Cute as a button

Sometime late last year, Michelle, a recent bride, submitted her photos to the Wedding Enthusiast.

If I could just pinch those adorable buttons on my computer screen, I would.

Here's a little something that Michelle sent me about planning her wedding:

Ricardo & I met when we attended the same high school, but it wasn't until 9 years after that we began to get to know each other better. One year into our relationship, I found a job in Australia and had to leave the Philippines for work. 2 weeks before I left, he gave me a promise ring. We were in constant communication despite our physical distance. He also had to leave the Philippines for Taiwan in 2010, where he got a 2-year scholarship.

Wedding planning officially started early 2011. At that time, we were still planning for a 2013 wedding. A few weeks after, we decided to move the wedding date a year earlier. We planned the wedding from overseas, with the help of our family and close friends.

The first supplier we booked was our videographer, Kris Matanguihan. When we saw one of his works, we were immediately sold. At that time, he only had a few videos uploaded, and we watched each and every one of them. He creates SDEs with beautiful stories. We never looked at other people's works from there, we booked him right away.

Our photographer, Black Tie Project, was chosen by my then-fiance. What made us go for them was the "drama" behind their work. Another deciding factor for Ricardo was the "depth of field" as he calls it, which I do not even know how to define.

What we liked about My Photato's work was how they work with available and natural light. Their works are very different from our main photographer's style, and booking them enabled us to have 2 sets of photos with different "feel".

For our reception, it was Ricardo who wanted to have it indoors. Having worked in a hotel years ago, he wanted a place which feels like a hotel function room, sans the high cost. We chanced upon photos of the Philippine Stock Exchange Auditorium, and liked what we saw. The chandeliers gave the auditorium the vibe that we both wanted.

After booking our reception venue, we started church-hunting. Santuario de San Jose was a perfect choice as it wasn’t only close to our venue, but it is also inside a private subdivision, so we knew that traffic noise wouldn’t interrupt our celebration. The altar is a sight to behold, as well as the stained glass door. Apart from that, the church has glass doors and windows on the side, allowing for natural light.

We booked our caterer, K by Cunanan, based initially on their styling. Good thing their food didn’t disappoint. My mom is very hard to please when it comes to food, thus we made sure she was with us during our food-tasting, and she had a say on what to select from the menu. This is one of the things we splurged on as we wanted to offer our guests something they would enjoy and rave about. We believe we achieved those two things.

The other suppliers we booked were chosen based on different things – customer service (we needed someone who does not make us wait for a month before replying, as we were both based overseas during the time of planning), sample of previous works, location (should we need to drop by their office) and rates.

We weren’t very particular with the flowers for our entourage as well, so we booked Amaranthus Florist whose rates are not only competitive, but were able to adjust to our budget. The sample photos of their drapes set-up also impressed us.

Wingdingz Invitations was willing to print our DIY invites, we only had to adjust to their size specifications. When doing our research, we learned that they have a 7-day turn-around of orders. True enough, we were able to get our printed invites less than 7 working days. Their office was located in a very convenient place, not to mention close to where we live.

For our coordinators, we chose the team who we were able to connect with the most. When we met the head of Events Malditas, we felt the connection right away and we knew from the start that they will make our dream wedding come true. It was important for us to be able to communicate well with our coordinators, and that was just what we had with them since day one.

We’ve tasted several cakes, some too tough, others too crumbly. Not the case with Hearts and Bells’ cakes – theirs were moist and tastes just right, not too sweet nor too bland. Just like with our caterer, we asked the opinion of our moms: they liked both of the flavors that we had during our cake tasting, and so we had our wedding cake in 2 flavors.

Photographer: Black Tie Project/My Photato
Caterer: K by Cunanan
Gown: Ava Bridal
Suit: Onesimus
Florist: Amaranthus
Cake: Hearts & Bells
Invitations: Wingdingz