Hi ladies! I'm back and, after a really long engagement, finally married! There was lots of drama leading up to and the morning of the wedding, but by mid-afternoon I managed to put out all the fires and we had an amazing weekend.
I need to note the fact that since I live in Houston but got married in Austin, some vendors come from Houston. Therefore, they are not included in this list of reviews. If you'd like to see the Houston vendor reviews, please visit the Houston local board.
If anybody has any questions, please feel free to page me on the December '10 board or PM me.
Cake: Blue Note Bakery (A)
We ordered the groom's cake and main bridal cake through them. When we went for the tasting, I was floored by how awesome everything was. I met with a ton of bakeries, and they are hands-down the best. We picked some flavors that we really liked, and just sort of hoped everybody else would too. The chocolate mint went over really, really well and the chocolate and peanut butter did as well, but the lemon cake was a little dry. It wasn't anything major, but in my opinion we paid way too much money for dry cake. Fortunately, it was just one of the flavors so it wasn't that bad. H ordered a 3D groom's cake though, and they executed that almost perfectly.
Paper product design: Go Against the Grain on Etsy (A+)
Laurel is amazing. I told her what our theme and colors were, and she ran with it. What she gave me back was absolutely perfect... my guests loved the invitations. We liked her so much we sent her our programs to do, and those were beautiful as well.
There were a few mistakes, but Laurel always fixed them willingly and in a timely fashion. The absolute perfection of the final product and a reasonable price is exactly why Laurel earned her A+.
Invitation printing: Paper Place (A-)
Once we got the invitation design from Laurel, we went ahead and sent our stuff over to Paper Place because we had such a large order of invitations (we printed the programs at home). They were seriously expensive, but I loved them. Molly was easy to work with, but my only complaint with them is that she didn't tell me she had completed my order, and she ran my credit card without calling me and letting me know she was going to do that. I personally think that you should call and tell a person before you just run their card. I asked her to call before she ran it, she said she would, then she didn't.
Transportation: Longhorn Limos (A+)
They were amazing. They were reasonably priced, showed up early, and got everybody where they needed to go. The driver was very patient when my mom said she needed him to wait because she needed to follow the limo.
DJ: Byrne Rock (A+)
I told Byrne in advance that I wasn't expecting that many people to dance, and then I was seriously surprised when almost everybody at some point hit the dance floor. If you don't give him a ton of must-play songs and let him do his job, he will get people up dancing. He played songs I hadn't heard in a long time, and loved every minute of it.
He gets an A+ because he seriously exceeded my expectations. In addition to the dancing, we asked him to bring his karaoke equipment just in case somebody wanted to sing (we actually have a fairly talented guest list). He brought it for an additional fee, but then he didn't have a book that listed out the song selections and the songs he did have were fairly old, and he didn't have anything from recent years. Some people still sang, but eh, it wasn't really worth it. Oh well.
Videography: Heather Olson (A+ changed to F- if you can even have an F-)
I really wanted a videographer, but I wasn't really willing to pay a whole lot for one. So, Heather was perfect for this. Her prices were amazing, and if you want to book her, I suggest doing so now because her prices will continue to go up. Anyway, we loved her. She was all over the place, but we didn't notice her. I can't wait to see a rough cut!! Update: Please see tread titled My Experience With Heather Olson for updated information about this vendor.
Ceremony venue: St. Thomas More Catholic Church (A++)
I'm not a fan of giving tons of plusses for vendor reviews, but they 100% deserve it. They have been nothing but totally amazing. Terry (the event coordinator) was extremely patient as we planned from afar, and let us do a Friday afternoon rehearsal, which was only a few hours before the ceremony. She ran it like a pro, got us in and out of there, and it went really well. Ren, the music person, did a fabulous job of getting us an organist at kind of the last minute, arranging a piece of music for me to walk down the aisle to, and he was fairly lenient with some secular music as long it was still appropriate for a church setting. Terry did a phenomenal job of getting everything started on time, and we started exactly on time which was important to me. I cannot say anything except positive things about this church, and will never forget their kindness.
Reception venue: The Hilton Downtown Austin (B-)
Parts of working with this venue were awesome, parts were awful, and I think overall it averages out to a B-. When we first met with Elizabeth, we were very excited to work with her. She definitely seemed to have it pulled together, was organized, and we loved the venue. Then, as we progressed into wedding planning, that seemed to not be the case. She forgot things that she even told us, and we constantly had to refer back to emails she sent us with things, repeat things we had already talked about, etc. We had a phone call that got a whole bunch of issues sorted out, but then she would totally forget what was discussed the next time I talked to her, or when she would email me a run-down of the conversation. I just hate repeating myself, and found this to be a recurring event that drove me crazy. She is just inconsistent, and it finally drove me crazy after months of dealing with it. If you want to book with them, I would do it again I think but just know going into it that you have to be seriously specific about what you want, and keep each and every email, and read every line of everything in event orders, contracts, etc.
Some of the Hilton prices for things were insane as well. For example, to set up a screen to do a slideshow required talking to the AV department. They tried to charge us something like $400 an hour for just a projector. I think that is seriously outrageous, and as a result opted out of having anything to do with the AV department (no uplighting or pin lights, no screen for pictures, nothing).
But, when I asked for a Christmas tree to hang our ornament escort cards on, they provided it without a problem. When our linens fell through, they provided them (but they were in our contract anyway). They set everything out, and cleaned everything up, so that made me happy.
The reception looked great though, but I have to say the words "send it to our room" are not ones the catering staff seems to understand. We were told we would have a plate of our hors d'oeuvres from the cocktail hour, some of our cake, our gifts, and a whole bunch of other stuff sent to our room. We ended up having to track down our gifts and the other missing items, so that was obnoxious. Minor, but obnoxious.
Bridesmaid dresses: Alfred Angelo (A)
I had the girls pick out their own dresses, but gave them a color and length, from AA. The girls all had a fairly good experience with them, but apparently alterations gave them issues.
Guest hotel blocks: Hilton Downtown (B) and Hilton Garden Inn Downtown (A)
The Hilton's policies on guest booking were ridiculous. The booking deadline was a full month before the event, and they have an 80% rule. For example, if we blocked off 10 rooms, and on Nov. 17th only 5 rooms were booked, we were responsible for paying for another 3 rooms in full (to achieve 80%). I hate the 80% rule to begin with, but then to have the deadline a month before the event? This was almost unacceptable enough to get me to not book there, but I did book a few rooms because I knew our families would want to stay there.
The Garden Inn was booked because it was less than a block away, and easy to walk to. They didn't have any ridiculous booking polices, so we booked the majority of our rooms there. The only issue with them was the cost of parking, but that wasn't a huge deal.
Florist: Just in Blooms (A)
Nestecha did a great job on the flowers, and was the most reasonably priced florist we found. My only small issue was that we were supposed to borrow vases, but that fell through and so we ended up having to rent vases from her at the last second. So, that was rough having to deal with that the morning of the wedding due to some of her policies, but everything looked great otherwise. There was also a question of insurance between her and the Hilton, so if you book with her collect her insurance information up front and make sure it's ok with your venue.
Hair and make-up: Keep Austin Gorgeous (A+)
The team over at KAG is incredible. They transformed myself, my mom, and my wedding party into something more beautiful than I could have ever imagined. They were totally sweet about my running 30 minutes late due to traffic being uncharacteristically bad in the middle of the day, but they got everybody in. They are expensive, but they were amazing and actually one of the few vendors that I can honestly say was worth each and every single penny. They travel, but their shop is so much fun that we just went there. My mom put out tons of food, so people sat and chatted and ate between hair and make-up. I totally recommend them for any event where you need to look your absolute best.
Tuxes: Al's (A+)
The guys got their tuxes through Al's, and as far as I know, nobody had any problems with them.
Thank you guys for all the planning advice, pointers, tips, etc. over the last few years. You all made the planning so much easier, and I truly valued the vendor reviews of past brides so I wanted to go ahead and post mine.