Sabrina & Ava

This originally ran as a Local Love in the 2025 issue.

Wedding Date May 25, 2024

Sabrina Regino had just checked out of a hotel in West Virginia after attending a friend’s wedding when she got a text message from Ava Julio, the pretty girl she had recently connected with on Hinge. Ava wanted to know if Sabrina could join her that day at Baltimore Pride—it would be their first time meeting in person. Sabrina “didn’t think twice about saying yes,” but there was one catch: She was a “disheveled mess”—dressed in a baggy T-shirt and cozy shorts for the four-hour ride home—and “there was no way I was going to meet this beautiful girl looking like this.”

She came up with a hasty plan. “Scatterbrained, I instantly ran back into the hotel with this whole story about how I misplaced my toiletry bag and begged the woman at the front desk to let me back up to the room,” says Sabrina, who works as a wedding photographer under the name Sabrina Leigh Photography. She took the quickest shower of her life with a bar of hand soap and dried off with the world’s smallest washcloth. Within five minutes, she had run back downstairs and sprinted to her car.

When Sabrina arrived at Ava’s apartment in Towson, she instantly spotted Ava waiting outside. “I saw this beautiful girl with cascading straight brown hair and the biggest smile standing on the sidewalk,” says Sabrina. “I will never forget the first time I laid eyes on Ava. If only we knew in that moment how many memories were ahead of us.”

Three months later they were engaged when Ava, who works in finance, surprised Sabrina with a ring. “We just knew we wanted to spend our lives together,” says Sabrina.

As a wedding photographer, she had attended her fair share of weddings and pretty much knew what she wanted when it was her turn. “I knew I wanted it simple in design, but incorporating personal elements was most important,” she says. That included hosting the wedding at Ava’s childhood home in Lutherville, using their kitten, Klaus, as the ring bearer, and having family members co-officiate the ceremony.

After a poolside cocktail hour, dancing under the twinkle lights, and a late-night cinnamon bun bar, the two knew they had succeeded in making sure the entire night felt like them. Says Sabrina, “Be grateful each and every day that you get to spend all your days with your favorite person by your side, unconditionally.”

BEAUTY Tasia Mitropoulos CAKE SugarBakers Cakes CATERER Zeffert and Gold FLORAL DESIGN Violet Florals HONEYMOON Maui, Hawaii INVITATIONS Zazzle LOCATION Private home, Lutherville MUSIC Jason Jani OFFICIANTS Frank Regino and Joseph Gambino PhotographER Madeline Serio VIDEOGRAPHER Justin Porter Media Wedding Dresses Garnish Boutique WEDDING PLANNER 1423 Events