The glaciers that flattened the rest of the Midwest never made it here. You can go see exactly where they stopped, over at Devil's Lake, where the ice piled up rock at both ends of an old river gorge and left a lake sitting in the middle of it. An hour west of there, none of that ever happened. Coulees cut deep between the bluffs, spring creeks running cold at the bottom, farms tucked into valleys that took ten thousand years longer to make than the flat country east of us.
Story-driven photography for couples who want their day to feel as good as it looks.
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
The glaciers that flattened the rest of the Midwest never made it here. That's the whole story of the Driftless, and you can see it from any ridge road outside La Crosse: coulees cut deep between the bluffs, spring creeks running cold at the bottom, farms tucked into valleys that took ten thousand years longer to make than the flat country an hour east. It's the best-looking land in Wisconsin and we're not neutral about that.
We're Ray and Kelly, a husband-and-wife team documenting weddings across Wisconsin since 2007. We live in Viroqua, southeast of La Crosse, which means western Wisconsin isn't a region we travel to. It's where we buy our groceries.
We won't hand you a shot list or ask you to hold a pose while we fix the light. We photograph what's actually happening, which usually turns out to be the parts you'd have missed anyway. Your mom's face during the vows. Your brother laughing at something off to the side. The ten seconds right after the ceremony when nobody's looking at you yet.
We didn't always live here. We spent years in Chicago, then Portland, and we moved back on purpose. It's hard to explain to people who've only driven through. The valleys are deep and close together, the farms sit down in the folds of them, and about every third mile there's something worth pulling over for. There's an elk farm down the road from us and a bison farm not far past that.
We're out in it constantly. Kayaks on the small lakes with our kids, the Mississippi twenty minutes west, Governor Dodge when we want a whole day of it. Ray flies a drone many weekends for no particular reason except that the land keeps looking different from up there. A good number of our favorite meals have been at the Driftless Café in Viroqua.
That's the short version. There's a longer one with more about us and less about the scenery.
we are ray + kelly!
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
Fall is the obvious answer here and it earns it. The coulees turn in mid-October and the color climbs the bluffs instead of spreading out flat, so you get it layered in every direction at once. The light we like best, though, is late summer, when fog sits low in the valleys in the morning and the evenings stretch long and gold across the ridge farms. If your date is flexible, we're glad to talk through what each season actually looks like here rather than what it looks like in photos.
WE KNOW THESE ROADS
We're not driving in for this one. We live in Viroqua, which means we know which back roads wash out after a storm, where the light lands in the Norskedalen meadow at six in the evening in September, and which venues get complicated when a ceremony runs late. None of that is a selling point exactly. It's just what happens when you photograph weddings in the same valleys for twenty years.
A La Crosse Wedding
La Crosse Venues &
Locations We Love
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
A few of the areas and venues we love around La Crosse and the Driftless:
La Crosse — Grandad Bluff over the whole valley, river bluffs, and The Nature Place tucked into Myrick Park
Coon Valley — Norskedalen, Norwegian heritage grounds in the coulees, and the venue we've photographed more than any other in the region
Viroqua & Westby — ridge farms and backyards, our home ground
Sparta — Justin Trails, rolling trails and a barn with room for the whole weekend
Black River Falls — Burlap and Bells, one ceremony site inside a stand of tall pines, another on a hilltop against a rock face
Spring Green — Octagon Barn, Hilltop, and Cates Family Farm, an hour east and worth the drive
Don't see your venue here? Reach out anyway. We're happy to scout any location ahead of time.
Click below for more
Recent La Crosse Area Wedding Photos
VISIT THE BLOG
Erin and Dan got married at Burlap and Bells in Black River Falls, a working barn property with real history to it rather than something dressed up to look rustic. The venue gives you two completely different ceremony backdrops depending on where you stand, a stand of tall pines or a hilltop with a rock face and rolling hills behind it, and either way the light does something no other venue we shoot does. See Erin + Dan's full wedding day →
Cari and Owen chose the Octagon Barn in Spring Green for the light alone, and it delivered. The octagonal structure does something to natural light you don't find anywhere else in Wisconsin, and the surrounding farmland gave us long, open stretches for portraits between the ceremony and reception. We've photographed here more than once and it delivers every time. See Cari + Owen's full wedding day →
Faq
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
What is the Driftless Region?
The Driftless is the part of Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois that the last glaciers skipped over, so instead of flat farmland you get steep ridges, deep coulees, and spring-fed creeks that never got smoothed out. La Crosse and the towns around us sit right in the middle of it.
How far will you travel from Viroqua?
Pretty far, and often. We regularly photograph weddings across Wisconsin and into Minnesota and Iowa. If your venue is within a five hours of here, distance isn't what's going to stop us from saying yes.
Do you photograph weddings at Norskedalen?
Norskedalen is probably the venue we know best in this whole region. We've shot several weddings there and still notice something new every time, the meadow looks different depending on the month, and the old Norwegian buildings give you backdrops that don't feel staged no matter how many times we've stood in front of them. If that's your venue, you're in good hands.
How much does a wedding photographer cost around here?
It varies, but we've laid out real numbers, not vague ranges, in our guide to what wedding photography actually costs in Wisconsin.
