The Matador

Redmond, Washington

Okay so when Erica first reached out about photographing the Matador, I was nervous. Not because of the job itself, but because she wanted to hop on a phone call and I will be honest with you, phone calls still make me a little sweaty. I say whatever is on my mind in the moment, which is sometimes completely unrelated to the actual topic of the call, and I never really know how it's going to go.

But then we met in person at an engagement party I was photographing (I was still doing some wedding adjacent stuff at the time, no regrets, it was a great party) and I watched us both get a little tipsy on pink wine and thought, okay, we're going to be fine. We can be friends.

Reader, we drank margaritas during the shoot.

The Matador is exactly the kind of restaurant that's fun to photograph because it already knows what it is. Dark, moody, energetic, unapologetically bold. Tequila forward menu, sizzling fajitas, habanero enchiladas, nachos stacked genuinely high. The kind of food that comes out of the kitchen with a little attitude. The low light interiors are a photographer's dream as long as you're not precious about perfection, which I'm not.

The Redmond location was a great shoot and Erica was a great client and I will probably always associate the Matador with pink wine and margaritas and the specific relief of realizing a phone call you were nervous about was going to turn out just fine. We send each other voice messages now, so I think it's safe to say we're actually friends. Networking is weird and I forget I’m an actual adult that owns a business more often than not, but sometimes it all works out really well.

xoxo Chelsea