Inside a Tucson Brand Session: How Lidda Design Got Photos as Luxurious as Their Work

If you have ever scrolled through a beautifully designed website and thought wow, everything about this business just looks so polished and intentional, chances are there was a brand session behind it. Not just headshots. Not just a quick photo of someone at a desk. A real, thought out brand session that captured the people, the process, and the personality behind the business.

That is exactly what I got to create for Lidda Design, a luxury interior design firm right here in Tucson. And honestly? It is one of my favorite sessions I have ever shot. Let me tell you why.

Meet Lidda Design

Lidda Durazo is the Director of Interior Design at Lidda Design, a Tucson firm that has spent 25 years creating luxurious residential and commercial spaces across Arizona and North America. Together with her husband Shawn Hunter, who handles custom residential and architectural design, they have built a business that has been featured in Architectural Digest and Tucson Lifestyle Magazine. Their work is stunning, their portfolio is jaw dropping, and their dedication to their clients is something I got to witness firsthand during this session in a way I absolutely did not expect.

Lidda offers architectural design, interior design, custom home building, and interior finishings. So when she reached out about photos, we had a lot of ground to cover and a beautiful space to work with.

Why Lidda Needed a Brand Session, Not Just Tucson Headshots

When Lidda first reached out, she described needing headshots, team photos, and just a few of us working. Sound familiar? This is one of the most common conversations I have as a Tucson headshot photographer. Someone comes to me thinking they need headshots and once we talk through where the photos are actually going, it becomes clear that what they need is a full brand session.

For Lidda, the photos were going on their website, social media, marketing materials, and given their magazine features, potentially in editorial contexts too. That is not a Tucson headshots job. That is a brand session job. And once we established that, the planning got really exciting.

What the Lidda Design Brand Session Actually Looked Like

Walking into the Lidda Design office for this Tucson brand session felt like stepping into one of their finished projects. Beautifully curated, intentional in every detail, and warm in a way that luxury spaces sometimes are not. I immediately knew this was going to photograph beautifully.

We covered a lot of ground. Individual headshots for Lidda and Shawn. Team photos that showed the two of them as the powerhouse duo they truly are. Meeting scenes. Moments with blueprints and 3D models. And detail shots of their office space, because in a business built around beautiful environments, the space itself tells part of the story.

And then the meeting scene happened. What started as a staged setup for photos slowly took on a life of its own. Lidda and Shawn got so deep into reviewing their plans that when they noticed something that needed attention, they just went for it. Suddenly I was not photographing a recreation of a meeting. I was photographing a real one. That kind of dedication, the fact that even in the middle of a photo session they could not help but show up fully for their work, is exactly the kind of thing a brand session is made to capture.

The Moment That Stopped Me in My Tracks

I have to tell you about this because it is the moment I keep coming back to when I think about this session.

We were shooting the blueprint scene with Shawn and I noticed he had a notepad sitting on the table that was completely blank. I asked him to jot something down so it did not look empty in the frame. Just write anything, I said. Scribble something. It does not matter.

Shawn picked up his pen and without pausing, without referencing anything, without even seeming to think about it, he drew a full cabin and house design. A complete architectural sketch. Just like that. Like most people doodle a flower or write their name when they are on a phone call, this man drew a house.

I stood there behind my camera genuinely in awe. That one moment told me more about Shawn Hunter and Lidda Design than any posed photo ever could. This is not just what he does for a living. This is just how his brain works. Architecture is not his job. It is his language.

And that right there is the magic of a brand session. You cannot plan that moment. You cannot pose it. You can only create the conditions for it to happen and then be ready when it does.

The $100 Bill on the Wall (Because of Course)

While I am sharing behind the scenes moments, I have to mention the framed $100 bill in Shawn’s office. I noticed it among several framed pieces on his wall and naturally I had to ask. Turns out they found it in the building when they first moved in and they suspect it might have blood on it. So they framed it.

I photographed it immediately. Because that $100 bill is personality. It is the kind of detail that makes you feel like you actually know the people behind a business. Sharp, accomplished, a little bit funny, and completely unafraid to let their quirks show up in their space. That is a brand. And that is what photos can do when they go beyond just a headshot.

What Lidda Design Walked Away With

By the end of the session we had a full library of images ready to work hard across every platform. Individual headshots for both Lidda and Shawn. Team portraits. Real and candid meeting moments. Blueprint and 3D model scenes. Office detail shots. And a handful of images that were completely unplanned and ended up being some of the most powerful in the whole gallery.

That is what a brand session gives you that Tucson headshots alone simply cannot. It gives your audience a reason to trust you before they ever pick up the phone. Tucson headshots are a great start, but a brand session takes it so much further. It shows them not just what you do but how you do it and who you are while you are doing it.

Is a Brand Session Right for Your Tucson Business?

If you are a small business owner, a creative professional, or a realtor here in Tucson who has been thinking you just need headshots, I want to invite you to have the same conversation I had with Lidda. Tell me what you do, where you are showing up, and what you want people to feel when they find you online. The answer to whether you need headshots or a brand session usually becomes pretty clear pretty quickly.

And if your answer sounds anything like headshots, but like I’m working? I know exactly what that means and I would love to show you what is possible. Reach out and let’s chat. I promise it will feel less like a business meeting and a lot more like hanging out with someone who is genuinely excited about what you are building.

You can see more of Lidda Design’s work at liddadesign.com. And if you are looking for a Tucson headshot photographer or brand session photographer who will actually show up and pay attention to the story your business is telling, I would love to be that person for you.

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