Rain-Soaked Romance: Waterfront Couples Session La Crosse
If you're planning a waterfront couples session in La Crosse, the best moments don't always cooperate with the forecast — and Dr. Schumacher and Tina's evening in downtown La Crosse is proof that rain doesn't ruin a session. It just changes it.
Dr. Schumacher and Tina are La Crosse fixtures. I crossed paths with Dr. Schumacher years ago in the ER. They've built two businesses anyone who spends time in this city knows well: Javavino, the wine bar and restaurant that's become a downtown institution, and Relevate Ketafusion, their ketamine wellness clinic that's quietly changing lives.
Their session was part of our Photos with Friends series — a tradition we started to honor a dear friend who faced an unexpected health battle, when the celebration we'd planned had to be reimagined. We decided then that some moments don't wait for perfect circumstances. You make them anyway.
Where Are the Best Locations for Couples Portraits in Downtown La Crosse?
We started near Sagra on the south end of downtown and worked our way north toward Love Child Restaurant — brick facades, side streets, the kind of late-evening light that makes flash photography look like cinema. La Crosse's downtown corridor gives you architecture, texture, and depth in a three-block radius. It's one of the most underused portrait locations in the area.
Then it started to rain. We ducked into a nearby parking garage and kept shooting. The concrete, the artificial light, the rain just outside the frame — it created something we couldn't have planned. Some of the strongest images from this session came from that parking garage. Dr. Schumacher and Tina barely flinched. That's what happens when two people are genuinely comfortable with each other and with being seen.
What Is the Photos with Friends Series?
Photos with Friends is an ongoing series where a small group of friends or colleagues are photographed together and gather for dinner afterward. We started it as a way to celebrate our friend, Dr. Christina Wika, who was diagnosed with leukemia just before her wedding — a way to keep her memory alive and to honor the people who matter most. If you'd like to be part of a future gathering, reach out here.
The series has grown to include clients, past leads, and people I've simply wanted to spend time with — in Onalaska, downtown La Crosse, and beyond. Dr. Schumacher and Tina were a natural fit: two people who've built something real, who show up for their community, who didn't need a reason to be photographed together, just an invitation.
Some moments don't wait for perfect circumstances. You make them anyway.
Flash photography is the technical backbone of every session we shoot. It gives us cinematic, controllable light that holds up in a parking garage at dusk just as well as it does on a riverfront at golden hour. No chasing the sun. No compromising because the sky didn't cooperate.
Howard & Tina — Downtown La Crosse
Fifteen frames from a session that started as a plan and became something better. Brick and rain and concrete and two people who've been building a life together long enough that the camera catches what's already there.
What happens next
Every session follows the same simple path — planned with you from the first call to the wall.
Reserve your date
The $300 session fee reserves your date, covers your planning call, the session and your theater reveal — and applies in full toward your artwork; most clients invest $1,500 or more.
Plan it together
A FaceTime planning call before your session — locations, outfits, and what matters most to the two of you, planned together.
Your theater reveal
Two weeks later, you’ll see your portraits presented large for the first time — and we design your wall art and albums together.
One conversation. No pressure. We'll tell you honestly if we're the right fit.
A marriage worth seeing every morning
The portrait you walk past at the start of every day isn't decoration — it's a reminder of the two of you on a specific evening, in a place that meant something, looking the way you actually look together.
An album holds the whole session: the candid ones, the ones you didn't expect to love, the quiet moment between poses that turned out to be the truest one. Something real, printed and bound, built to last longer than any phone.
See the ArtworkFrequently asked questions
Can't find what you're looking for? We're always happy to talk it through before you book.
Book a planning call →01Where are the best locations for couples portraits in downtown La Crosse, Wisconsin?+
Downtown La Crosse offers some of the most versatile portrait locations in the region. The stretch between Sagra and Love Child Restaurant provides brick architecture, side streets, and waterfront access within a three-block radius. Covered spaces like parking garages and building alcoves allow sessions to continue regardless of weather — and often produce the most unexpected images of the day. Downtown La Crosse is one of the most photogenic corridors in the Coulee Region.
02What is J.L. Wiswell Photography's Photos with Friends series?+
Photos with Friends is an ongoing series where a small group of friends or colleagues are photographed together and gather for dinner afterward. The series began as a way to honor meaningful relationships — specifically to celebrate our friend Dr. Christina Wika, who was diagnosed with leukemia just before her wedding. We've carried that tradition forward ever since, hosting gatherings in La Crosse, Onalaska, and beyond.
03Who are Dr. Schumacher and Tina?+
Dr. Schumacher and Tina are La Crosse business owners and community members. Dr. Schumacher and I worked alongside each other in the ER for several years. They own Javavino, a wine bar and restaurant in downtown La Crosse, and Relevate Ketafusion, a ketamine wellness clinic serving the La Crosse area.
04How much does a couples portrait session cost in La Crosse, WI?+
The $300 session fee reserves your date, covers your planning call, the session and your theater reveal — and applies in full toward your artwork; most clients invest $1,500 or more. We serve couples throughout La Crosse, Onalaska, and the surrounding area, and we travel for the right session.
Jeff & Alisha Wiswell
We're Jeff and Alisha. We met saving a critical patient in the ICU—and we bring that same presence and precision to every portrait session. Two people, one vision: to photograph you the way we actually live—honest, intentional, fully present.
You show up as yourself, and we handle everything else — Jeff directing and shaping the light, Alisha guiding every pose and keeping you at ease. The portraits you'll treasure aren't the perfectly arranged ones. They're the honest ones, and drawing those out is the whole job.
