What to wear for family photos

You do not need new clothes. You need three decisions: a palette, a level of formality, and one thing per person that has some texture to it. Everything else is noise — and the families who overthink this are not the ones who end up happiest with the pictures.

The one rule that matters

Coordinate, do not match. That is the whole thing. Everything below is detail.

Pick three or four colors. Let each person wear some combination of them. Nobody wears the same outfit as anybody else. That is it — and it works because a matched set of khakis and white shirts turns six people into a uniform, while a coordinated palette lets each person still look like themselves while the group reads as a group.

The second half of the rule: comfort beats correctness every time. A dress that is objectively perfect and slightly scratchy will lose you the whole candid half of the session, because the person wearing it will be adjusting it in every single frame. I would rather photograph a kid in a favorite worn-out sweater than a kid in something ideal that they hate.

Colors that work in Philadelphia

Location matters here more than people expect. Philadelphia backgrounds are mostly green, grey and red brick, and those three set the constraints.

Reliable palettes:

• Warm neutral: cream, oatmeal, camel, soft white, tan. Works everywhere, always. My default suggestion.
• Earth: rust, olive, mustard, brown, cream. Made for autumn and for the Wissahickon.
• Cool classic: navy, denim, chambray, grey, white. Excellent against brick and cobblestone in Old City, and it never looks dated.
• Muted jewel: deep green, burgundy, dusty blue, plum. Good for winter and for evening sessions.

Colors that fight you: neon anything; bright red, which reflects onto faces and turns skin pink; and kelly green, which disappears into summer foliage entirely. Pure white is fine in shade or on an overcast day and blows out in direct sun. Full black loses all its detail in the shadows — charcoal does the same job and keeps the texture.

One useful trick: pick your palette from something you already own and love. A favorite blanket, a rug, a painting in the living room. It guarantees the colors work together and it guarantees the photographs match the house they will hang in.

Patterns, logos and stripes

One patterned item per person, maximum, and not more than two patterned people in the group. Patterns pull the eye, and if four people are wearing them the eye has nowhere to rest — which in practice means it does not rest on anyone’s face.

Avoid fine, tightly repeating patterns: narrow stripes, small checks, herringbone, houndstooth. At certain distances these interfere with the camera sensor and shimmer or produce colored artifacts. It is a real technical problem, not a style opinion, and it cannot be fixed afterwards.

Large logos and printed graphics date a photograph faster than anything else. A shirt with a brand name across the chest is a timestamp, and in fifteen years it is the only thing anyone will look at.

What to use instead: texture. Cable knit, corduroy, waffle weave, linen, denim, suede, chunky wool. Texture does everything a pattern does — it keeps clothing from reading as a flat block of color — without any of the visual noise. In black and white it is the only thing that survives at all.

Dressing kids without a fight

Three things, learned the hard way.

Nothing brand new. A first-time outfit has an unfamiliar collar, unfamiliar seams and a stiffness that will not have washed out yet. Kids notice all of it. Wear it once around the house first.

Let them pick one item. The boots, the hat, the dinosaur socks. It gives them a stake in the day, and honestly the odd choice usually makes the picture better — a kid in rain boots and a party dress is a photograph, whereas a kid in a perfectly styled outfit is a catalog page.

Bring a change for anyone under six. Not for a second look — for the mud. There will be mud.

And a note on tights and bows: if a small child fusses with something for the first ten minutes, take it off. I will not miss it, and half the frames in a good gallery are of kids in motion where it would not have shown anyway.

Season by season

• Spring: lighter neutrals, soft blues, and layers, because April in Philadelphia is three different temperatures. Blossoms are pink, so avoid pink.
• Summer: linen, cotton, breathable everything. Sessions run at 7:30pm for a reason. Sandals are fine; new sandals are a blister waiting to appear at minute forty.
• Autumn: the trap season. Backgrounds are already orange and red at full saturation, so dressing to match makes everyone vanish. Go cream, rust, deep green, navy, charcoal, denim. Knitwear photographs beautifully against fallen leaves. See the fall guide for the full timing picture.
• Winter: coats you actually like the look of, because they will be in every frame after the first twenty minutes. Wool over puffer if you have the choice — puffers add a lot of visual bulk. Hats and scarves are genuinely great props.

The details people forget

• Shoes. They are in every full-length frame and nobody thinks about them. Cobblestone in Old City eats heels; the Wissahickon towpath eats white sneakers.
• Length. If we are sitting on grass or steps — and we will be — make sure a skirt or dress works seated as well as standing.
• Hair ties on wrists. They show up in every photograph and cannot be removed convincingly. Pocket them.
• Sunglasses on heads. Same.
• Ironing. Two minutes with a steamer beats an hour of retouching, especially on linen.
• Layers you can lose. An outer layer that comes off gives us two looks in one session for free.

If you are going to buy something

Buy for the adult who is least sure about being photographed. Every family has one, and their comfort determines the mood of the whole session more than anyone else’s. If that is you: something you already know you look good in, in a color from the palette, is worth more than anything new.

Beyond that, one or two pieces to fill gaps is plenty. If you find yourself buying six coordinated outfits, stop — you have crossed from planning into styling, and styled families look styled. The point of the candid half of the session is that it looks like your actual life, and your actual life has a favorite sweater in it.

Last thing, and I mean this: text me a photo of everything laid out on the bed a few days before. It takes me two minutes to look at and I will tell you honestly if something is going to cause a problem. Nobody has ever regretted sending it.