Proposal Brainard Lake July | Ward
Proposal at Brainard Lake in the Colorado Mountains
Proposal Details:
We should start with the caveat that recreating this proposal would be extremely difficult. We have another spot we use for proposals because this former spot was just getting too busy. There are people letting their boats into the water, people fly fishing, others sitting around the lake, many times people sitting on the bench. While it is not as busy as some locations Brainard Lake is no longer secluded like when we started years ago. Outside of that the other factor is that the guy was there without her knowing it. This is something with less than 1% of proposals.
Not knowing all the details the plan was to use another location at Brainard Lake. Upon getting to the location we realized that the plan was changed in that there was a tent with a dress hanging on it. Inside the tent was a place for doing hair / makeup. If you think this is the solution to getting her in the ideal hair / makeup / clothing this is not the ideal way to do things. Timing wise things will go crazy long and she will know what is going on. Is that a bad thing? Well emotion is elongated and for some women will be heightened due to the anticipation. It is a hurdle when you do not tell your photographer and there is a firm sunset.
It took about 90 minutes for the clothing transformation to occur. I think it worked for them but for 90% of proposals it would not work. At times guys push something in the hair / makeup / clothing and they piss her off. Heels + hiking do not work. Making her freeze is not a great idea. We have seen a ton of things over the years. There is a balance and a way to get her looking good but also to keep it natural. All that to say this is a fairly rare proposal.
One other thing to note on a setup end is that we have debated offering it as a service. We currently do not mainly because it creates an open door scope with restrictive private lands in outdoor variables. To unpack that more when guys want a setup they think of it like a couple things but most often it is hours of setup after hours of prep. Setup also starts introducing things that are not legal on public lands. There are then factors like stuff that will not do well in the outdoor conditions. Wind is a big factor but did you see the twinkle lights in the jars? Nope – no one would unless it was pitch black.
All that to say he did really well and there was a slew of emotion. Shooting to limit the people in the background was a challenge but we got the photos and video. We included both angles of the video as one had the better angle and the other the better audio. Ironically nerves can make guys miss the spot even when you tell them in person. They were big Bachelor / Bachelorette fans so should we say that was the ‘final rose’. While there were nerves the proposal was well thought out and from the heart. Bring on the gush of emotion for this proposal.
You can get proposal ideas from reading past blogs and read about how we do proposals on our engagement proposals page. If you like what you see here and are considering using this location here are some of the other shoots we have done at Brainard Lake.