WHAT A BOUDOIR SESSION IS ACTUALLY LIKE

What Should I Expect During My First Boudoir Session?

Most women arrive having imagined a version of this that isn't quite right.

The picture in your head is probably borrowed from somewhere… a little posed, a little performed, shot the way so much of this genre is shot: for someone else, with someone else in mind. That isn't all what happens here.

There's a particular kind of recognition that typically can only come from another woman. A man can tell you you're beautiful and it lands as flattery. When a woman sees you and means it, it lands differently because it isn't about being wanted. It's about being seen. That's the register this work lives in. You happen to be wearing something beautiful, and usually very little of it - the photograph is still about you.

In nearly twenty years behind the camera, I've learned that the experience is a majority of what this work is about.

Here is what it actually looks like.

IT BEGINS WITH A CONVERSATION

Before anything is scheduled, we talk - by phone if you prefer, though I'll gently steer you toward a video call, because something settles when you can see my face. This first conversation is mostly about you. Why now. What you're imagining. Whether there's a wedding, a pivotal moment, a transformation, a celebration… a reason this rose to the surface this year.

Some of it is practical: I'll walk you through how the day works, so the unknowns stop being unknowns. Most of it is quieter than that. I'm listening for whether this is right for you, and you're deciding whether I'm someone you'd want in the room. By the end we'll have covered the rest too - how it all works, what it costs, how to book - handled directly, in private.

BEFORE THE DAY

I’ll send you a complete preparation guide and will be available to answer all of your questions before you walk through the door. You'll bring your own wardrobe. I don't keep a studio closet - no rack of samples could fit the range of women who come through here, and the pieces that photograph best are almost always the ones already yours and fitted perfectly. Come with five or six looks in mind rather than your whole drawer, and we'll narrow to the final few together.

That curation is part of working with me. If you're in a fitting room unsure between two things, text me. If you'd rather talk it through, we will. And if you arrive knowing exactly the looks you want, I love that too.

If you’d like a head start, here is my full guide on what to wear. →

THE DAY ITSELF

The studio, here in Greenville, South Carolina, is a series of beautiful spaces - each one different, each lit by its own set of windows. I work mostly in natural light. Occasionally I'll bring in a strobe for a particular, more dramatic frame, but boudoir moves quickly and the room needs to feel calm, so daylight is usually where we stay. The variety between spaces is deliberate; it's how we keep no two photographs feeling the same.

If hair and makeup is part of your collection, my stylist will be there when you arrive, and that time is one of my favorite parts of the day. We talk, we have a glass of champagne, the nerves loosen, and by the time we begin you're entirely ready - the look Privée is known for, shaped in front of me so the three of us can build it together. If you have an artist you trust, or you do your own better than anyone could, that's welcome too.

Then it's just the two of us. No one else is ever in the room while I'm photographing you, and I hold that for a reason. Even the most supportive friend changes the air… with another set of eyes present, you start, without meaning to, to picture how you look to her, and that's the fastest way to become your own critic. I want you thinking about no one but yourself.

You don't need to know how to do any of this. I'll tell you exactly what to do throughout the session… your hair, your chin, your hands, down to the angle of your foot. And here is the part most women come to love: if I'm not telling you what to do with some part of you, it's because you’ve already made it perfect. The silence isn't me leaving you to figure it out. It's me telling you you've got it.

We'll move through two or three looks, sometimes more if the day is flowing. There's music - mine, or a playlist you've made for it. There's a steamer, somewhere to hang everything, something bubbly to drink. It's unhurried in the way a good afternoon is should be.

WHAT WE MAKE

Implied is the word here - never explicit. There is a line where this kind of photography ends and something else begins, and I hold it deliberately. Within that line there is enormous range. Some of the strongest frames involve simplicity and subtlety. And not all of it is the obvious vocabulary of boudoir, the corset and the thigh-highs… a great deal of it is softer and more playful than people expect: you, laughing, in something comfortable, looking like yourself on your best ordinary day… how your Love sees you.

THE REVEAL

A few weeks later you'll come back to the studio, and we do this part properly… a glass of wine, your images on a large screen, shown the way they're meant to be seen in this moment. You'll choose your favorites, design your album, and make your selections then and there.

I no longer send online galleries before that conversation. With how easily watermarks can now be removed, sending your images out into the world unfinished isn't something I'm willing to do - these are yours, and they stay protected until they're in your hands the way you chose them. If you're out of town, we'll do the reveal together over a screen share video call. Once you've ordered, your purchased images live in a private gallery where you can view, download, and order at will.

THE SHAPE OF IT

From your inquiry, the consultation usually happens within a few days. I recommend booking your session at least six weeks ahead of any date you're hoping to have albums and prints in hand. The reveal follows two to three weeks after the session. From there, digital files arrive within forty-eight hours of your order, prints within a week or two, and albums in three to four weeks.

That is the architecture. What it adds up to is harder to put on a timeline.

One client arrived so nervous she could barely meet the camera. I showed her frames as we went, the way I always do, and somewhere in the midst of our session something unlocked. By the end she was in tears - the good kind - and told me she hadn’t seen herself like that ever. The shoot helped her see herself in a new way… sensual, sexy, confident, beautiful… and it radiated out of her so much that her fiancé noticed when she got home. That part I can't schedule for you… but it is the part the whole day is built around.

When you're ready, inquire privately →.

I'd love to learn about you.