Get to know us
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?”
Mary Oliver
First of all, we just want to welcome you to our little corner of the internet and to express our gratitude that you’re interested in our work. We truly believe in the power of photography and storytelling to preserve life’s most precious memories and we are so honoured that you are considering inviting us onto that journey with you.
We’re Tamar & Matt, we fell in love as teenagers and have grown up together ever since. We became adults together, we’ve grown two incredible little boys together and are currently pregnant with our daughter. We have built this beautiful and challenging and fulfilling business together as well, allowing us to work together and stay home with our boys and live the kind of slower paced life that we’ve always dreamed of.
So many things about us influence our creativity and our work, but in particular, Parenthood has challenged and stretched us in ways we never could have imagined, and it has inspired us endlessly to see the value in life’s every day moments. Our transition into parenthood has been a beautiful, powerful time for us as people and as a couple. In all of life’s joys and challenges, we have clung tightly to each other, we have been intentional about being each other’s safe place.
All of this to say, we realise (and feel so deeply) the weight of how important it is to capture your memories, to preserve your story and to capture you in an authentic and artful way. Our love for each other, and for our wee boys, informs how we capture your connections and your loves, too. Your story deserves to be told, your love deserves to be captured, and we are so grateful to every person who puts their trust in us to document their journey.
Our Why
In early 2021, two life-changing events took place within a three week period. Tamar’s big sister passed away, and our first child was born.
From Tamar’s perspective, the agony of grief mixed with the euphoria of birth shifted her consciousness, simultaneously slamming her into the reality of life and loss, but also elevating her above her own circumstance, revealing the truth that we’ve heard so many times but never fully understood until it became our reality - Love is the centre of everything, life moves fast, things change irreversibly, and the beautiful and the painful sometimes come in pairs.
All we can do is live in the now, and love ourselves and those around us fearlessly and fiercely.
Our Why rests in this simple truth - your Love, your life, your reason for being, your experience and your why, deserves to be documented in a beautiful, considered, authentic way. You deserve to have these memories to treasure always. We know what it is to love, and we know what it is to grieve, and we’ve learned how important it is to honour your journey and to preserve your memories.
This is us
Matt
Elopement and Couples Photographer and VideographerMatt has been photographing and filming elopements and couples across Scotland since 2018. He loves meeting new people and would definitely call himself an extrovert. He’s the kind of photographer who will vibe with you on the day, who will be absolutely loving capturing the joy and celebration of this beautiful moment in your life. He loves being outdoors and is greatly inspired by the magnificence of Scotland’s landscapes, whether that’s the scottish highlands or the borders, the beaches or the lochs, the rolling hills or the ancient forests — Matt loves to be outdoors in nature and this is so evident in the incredible photos and videos he creates.
Family Photographer and VideographerTamar
Tamar has been travelling all over Scotland capturing people’s stories since 2018. Photography has always been a huge passion of hers, and she got her first camera at 11 years old. It never left her side and she turned it into her career as soon as she graduated from university. Tamar is a self proclaimed empath and is greatly inspired by your stories, your connection, and your love. Becoming a mother was the most transformative thing she has ever experienced and gave her a completely new perspective on life. She is passionate about showcasing parents and capturing them in each stage of their parenting journey. Her love and empathy for children and mothers is so evident in the work that she creates.
-
We are both from a similar area in the midlands in England! We grew up around 30 minutes drive from each other, but didn’t meet until we went to the same sixth form in 2011. After a few months of meeting, we both knew we’d found our person and promised each other we’d get married one day. From that moment on, it was never a question in either of our minds. There was nobody else, just each other.
Over 10 years later, we are still driven by our love for each other, as well as our love for our boys and all that we’ve built together.
We moved to Scotland in 2018, set up Tamar Hope Photography, and everything seemed to flow naturally from there! We feel so so lucky to have been able to create this life where we get to spend so much time together and with our children and we get to explore the most beautiful country we know for a living! We also get to connect so deeply with so many incredible souls through this work and it truly is so wonderful.
If you’d have shown 16 & 17 year old Matt and Tamar a snippet into their late 20’s and early 30s, they’d be mind blown in the best way possible (and so, so excited).
-
Shiloh & Wolf, our boys are everything and more. Parenthood is the most turbulent, immersive, all consuming and beautiful type of magic.
Shiloh is 2, he’s super into tractors and construction vehicles, he’s a little whirlwind with the most energy i’ve ever seen a human exhibit! He loves to be outdoors, he loves looking through photos and videos of himself and people he knows, he loves to paint and he loves having messy feet.
Wolf is our littlest love, not yet 1. Tamar birthed him one winter’s evening in the sweet cosiness of our living room. He entered this world so calm, so content, and he spends much of his time like this too. He’s curious, loving, smiley, sweet.
-
Tamar was always the creative child, the artsy one, always drawing, painting, writing, directing and filming home movies or taking photos. Her siblings were always modelling for her, acting in her plays, letting her paint their faces or plait their hair. She never wore shoes (probably where Shiloh gets it from) and always wanted to dress just like her mum (a true hippy).
It goes without saying that she loves photography, but she also loves writing, poetry, reading, being outdoors, the beach, feeling the sun on her face, being a passenger on long drives - knowing that there’s nothing to do but sit and take in the scenery! She loves cooking and baking and eating, connecting with people, falling in love (with everywhere and everything), she love watching movies, and heart of the summertime.
Matt is someone who loves getting stuck into things, the kind of person who will be your hype man and get so excited for you and invested in you, hours will fly by and he will barely notice because he’s so focussed and so involved in what he’s doing! He’s always been into sports and keeping active and being outdoors, which lends itself so well to capturing elopements, especially out in the Scottish highlands!
Matt loves the outdoors, his pets, he loves good food, campfires, mindfulness, and those long conversations that you have with people you’ve just met but you feel like you must have been friends for a lifetime. Real love, joy, and tranquility are something you can’t touch, but you can feel: He loves experiencing it and capturing it to be looked back at over and again.
Why we love what we do
Put simply, we love Scotland, and we love love.
We are originally from England, and we moved as a couple to Scotland in 2018, before starting a family here in 2021. We have always been the couple that loves the outdoors, and when living in England, we were lucky enough to have access to the Peak District and the Lake District, as well as frequently taking trips to Wales, Cornwall and Devon - we have always been the kind of people to seek out natural spaces, and so when we made the move to Scotland, it immediately felt like home.
We do what we do because we love Scotland, we love photographing it, and we love being immersed in its beauty. On top of that, we are passionate storytellers, we are dreamers, and we love to connect with people, friends and strangers alike! Our work allows us to continually see the magnificence and beauty of Scotland through the eyes of our clients; we get to experience it anew time and time again with each elopement and session that we capture. Not only that, but we get to create beautiful memories for those who work with us, and we get to capture moments in their lives that they will treasure forever.
We feel immensely grateful to get to do this. Being elopement photographers and family photographers based in Scotland is truly a dream come true, and we are so very grateful to every single person who trusts us to tell their story through photo and film.