Boudoir at a Motel 6?! Budget Boudoir Shoot Experiment with Quinn

Internet trolls can make for interesting ideas. We were told that our art was “only pretty” because we had the advantage of beautiful clients (which, FACT), beautiful expensive locations, (which we will circle back to); and professional HMU; and not everyone in small towns has access to this. Normally, I’d delete or scroll on past these types of comments but this one sparked an idea! This was the perfect challenge; shoot boudoir in an ultra budget motel chain with the absolute bare minimum!

A fun little BTS fact is that we create all of our sets. From wallpapers to knick knacks, we set every scene up from scratch for each shoot. Why, you may ask? Variety! It allows us to use our studio to its maximum creative ability and truly customize each experience. Plus, I’m an artist after all and really like to keep things fresh. So it’s not like we shoot in $500/night hotels every shoot. Have we? Definitely but that’s VERY rare.

So, to prove that beauty could be captured ANYWHERE, I was on the hunt. It was important to me that it was a large national chain, so virtually everyone has access to it, that it was notorious for being inexpensive and that I had a willing victim! Quinn is the real MVP of this story. After throwing a few places around, I ended on the least expensive hotel within 30 miles of downtown Seattle, a Motel 6!

Quinn arrived, fresh faced and nervous! This was our bride to be’s first boudoir experience and it was an experiment so totally understandable. We checked in, I got to chatting with the manager and she thought it was awesome that we were doing a photoshoot and we were off! I was on hair and makeup, and looking more disheveled than normal that day but Quinn was gorgeous!

We kept things simple, only allowing ourselves to use one lens, a single light, a reflector and 2 sheer white curtain panels. We could only shoot in the room and on the motel property and had to keep my editing to a minimum. By luck of the draw, we ended up with the one room where the window was blocked by the stairs, so light was a struggle. I decided not to ask to switch rooms and called it bonus points if we made it work; and make it work, we did! Quinn looks gorgeous!

We were fortunate and found a heavily rotted little foot bridge that connected the parking lot to a shopping center, that made for a great alternative location and gave more variety The biggest struggle was space and light. My 50mm lens (closest to the human eye) didn’t allow me to backup enough. If I were to make any suggestion to others who plan to do this, just ask that you aren’t under the stairs and bring a wider lens or a zoom. If this inspires you to give it a shot, tag your images #BunniBudgetBoudoir or tag us! I’d love to see what you come up with!

Check out my favorites from our Motel 6 Boudoir Experiment.