I'm a designer, so I'm a bit of a sticker when it comes to invitations & websites matching, but I didn't have the budget to front for some of our other options. Wix.com is a free site that allows you to alter your own web templates. Our wedding website and our invitations coordinated really well with the effort that I put into it, but if you're not up for the effort, it might be smarter to find a matching set (site + invites) that's pre-made.
Maury Collections worked directly with my wedding coordinator to do the decorations for our wedding. I had little contact with them, but was happy with the pillars, chair covers and table they provided. At the end of the day we ended up paying for more than enough (we contracted for 200 chair covers, but only used 120, so we overpaid in advance for 80 chair covers, but part of that was due to the timeline we were working on.)
We loved that you can register for ANYTHING on this website. My husband and I are musicians - so some of the stuff we need you can't register for at Bed, Bath & Beyond. The registry even includes a little space where you can note what you'll use it for/how much you need each item and provides you a "thank you" list with who ordered what for you and their address. This site was perfect for us!
Geoff did sound for our wedding (we needed it as we were on the coast, it was windy, and without it, no one would have been able to hear our wedding). We found the amplification very helpful - and he was easy to work with. He's also in connection with my wedding planner (Patty Shelton), so it was easy to get in touch with him and contract him for the job.
I got my hair and makeup done at Sapphire Spa for my wedding, and was delighted to find out that it was downstairs from The Pearl hotel. This made for a very hassle and stress free day. I did trial runs at Dillard's makeup counter & Visible changes in my local mall, so I went in with pictures of what I wanted. The atmosphere gets five out of five stars - the music was really relaxing on the day of and exactly what I needed. The staff was lovely - I had made an appointment for my sister but they didn't write it down. One of the girls, knowing it was my wedding day, dropped everything she was doing to accommodate her - and when my sister wasn't happy with her first look, completely took it down, washed her hair and started over without any issues. My makeup was airbrush - which did last all day long (I got my makeup done at noon and didn't have my wedding until 5). My hair was gorgeous - not exactly what I showed in the picture, but close. However, it wasn't secured as tightly as it should have been, so a few bits and pieces did fall down a bit throughout the night. Overall, my appointment was three hours long - I enjoyed all of it, found it to be very relaxing on the day. The price was about what I found in the mall - and the makeup was cheaper than it was in my hometown. Overall, I was very happy - the one thing I would have improved would have been that my hair would have stayed up a bit longer. (Could have been solved with a few bobby pins and a few extra moments on my behalf.)
I searched on pinterest & google for what I wanted for my wedding, and shared photos with my wedding planner & Bridgeview. Patty Shelton (my wedding coordinator) and Bridgeview Floral worked together to make some stunning bouquets. I told that that feathers were a big deal at our wedding, showed them some picture of some arrangements that included feathers & succulents, shared my color palette and turned them loose - I had no idea what I was going to get on my wedding day, because there wasn't time to do trial runs. Patty went to get feathers and delivered them to the florist, and Bridgeview's creative talent was so appreciated on the day. I am in love with the maids bouquets & grooms boutonnieres.
I designed my own wedding invitations and uploaded the design to this website - we printed long invitations (a 4 x 8 postcard back and front to save on postage, printed two sets of return address labels, and got envelopes). I've used them often for projects that I've produced, so I knew that as long as I could make sure the jpegs/pdf's were high enough resolution, I could trust their color matching and prints. Managed to do it in a season of intense discounts, (look to see if there are any online promo codes) so we got them about half off. Shipping was quick, and we were pretty happy with the results. I ended up printing inserts with kinko's and was actually much happier with the results from vistaprint.
Total glory came out of a crisis here. I'm a fuss-free bride, so I was happy to have cupcakes as dessert for my wedding. Two weeks before the big day, the father of the bride decided that he would like to have input on dessert and he wanted a wedding cake (no cupcakes). He was the one fronting my budget and had made no other requests, so I decided to honor him and let him have some input. I spent a little time surfing the web and pinterest, called two cake places (a little nervously since this was a destination wedding. Most brides seem to at least get to taste their cakes beforehand), and found Gloria's. I got a very simple roughly iced turqouise cake that faded into white. It was strawberry on the inside with buttercream icing. My groom got a carrot cake with buttercream icing and a very simple design. I am SO HAPPY with them! The cakes came out phenomenal - they were cost-effective, beautiful, tasty cakes. The staff was friendly, responsive, and followed every detail to a T. They also worked VERY quickly (who orders a wedding cake the WEEK before your wedding?) They delivered the cake and charged me no deposit, though I did have to fedex them a check over the weekend to get the process rolling. Going with Gloria's was one of the BEST wedding decisions that I made.
Dear brides on a budget: Target is now carrying a bridesmaid line called Tevolio. It's only available online, but bridesmaid dresses all come in the same color, multiple cuts for CHEAP. Warning: The sizes run pretty small - so you may want to order about two sizes larger than you normally wear. Don't stress the zippers too much - because from what I read of other reviews, the zippers do break. Save yourself some headache by purchasing two dresses in two sizes. Shipping is pretty quick. All of my maids wore a dress from the target Tevolio line. They all matched (the color was consistent), everybody got to choose their own style, many of my maids got their dress for $50 (we bought right as a season was ending) and they looked AWESOME.
Patty is an amazing option as a wedding coordinator, especially if you're a bride on a budget. She was so helpful and very cost-effective. My timeline and wedding planning was a bit crazy: We had five months to plan. I had a specific budget. My groom and I were in separate countries at the time of our engagement, and the time zone I was in required me to wedding plan in the middle of the night. I was in a massive job and life transition that required me to move back home and change jobs. I had never planned an event of this scale before. I hadn't spent much time dreaming of what our wedding could be like, so I really needed help. There were so many options out there.
I contacted Patty at the outset and she was more than ready to work with me. I waded around quite a bit through ideas on my own, changed my mind several times, and then finally caught a vision of what I was going for late in the process. She was very responsive and supported that vision once I had it. She suggested several options for direction/theme, sent me several bids, recommended a sound guy, venues, managed my floral arrangements and was on-site on the wedding day. She had no hidden fees and had no issues with me talking directly with vendors. She did her job with patience, thoroughness, and a lot of joy, taking extra trips to the store to find things to put in my bouquet beforehand, ran to the store on the day to pick up some extra supplies, and was a good contact person to have on the day for people with questions.
Ultimately, she handled: My venues, wedding decorations including flowers, chair covers and pillars, sound guy, and wedding coordination on the day. I brought my own wedding photographer and officiant, but she also had recommendations for those. She also suggested the cake person that I used for my reception.
The best way to work with her: Remember that you're the bride. She's a partner in the process. This will work best if you take the responsibility to do some questioning and digging (ask Patty, look for local brides (http://weddingmapper.com), look on pinterest for theme ideas, walk around the city on google), make up your mind, cast the vision for her, and then ask for her help in making that happen.