A wedding day is guaranteed to be full of surprises. Mostly fun ones, but sometimes not so fun ones too: a sudden gust of wind that pulls loose a strand of the bride’s perfect hairdo, a groom that spills a drop of wine on his crisp white shirt because he was enthusiastically demonstrating how to swirl it, or the train of the bride’s dress that seems impractically long for the first dance.

The good news is that you can prepare yourself for these tricky situations. As a matter of fact, it’s exactly what we do! Whenever we’re photographing a wedding we bring our infamous “wedding day emergency kit”.

Our kit consists of a first aid kit and a bunch of must-have items that we’ve gathered based on experience and tips from others. Because not every wedding photographer brings these items, we recommend you have a look at our list, and ask your bridesmaids or groomsmen to keep them at hand. You never know what could happen on your wedding day, but as my dad would say: “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

Our wedding day emergency kit

You’ll find most of these must-haves in a dollar store!

• bottles of water
• energy bars
• deodorant (one for her and one for him)
• mints
• hand towelettes
• tissues
• bobby pins
• safety pins
• a sewing kit (travel size)
• spot remover pen
• hemming tape
• blister pads
• pain killers (e.g. ibuprofen or tylenol)
• eye drops
• band-aids
• matches
• plastic rain ponchos (also handy to sit on)
• tooth picks/dental floss
• a sewing kit (travel size)

Edit: more items added

Based on some great tips, we added a couple of items to our kit. Thanks for that! And here are the items:

• lint roller
• qtips
• hair spray (travel size)
• lotion
• sanitary towels/tampons
• contact lens fluid

Do you know any items we should add? Let us know in a comment below!