Sunny, owner and lead designer, made us a 5 tier, square, fondant-covered wedding cake for our Nov 7th wedding. She has at least a dozen difference flavors to select from but we went with two layers of our cake the carrot cake with cream cheese filling and the other two layers chocolate cake with chocolate Bavarian and hazelnut cream. Sooo good and moist! Had many guests tell me how good the cake was… compliments on both flavors! What happened to the other layer? We wanted the presentation of a “big” cake but only had 170 guests… so we had a fake layer… I think it was Styrofoam that she covered in fondant. The cake not only was delicious but the presentation was excellent. Sunny’s attention to detail and steady hand makes for some very beautiful and outstanding pieces of art! You get what you pay for. It is definitely nice when people see pictures of the wedding cake and go “Woooww…” Would definitely recommend and use again. Look at her website – you will love going through pictures of her previous pieces. Good luck!
We started our rental order in the Huntington Beach store for our Nov 7th wedding. Ashton Gadz was our consultant and she was a very nice girl and pleasant to work with. We asked a lot of questions and probably asked for more than most couples do but she always provided answers and help with a smile. The whole experience went smoothly – no complaints. We had a large rental order (10 tuxes and 1 suit) and everyone got their tux , on time, as expected. No last minute run to Friar Tux for resizing or the likes. We looked at Men’s Warehouse as well… compared the offers and crunched out the numbers. Friar Tux was more reasonable and had the cheaper price. Friar Tux was pretty up-front and didn’t hide costs and fees in the fine print… Men’s Warehouse had these surprises though. Would recommend Friar Tux and use them again! Good luck!
My bridal gown vendor finalists were Alfred Angelo (in Huntington Beach) and Mariposa Boutique (in Orange). Very hard decision!! Ended up choosing the bridal gown from Alfred Angelo. If you are cost-conscious Alfred Angelo is for you. They frequently have sales and if you sign up for their mailing lists, you get additional discounts. I bought my beautiful dress during one of these sales and it was almost $300 off! I had some ritzy, “fashionista” friends and family tell me how expensive my dress looked on top of how beautiful it looked during my wedding day… little did they know that the dress itself cost less than $1000.
Ok so you can get dresses at a great price here… but alterations are almost inevitable and definitely pricey here. I had to choose between just getting the dress at Alfred Angelo and then bringing it somewhere else for alterations (hemming up, taking in the sides, adding bustles) for less or bite the bullet and just get the alterations done at Alfred Angelos. I ended up biting the bullet and going with Alfred Angelos for two main reasons- at this point I was very tired of spending all that time and effort looking into vendors, prices, reviews… looking for a good, affordable seamstress was going to take a lot of work. Second point was, even if I found a good, affordable seamstress, how many times has she worked on that particular Alfred Angelo dress ? Probably not as many times as the Alfred Angelo seamstress. I wanted to get my dress altered by someone who was already familiar with this dress… Turns out that Mary, the Alfred Angelo seamstress, was very very sweet, knowledgeable, and accommodating. Again, she was not cheap ($185 for hemming up the bridal gown, $130 for taking in both sides of the gown, $60 for making 3 bustles) but you get what you pay for and if we were not satisfied, she would keep working it until we were.
Brides, do not lose track that although the Wedding Day is the special, big day, all the time and effort preparing for the Wedding Day goes into the whole experience also. Ideally, you have a spectacular beautiful Wedding Day where everything goes perfectly AND all the work with vendor selection and associated wedding preparation is a pleasant, enriching experience. Overall , I give them a 5 star rating. Although alterations costs are pricey, if you are patient, you are able to get sale discount prices on the bridal gown. I think most bridal gown salons do not offer sales on “normal” gowns to begin with and alteration costs are likely similar to Alfred Angelo’s. Most the dress consultants were nice and helpful during the dress fitting and shopping stages.
We also got the 6 bridesmaids dresses here. We were able to get a discount via coupon on their dresses also. We ended up getting these dresses altered at the seamstress of the bridesmaids’ choice- do not feel compelled to get bridesmaids dress alterations at Alfred Angelos- not as crucial as the bridal gown alterations.
I found out about Candi (owner and lead designer of Crowning Glory Designs) through a co-worker who got her veil from Candi. My co-worker found out about Candi through researching online forums such as project wedding and yelp. I don’t think she has a website but she is all over online review forums ( try www.yelp.com/biz/crowning-glory-designs-brea for starters)
The trend is obvious – everyone was in shock and disbelieve that very beautiful, custom-made veils could be so cheap… especially when bridal salons charge hundreds of dollars for a veil. Believe it or not – I only spent $50 bucks on my absolutely gorgeous, beautiful, single tier, finger-tip length, cascade-cut, flat ivory satin trim, ivory veil. When I scheduled an appointment to visit Candi to see her collection and get quotes, her wall was full of thank you notes and pictures of her satisfied brides. She works from her home in Brea and has dozens of sample veils and edgings and lace and so on to show you what she has done and what she can do. So glad my friend told me about Candi – I had so many people tell me they loved my veil during my wedding day and still do when people see the wedding pictures. I can understand if you are still skeptical (I was too)… but at least let this review be enough reason for you to set an appointment with her to see what she has to offer, get quotes, and see and touch the veils yourself. If you are really looking for ways to skim down the wedding costs, this is a place where you can skim down without affecting the quality. Good luck!
I got my wedding invitations from the place I least expected to get them – Party City (at Tustin Market Place in Tustin)! I am not sure how I discovered they did invitations but sure glad we got them here. I don’t like how some vendors are pushy and pressure you to buy. Working with DeAnna was very pleasant, comfortable, and stress free. She had lots of good advice and insight to add regarding style and etiquette. They had plenty plenty selection… dozens of books with real samples to look at and touch. Very satisfied with the one we ended up selecting – very classical, traditional and classy! Our wedding color was a crimson red and they had a claret red (for the text) that was perfect for us! They also had claret red inner-lined envelopes to match. Final cost with tax was $500 – this included 100 invitations w/ color text, red lined inner envelopes, outer mailing envelopes w/ pre filled in return address, RSVP cards and envelopes, thank you cards and envelopes, insert cards with our wedding website address and related details, and shipping. Would recommend to others and use again! Good luck!
Wedding window provides you with many templates to work with and generally user friendly. If you are not familiar with computers and applications in general it will obviously take longer to create a super cool, useful site. Many people complimented our wedding website layout and how it was a great way to get to know the bride and groom, their “story”, bridal party members, Wedding day details and plans, etc. Other cool things we did: uploaded mp3s that would play in the background as people browsed the site, guestbook for friends and family to drop a line and give their warm wishes, reception music requests, link to shutterfly where we posted our engagement photos, wedding day photos and honeymoon photos, link to gift registries. I believe we paid $100 (or was it $80, sorry) - for 1 year of website hosting (this allows your wedding website to be viewable on the world wide web). I do not remember if this price includes the CD of our website pages so we would always be able to look at our “site” after the 1 year is up. But this vendor does for sure offer the CD with your website pages – major plus. All in all I remember the prices to be reasonable. If you are doing a wedding website – must check weddingwindow.com out! If you are not sure you want to do a wedding website – you really should. You reap what you sow and you get what you put in. Good luck!
Our wedding was on Nov 7th this year. Paid $1250 in total… got a free projector rental throw in for being the first to book that day. I had to decide between Cheesy and Four Clicks. In the end, the need for a projector (for our reception slide show), cheaper price, and lighting used in their photobooth were the tipping points for Cheesy. If you are considering using a photobooth, make sure to request the free picture samples (Cheesy and 4 Clicks will). Also, if you are trying to decide which photobooth vendor to go with you definitely want a CD with all the pictures (Cheesy provided to me for free) and double prints per photo session. The double prints allow the person/group to keep one copy and provide you the couple the other copy for your picture/ guest / scrapbook! Cheesy also provides paper, stickers, markers and all the necessaries for the guests to put together a nice page for you to go into the book. And if you ask… they can throw in FREE use of photo props! Like feather boas, big big glasses, old gangster hats, mustaches, big scissors, and many more. Working with them (in the preparation months and on the wedding day) was easy and would recommend them to friends. Satisfied customer – would use again!
If you are deciding if you want to spend the money for a photobooth, let me tell you that I have read many reviews (i.e. yelp.com) and know many other couples who used one during their reception… none of them regretted it and all their guests loved the photobooth! I read reviews about grooms questioning the expense for a photobooth and my own husband did also… the brides went on to describe that after the wedding their husbands thanked their wives afterwards for coming up with the photobooth idea and for standing by it and following it through- same outcome with my husband! It really comes down to if you can spend the money for this “add on” – there are already many successful reasons to justify why you would spend the money. Good luck!
DJ Geo provided music, master of ceremony and up-lighting service for our wedding on November 7th. For our cocktail hour (1 hr) and reception (4 hrs) he charged $850 – the best price of several vendors I researched! Overall a very pleasant experience working with Geo to prepare for our big day and on the day of. We had 2-3 meetings before the wedding to determine reception program style and details, song/ music selections, and the sorts. He was responsive to emails and phone calls. Note: Geo lives in Fontana and we live in Irvine… we’d pick some central area to meet to have these meetings (i.e. Yorba Linda). Perhaps the distance would deter some couples, but sure glad it did not deter us because it was not much of an inconvenience ,really.
On the day of, he got to the reception venue a few hours earlier to prepare and set up. When we got there the up-lighting fixtures were all set up and the room looked spectacular! He knew exactly where to put the lights to not over or under do the lighting. Geo is very energetic and smooth and funny – made for a perfect Master of Ceremonies. Our guests were very amped from the open bar during cocktail hour and Geo made sure to keep and did keep that energy going all night long. He did a great job with both the cocktail hour and reception music and knowing how to read the crowd to keep that dance floor packed. I had several guests come up to me throughout the night telling me how the dance floor looked and felt like a club! Only reason why the rating is not a 5 is because Geo accidently switched the Mother /Son and Father /Daughter songs . Fortunately the day and night was going so well and beautifully that it didn’t bother me much. For other brides that could have been a big stink. Overall, Geo came prepared, Geo performed as advertised and as expected, and did what he could to keep the customer satisfied. No technical or equipment hiccups (thank goodness!). Would definitely recommend and would use his services again. Good luck !