couples spend their wedding day surrounded by people, schedules, and speeches, and then the honeymoon arrives, and nobody photographs it, even though it's often the first time you actually exhale together as a married couple. A honeymoon or post-wedding session in NYC gives you that: no timeline pressure, no guest list, just the two of you and a city you love. If your version of that is a legendary hotel room, a balcony, and a bathtub, I am very much here for it.

PLANNING A HONEYMOON OR POST-WEDDING SESSION IN NYC?

If YES, I'd love to photograph it — hotel rooms, balconies, and all the places that feel like you. See how my couples sessions work or check your if your desired date is available.