Boudoir : Reflections

I've always loved to write. As a young girl, I imagined my adult self as a journalist or a novelist, maybe even a poet. There was something comforting about the idea of escaping to my own world to create a reality that was only mine. Writing has helped me get through the darker times of life; through the confusion of my early teenage years, through heartbreak and my parent's divorce, through times where I felt like the only person in the world. I often think back to short excerpts I wrote, my poetry, my journals with pages ripped out and doodles along the sides. These dark times when I turned to myself, I turned into myself and it has led me to the woman I am today. I have this burning desire to bring forth and into the light what may lie just beneath the surface. I realize now that everything I have expressed in words, are fragmented pieces of my personal story.

When a camera fell into my hands, I began to tell more stories. About myself, but also about other women. I've had the honor of listening and learning and understanding the people who have been in front of my camera. I've seen women emerge from incredible pain with astonishing strength. I've seen the unspeakable magic that happens when the layers are stripped away and we are real with each other. Through boudoir, I have the ability to tell your story through my lens, to be with you and feel with you. When I can't seem to put things to words, I have my camera, and often times, it truly says everything.

Hair and Makeup by Katy Taurel

Boudoir : Hadas

"As a rape survivor, I always felt my body betrayed me. I was mad at it for being so weak, for letting everything happen, for not saving me from the worst nightmare I could ever imagine. I was just 11 at the time, amidst of growing up. I was discovering myself, femininity and sexuality. All was stopped at once. All I could think of, all I wanted, was for my body and I to be separated. As years went on I developed severe Bulimia. Nobody knew of course. I was always the strong-powerful-wise woman for everyone. How could I ever share with them how weak I really was? So I constantly punished my body, by not taking care of it, by pretending I'm really disgusting, ugly, fat, and so many more things that I will spare you. So I was drowning for years, deeper and deeper, pretending all was fine.

When I started recovery, there was one person who saw me - an amazing blind woman who saw me with her heart, and that changed everything. It was a long road, it still is. Yet I can say today, that I'm a much wiser woman.

I'm beautiful, I'm sexy, and I'm strong. I believe that because I learned to love my body and take care of it. Thank it for making me who I am. Being beautiful, sexual and strong is a good thing. Not something to be ashamed of.and because of that, I wanted to give myself, my body, a present. Thank it for sticking with me even when I did everything possible to ruin it. Give it the love it deserves. 

Society expects us to diminish how we see ourselves. I'm not willing to do that anymore. What makes me as strong as I am is that knowledge I learned the hard way. Choosing to be you is the best present you can give yourself."

Hair and Makeup by Cassy Avraham

Boudoir : Ms. A

"It took a long time. It took finding a husband who found me irresistibly attractive. It took having babies, seeing the wonder my body could produce, and then the setback of accepting a postpartum body. And right when I was ready to embrace my body all over again, I suffered a complicated birth, one in which the statistics were not in my favor. During my painful recovery, and for months after, every time I looked in the mirror, I struggled with staring at a body that had failed me, a body that had failed to serve its natural womanly role of bringing a child into the world. And even the therapist I saw to help cope with my birth story dismissed my pain as nothing more than, “you just had a baby, and you’re nursing.”

It took a long time. It took turning to God and accepting, it took turning to my reflection in the mirror and accepting. It took an exercise routine and healthy diet that made me feel strong, healthy, and alive. It took the loving support of my husband, the sweet embrace of my incredible children. It took the realization that life is bumpy, and that while the potholes can hurt and damage, the healing that follows makes us fuller and more complete people.

It took realizing, as a kallah (bride) teacher, the importance of a healthy body image in a marriage. That women owe it to themselves and to their relationship to feel beautiful and sexy, and that I had to channel those feelings for myself in order to give them over to the kallot whom I teach.

It took another look in the mirror and the decision that my body did not actually fail me. My body fought and survived against the odds, and the knowledge that I possess that strength as well as how much I have to live for, that pushed me to want to celebrate the body that is mine. It took overcoming my anxiety to schedule a boudoir shoot, to see myself through a singularly talented photographer and, as I wrote to her, “to see myself the way my husband sees me.” Because, when I ask, my husband claims that he does not see my flaws. He sees a beautiful whole, the beautiful whole with whom his life is joined, the beautiful whole who carried and birthed his children, the beautiful whole who is his partner in everything. And now I have these stunning photographs as a constant reminder of my blessings. I owe that to Rebecca.

And finally, it took a reminder that timing is everything. A week after my boudoir shoot, I found out that I’m pregnant – I could not imagine a more perfect beginning to the next 9 months."

Kodak Film Processed & Scanned by Panda Labs

Bridal Boudoir : D + E

It was a pleasure to tell the story of this gorgeous couple, coming home from their wedding in the early hours of the morning. Their love illuminated the session and shines through in the series of photographs below...

Hair and Makeup by Katy Taurel

Dress Designer - Shai Rafaeli