Hey Ladies! We had a destination wedding in New Orleans on 10/30/10 (we're from NY). Everything turned out exactly how we imagined it to be! We had awesome weather. Everything was just perfect! I'm not going to list the dress stores I used in NY since that won't help you ladies. I did all of our planning via phone, email, online & recommendations from this board on The Knot. I can't tell you how helpful the ladies on here were! Being from NY, I'm used to the attitude of everyone out for themselves. The warmth and hospitality I got from EVERYONE in New Orleans made this planning so much easier. We always loved NOLA & was very special to us, it just grew even more after our week there. Oh, and NOLA just made about 60 new friends that we brought down - and they all want to come back next year!
Room Block - A+ Chateau Bourbon Staff was really nice & helpful, got a great rate for such a busy weekend (Halloween, Voodoo Fest, Saints home game), rooms were really big, almost all of us had balconies or doors to courtyards
Hair/Make-up - A++ Two Sisters Hair & Make-up Okay, I can't say enough how much we all loved Stephanie & Gina. They did such a great job on everyone's hair & make-up. They were also just so sweet and enjoyable to have around. I felt like we had two girlfriend in the room with us getting ready. They were such a welcome in all the chaos of so many people getting ready in 1 room. Our best man's wife had gotten her hair done elsewhere and didn't like it. She came in & they could tell she didn't like it and offered to fix it for free! Our hair & make-up lasted well into the night and still looked great. I can't say enough nice things about these ladies!
Ceremony - A++ House of Blues Parish Room Chloe & Kelly did such an outstanding job. They really were all over every detail & were so helpful. The room was just the vibe we were looking for. We didn't want traditional & this room was the perfect mix of the edge we wanted while still making our older relatives happy. They even helped me day of get all my second line info confirmed. Talk about being totally worry free!
Officiant - A+ Coco Robicheaux We are not very religious but I come from a religious family so I was a little worried about how they were going to take Coco...Well, they loved him! He was such a sweetheart. He took pictures with our friends & family, told them stories about his life. He performed a perfect ceremony for us - again the right mix of unique/traditional. We used one of his songs as our first dance song. When we told him this at the rehearsal, he sang part of the song a capella for us. He really made our day special.
Second Line Band - A Smitty Dee's We used Smitty Dee's for our ceremony & second line. Yes, I know they're a brass band & that's not what people usually use for a ceremony but we agreed we thought it would be a fun twist. We were very happy with the results. Dimitri warned me that they usually don't do ceremonies, but I have to say, we were pleasantly surprised. I only gave them an A- because there were a few bad notes in the ceremony. But like I said, we knew they didn't really do ceremonies so it's unfair to really criticize. We also have A LOT of musicians in our group so things like that do get noticed more than an average group. They even learned a Nine Inch Nails song, our favorite band, and gave it a jazz twist. Our friends have still not stopped talking about it!
Flowers - A+ Fat Cat Flowers We were a very small wedding so we didn't need much for flowers. Diane was already booked that day but decided to take us on anyway due to our size. We communicated mostly over email and never got to meet in person until the day of my wedding. Our flowers were OUTSTANDING! We couldn't get over how perfect they were. She delivered the look & feel I was going for. They lasted for such a long time too! I wish we lived in NOLA so I could get all my flowers from Diane!
Parasols - A+ Liz Petro on Etsy Everyone loved their parasols. I know, usually only the bride & groom carry them but our moms & bridal party loved the idea so much that everyone ran out and got them! Liz did almost all of our parasols custom & they were all perfect!
Cake - A+ The Royal Cakery Talk about a delicious cake. OMG. Our cake was unique in color, but designed exactly as we asked for. I thought the price was VERY reasonable (maybe bc I'm from NY?) and tasted SO GOOD. I wish I could have more right now!!! I got my groom a "groom's brownie" since he's not a cake fan but even he enjoyed the cake. We also got my grandmother a birthday cake since it was her birthday that day. She said her cake was delicious too. Love these ladies, so nice, helpful & make beautiful AND tasty cakes!
Reception - A- Pat O'Brien's Briars Suite The room turned out perfectly & ended up being exactly what we needed & wanted. It was very difficult to get information from them. We wanted pictures of the room because we couldn't come down to see it and they were only able to provide us with 1 - 2 inch square picture of the room... It was a little difficult to get in touch with them when I had questions (3 weeks & no return phone call) but everything worked out in the end. They did want me to drop off my favors and centerpieces at 10am the day of the wedding... After a bunch of back & forth, at 2:20p the day before the event, they were like "oh come down at 3p then and drop the stuff off." We were happy to have it handled in the end, but caused a great deal of stress so close to the wedding. The FQ was packed & there was lots of traffic so getting to Bourbon & St. Peter on the Friday before Halloween was a nightmare. In the end, none of that mattered and everyone enjoyed the food & hurricanes. Most of all, they loved the balcony on Bourbon Street. My grandmothers were even throwing beads off the balcony! We had no problems day of. Our bartenders were super sweet and had fun with our guests. Day of, it went off without a hitch.
DJ - A+ Crescent CIty DJs Harold was reasonably priced & very easy to work with. He has his entire song database online. We're big music people so having the right music was VERY important to our day. He was patient and easy to work with. He did everything exactly as we asked and was just perfect!
Furniture Rental - A Event Rental We ordered a few extra tables & chairs because Pat O's couldn't confirm how many we'd have... Event Rental was on time and everything was exactly as described. They did call me the day of my wedding looking for payment even though I had paid by credit card months before but it did work out in the end.
Car Service - B+ American Luxury We didn't really need a limo because we were going to second line from our ceremony to our reception. So we decided on an SUV to get the bridal party and officiant to the House of Blues. We then asked them to make shuttle trips from our hotel to the HOB with our guests as necessary. Well, the day before our wedding they called saying they didn't understand what we needed them to do. This caused a bit of stress as they needed all kinds of contact names & numbers. All of that would have been fine - it was just done at the last minute when I had a TON of other things to deal with. Our driver did tell my mother he wouldn't drive her to the ceremony but as soon as I told him he had to, he did it. A little confusion but worked out fine.
Photographer - A++ Jen Amato Photography I knew right from the start that Jen was our perfect pick. She was recommended by Studio Tran. We looked at her portfolio and saw that she had the style we were after. Jen was just so accommodating and easy to work with. I felt like I had a friend there - not a stranger. We all immediately felt comfortable with her. She got all the shots we wanted, and then some. She knew the best way to pose us. She really captured our personalities in the pictures. All of our friends and family loved her & her husband Randy (he helped as her assistant the day of our wedding). Our pictures came out better than we could have ever imagined! My husband never smiles nor has his eyes open in pictures. She managed to get both! I would recommend her to anyone!
Favors/Welcome Bags - A+ Locally, we used Zapp's & Leah's Pralines for goodies in our welcome bags. Everyone loved both the chips and pralines. Leah's made custom labels for us and turned out great. For our favors, we did Hubig's pies. OMG were they good! My husband does not eat pie and even HE liked them! Not being from NO, we can't get them so it was a real treat to have some leftover! I think we'll be ordering more soon & have them shipped up... We also included Pepto, Advil, ponchos, Shout wipes, etc from Alltravelsizes.com. Came quickly, good prices. I bought Voodoo dolls from Accent Annex & Pat O's hurricane mix from Cajun Grocer. We bought over 2000 beads & go cups from Beads by the Dozen.
If you want to see a sample of our pictures (and see some of the details I mentioned) you can visit Jen Amato's blog at
www.jenamato.com/blog. Scroll down to Stephanie & Chris.
My husband posted a bunch of our wedding videos on youtube. Visit
www.youtube.com/syndrummer. (FYI - we didn't hire a videographer. I work in tv, along with a number of our guests, so it seemed silly to hire one! The video here isn't professional)