Private estate weddings and coordinators?

jessiechia8703 · April 2012

Hi everyone!

I have been engaged for about 6 months but am just now starting to dive into wedding planning! My fiance and I would like to do a wedding in Maui at a private estate (of the ones we've found online our favorite is the Olowalu Plantation House - it's so beautiful with all the trees!). Any tips on how I get in touch with someone to answer questions about the location - like getting pictures of actual weddings that were held there, how many people it holds, pricing, etc? I tried emailing mauivenues.com but haven't gotten a response in over a week... so I was thinking there may be someone better to get in touch with to get more info on the site.

I also want to get a planner for the entire process - because I'm horrible with planning and need all the help I can get! I heard that the private estates assign a coordinator but after reading some of the Olowalu posts, it seems like everyone went with a different person! Any experienced brides married in Maui who know how much a full on planner costs (not just a day-of coordinator), and how you decided which planner/coordinator to go with?

I appreciate any advice you guys have.. I'm so new to this and I have no idea where to start!

lwilson712 · April 2012

I'm not sure about some of the other stuff, but if you want to see some pictures of weddings that have been held there- you can search through some of the Maui photographers blogs. Just a starting point, Anna Kim, Joanna Tano, Natalie Brown, etc.. all have pictures of weddings from Olowalu Plantation house that you can browse through by searching their blog. Hopefully the ladies can chime in on the rest.

dianalynm · April 2012

Everything you need to know about Olowalu is pretty much listed on their website. olowaluplantationhouse.com. If you contact Donna, the sitekeeper, she is extremely helpful and will answer any and all of your questions. Her contact info is listed on the website. Why not contact the venue directly, right?

You can pretty much choose your own wedding planner for Olowalu, just make sure they are familiar with the house rules.

We actually are on our 2nd planner because our first one was terrible. We originally started planning with Blue Sky Weddings, which I recommend you avoid. Our current planner is Cherise of The Perfect Wedding. The reason I went with her because many brides on the message board have worked/are working with her and I have heard nothing but great things about her! She has been fantastic so far, so I am glad with our decision to fire our first one and hire Cherise.

For photos, just do an image search on Google for "Olowalu weddings" and tons of photos come up! You can even search on sites like stylemepretty.com for Olowalu weddings as well.

Hope that helps!

dianalynm · April 2012

PS You will also find that you can put a hold for up to 30 days on a date at Olowalu w/o putting any deposit down. I say if you know your date, hold it now directly with Donna! Then take the time to interview several wedding planners and find one that suits you. Once you find the one, go ahead and book. They make the process so painless. And, if you decide to use a different venue for whatever reason, Olowalu has a refundable deposit policy if you cancel within a certain time.

One of the many reasons I like Olowalu! Besides the fact that it is absolutely gorgeous there!

jessj336 · April 2012

I just got married at Olowalu and used Lori Lawrence of Tropical Maui Weddings as my wedding coordinator. I highly recommend her as she does tons of weddings at Olowalu and she only charges a flat fee for the ceremony & reception and doesn't charge a commission for the vendors she books. You can also book vendors on your own as well.

As Diana said you can get all the Olowalu specific info on their website. We booked the venue through Donna about 2 months before we hired Lori.

Please let me know if you have any other Olowalu specific questions or questions about vendors.

jessiechia8703 · April 2012

Thank you guys so much for your input! I figured there was a website to get me directly there

And sorry for being such a newbie in the wedding planning world - but is there a difference from a coordinator and a planner? I'm looking for someone to help me with the entire process - who can give me options for food, table/chairs, hair/makeup, help with setup - the whole shebang! (not just the day of the wedding). Would that be a coordinator? Are you guys using Cherise and Lori for all the planning help or only on the day of your wedding?

Also Diana - when is your wedding?? After looking at some pictures, it looks like the dance floor at Olowalu is outside. Did you worry at all about the possibility of rain on your wedding day?

lindsayscottc · April 2012

Hey there. We're using Lori as well, for our wedding at Olowalu. She has definitely helped us with suggestions for vendors and such, so definitely more than a day-of coordinator.

Diana, that's interesting that your bad experience was with Blue Sky weddings... I contacted her before we did our planning trip to Maui in January, and pretty quickly nixed her - now I'm quite glad I did!

jessj336 · April 2012

Lori helped throughout the planning process...she is amazing!! I couldn't have done it without her honest opinions, suggestions and support.

twie3230 · April 2012

The dance floor at Olowalu is outside. It is actually a slab of concrete which you can choose to cover with a dance floor of your choosing cost and lookwise. The house is only used for getting ready and the for the caterers. There is a set of separate bathrooms next to the house for guests to use. We hired two clear topped tents (one for over the dance floor) to make sure our guests were covered in case it drizzled at all (thankfully, it didn't). If you want to see pictures you can check out Visionari's blog (our photographers).

Olowalu is such a beautiful wedding venue. Add to that whales breaching and the beautiful sunset and your guests will be amazed at the venue. Much different than a hall or restaurant.

We used Cherise from Perfect Weddings and she really did make everything perfect. She is worth every penny and then some (and she only charges a really affordable flat day of rate). We really had a bare bones idea of what we wanted and she was always there with really good suggestions to suit our budget and helped us along the way (for instance, the fabric that wraps around the tent poles if $50/pole rental, which we thought was crazy. So she recommended twinkle lights for way cheaper and we loved the way it looked at night). She reminded us of all the things we didn't think of when it comes to planing and any vendor she recommended was truly amazing. We didn't head out to Hawaii before the wedding, so all of our choices were made sight unseen, and we were not disappointed at all. She was also great at replacing any vendors that had to back out last minute without worrying us at all (for example, our fire dancer cancelled the day of and she got another one who was AMAZING and told us later).

Good luck with your choices. I'm sure you will get plenty of help by looking through all the reveiw posts here. It helped my planning immensely and the girls here are super nice.

Happy planning!

Private estate weddings and coordinators?

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