The Macpherson Family

From a Day at Thoresby to Memories at Home

Earlier this spring, the Macpherson family won my Thoresby Horse Trials giveaway, giving Louise, James, Alice and Harriet the chance to enjoy a lovely day out at the event together.

Their prize included a course walk with the wonderful Ellie & Finn Healy, and it was such a pleasure to eventually welcome the whole family in front of my camera for their portrait session on 1st May.

For me, early May is when spring really comes into its own. The countryside is bursting into life, the grass is beautifully green and everything feels fresh and full of possibility — which made it the perfect time to photograph this particular chapter of the girls' childhood.

The setting was especially meaningful, too. Rather than choosing a picturesque country estate or unfamiliar location, we photographed the family right at home on their family dairy farm.

With their two Labradors, Buster and Daisy, their ponies Mermaid and Lily, and the girls growing up surrounded by the farm, this wasn't simply a family portrait session. It was a chance to document the place, animals and people that make up their everyday life.

Bluebells, Ponies & a Little Bit of Chaos

One of my favourite parts of photographing families with horses and children is that you can plan the location, but you can never quite plan what the animals will do!

Before we started properly photographing, I got to jump in the old Land Rover and head off exploring the farm to find some of the best spots. We went through the stream and eventually discovered a beautiful area of long grass and bluebells — the sort of setting that makes you want to stop and photograph everything.

The only slight problem?

The ponies thought the long grass was considerably more interesting than the camera!

Mermaid and Lily were very happy to make the most of the endless buffet, while Alice and Harriet did their best to persuade them that there were more important things to be doing. And honestly, that's all part of it.

Working with children and animals isn't about creating a perfectly controlled scene where everyone stands exactly where they're supposed to. It's about allowing a little bit of chaos, following the moments as they happen and capturing the personalities that make your family yours.

Once we'd given the ponies plenty of opportunity to investigate the grass, we moved down towards the driveway, where there were fewer tempting snacks available. This made things a little easier for the girls — and even brought some of the family's cows into the photographs too.

Those little unexpected moments are often some of my favourites. A pony wandering off, a child laughing, a dog getting involved, or the cows appearing in the background aren't things that need to be edited out of a family portrait session. They're part of the story.

Photographs of the Childhood They'll One Day Look Back On...

We finished the session on the driveway, taking in the beautiful views across the farm and creating some of my favourite photographs from the day.

What I loved most about this session was that everything had a sense of meaning. Alice and Harriet weren't simply being photographed in a pretty location — they were being photographed at home, with their ponies, their dogs, their family and the landscape that forms such an important part of their childhood.

These are the photographs that become more valuable with time.

The ones that take you straight back to how muddy the farm was, how cheeky the ponies were, how the girls looked at this age, and what it felt like to have these animals as such a huge part of everyday family life.

If you have children growing up around horses or ponies, you probably already know how quickly these chapters disappear. They get taller, the ponies change, favourite dogs get older and suddenly the little people you remember riding around the farm are not so little anymore.

A portrait session doesn't need to be perfectly behaved or beautifully choreographed to create something truly special. In fact, I think the opposite is often true.

If you'd love to have this chapter of your family's life captured — your children, your horses, your dogs and the places that mean the most to you — I'd love to create something beautiful for you.

I photograph relaxed, natural family and equine portrait sessions across the UK, creating artwork that tells the story of your family as it really is, rather than simply recording what everyone looked like on one particular day.

Because these are the photographs you'll want to have long after the girls have outgrown their ponies, and the farm has changed around them.