Nicola Rinaldo:
Gold Hour, Wild Field

Bare feet in the stubble, hay bales for a stage, and nothing between her and that endless blue but sunlight and nerve.

Nicola Rinaldo, atop the bales at golden hour

Some shoots happen on a soundstage. This one happened in the middle of nowhere, in the last good light of the day, in a field that had just been cut for harvest — and Nicola Rinaldo turned it into her own personal runway. No backdrop, no studio walls, just gold stubble underfoot, round bales scattered to the horizon, and a sky so clean and blue it looked painted on. She climbed, arched, and posed like the whole landscape had been built for her.

“There’s nothing to hide behind out here,” she said, hair loose and wind-blown, barefoot on top of a bale like it was the most natural place in the world to stand. “No walls, no ceiling, just sky. It makes you brave in a different way.”

The wardrobe matched the setting — a hand-embroidered, sheer floral bra set the color of the field itself, delicate enough to look like it grew there. The Cat House Meow team chased the light for hours, timing every setup around the sun as it dropped lower and turned everything the color of honey. Between takes, Nicola kept climbing back up onto the bales without being asked, chasing better angles, better light, better versions of the shot the crew had already loved.

“She wasn’t waiting for direction, she was hunting for it,” said one photographer on the team. “Half the strongest frames came from her just moving through the space instinctively — leaning into the bale, dropping to the ground, reaching for the sky. You just had to keep the shutter ready.”

Last light of the shoot, before the sun dropped below the tree line

What makes a Cat House Meow shoot a Cat House Meow shoot isn’t the location — it’s the reason everyone’s out there in the first place. Whether it’s a studio in the city or a stretch of harvested field two hours outside it, every frame is still doing the same job: funding the brand’s animal welfare and humanitarian mission. Nicola knew that going in, and it changed how she moved through the whole day.

“I want people to look at these and feel free,” she said, watching the sun finally slip behind the tree line. “And then I want them to know that feeling paid it forward.”

By the time the crew wrapped, the light was nearly gone and Nicola was still barefoot in the stubble, in no hurry to leave. That’s the kind of energy this brand chases — a kitten who finds the wildest possible setting and makes it look like exactly where she belongs.