New Jersey is the most densely populated state in the country, and that is the fact a photographer works with rather than around. It means venues are frequently bounded: the grounds stop at a hedge and beyond it is a road, a neighbour or a car park, which constrains the wide angles and not the close ones. It also means the state runs to a great many purpose-built banquet venues, which are among the most capable and least photogenic buildings in this guide — elaborate, warm, mirrored and lit for spectacle, and all of it solvable once the exposure is reversed.
And it means the landscape that does exist is worth walking to: the Watchung ridges west of Newark, which look east across the basin to the Manhattan skyline; the Highlands in the northwest, the coolest and most wooded part of the state; and the sandy Pine Barrens edge in the south, where pitch pine gives no shade and the sky is enormous.
Two things recur through the guides below. The first is humidity: fifteen miles of northeastern summer air reduces a distant skyline to a pale grey suggestion, which makes the view a seasonal asset rather than a fixed one — clearest after a front in autumn and winter, softest on a July afternoon. The second is the reversal that every ornate room needs: expose the ambient a stop or a stop and a half under what skin needs so the chandeliers hold their crystal and the plasterwork keeps its shadow, then add one warm-gelled source just above skin level.
Raising the sensitivity until the room looks bright is what produces the flat gold photograph these venues are known for, and it is entirely avoidable. Each guide names the shade, the hour, the exposure decision and the covered alternative, and says plainly where the shade is not. We have not photographed at every venue here, and where we have not, we say so.
The Venetian, Garfield: The Building’s Own Logic
A grand spectacle venue in northern New Jersey — built to impress, which is a coherent logic and a demanding one.
The Terrace, Paramus: Field Notes
A banquet venue in Bergen County whose principal outdoor space is a paved terrace — a hard, bright, reflective surface with its own rules.
Royal Manor, Garfield: The One Decision That Governs Everything
A banquet venue with a ceremony garden in Bergen County — and one decision that changes the whole character of the pictures.
Renaissance Woodbridge: The One Decision That Governs Everything
A full-service hotel in central New Jersey — and one decision about where the portraits come from that settles the whole running order.
Morristown Hyatt: The Problem, and Four Ways Out
A modern hotel in a historic New Jersey town — comfortable, capable and visually anonymous, which is a solvable problem.
Grand Marquis, Old Bridge: The Problem, and Four Ways Out
A banquet venue in central New Jersey where the entire day happens under artificial light of several different colours.
The Fiesta, Wood-Ridge: The Problem, and Four Ways Out
A large banquet venue in northern New Jersey where almost every surface reflects — which is a genuine problem and a genuine resource.
Meadow Wood, Randolph: What It Suits and What It Does Not
A banquet venue with a small lake and wooded edges in northern New Jersey — water is a real asset and it has rules of its own.
Park Savoy, Florham Park: What It Suits and What It Does Not
A single-event estate venue in northern New Jersey — exclusive but compact, which suits some weddings and not others.
The Rockleigh, Rockleigh: Field Notes
A multi-ballroom venue in northern New Jersey — several weddings at once, on a shared property, which is its own photographic problem.