i know this board isn't the most active, but i always appreciated any vendor recommendations i could find, so i thought i'd pass along our experience.
we were married on may 8th at the currituck club in corolla... all weather reports were that it was supposed to rain, but the rain stayed out over the ocean and it was a gorgeous day
now... on to the vendors.
coordinator - sarah @ the currituck club - she was AWESOME. it was such a relief to work with someone who knew all the right questions to ask and who could make sure i was getting everything done that i needed to. i was able to drop off all my stuff earlier in the week with postits for where everything should go, and it was perfect. even when we were 1 centerpiece short (i'll get to that later), they improvised with a bridesmaid's bouquet and i was only told about it after the fact. i really can't say enough great things about all the gals at the currituck club. they're the main reason i wasn't at all stressed in the week leading up to the wedding. and on a side note, their food is so good!
florist - renee landry - she was really great. i was so excited to work with her, i love her creativity. my centerpieces were gorgeous and so were the bouquets. i had her put up branches & lanterns and it was a huge hit! the problem came when i wanted to see a centerpiece ahead of time. she doesn't do that, but offered for me to purchase one extra centerpiece and she'd make it ahead of time. i said that would be great, i'd like to purchase an extra centerpiece, and we finalized my contract and we were good to go. the problem was, she never added the extra centerpiece to the contract (something I should've caught, but also something i fully expected to be there given the emails). so, i got my 'extra' one a few days before the wedding, which we kept in the house, and then only had 5 instead of 6 for the day of. like i said above, the currituck club gals were great at improvising, but once i reviewed the emails and the contract, i was disappointed with what happened.
cake - marsha johnson / great cakes obx - loved, loved, loved the cakes. we used her for both the wedding cake and the groomsman cake. i had actually tried to use just desserts for the groomsman cake after tasting their cake at the wedding expo, but they are so difficult to get in touch with! i emailed/called with my ideas but they rarely responded. marsha, on the other hand, and her assistant natasha, are great! the groomsman cake was an xbox 360 and i gave her a couple that i had found online and she ran with it, and the cake was a huge hit! our wedding cake was absolutely fantastic. it looked exactly how i wanted and was delicious!
cake topper - ginger babies on etsy - this was a last minute decision, i wasn't planning on a cake topper. however, as soon as i saw her toppers, i knew i *needed* one.
i did a rush order and it was worth every cent. she customized it with my hairstyle, bouquet, she matched my husband's uniform exactly... i loved all the details and how cute it was!
videographer - island shore productions - tony did a great job and i'm excited to see how it turns out. sometimes it seemed like there was a little bit of conflict between the photographer and videographer, but i'm guessing that might be fairly normal. our main goal with the video was to get the ceremony because our grandparents weren't able to attend. everything else that they got was just a bonus and i think it'll be great.
photographer - jp40 photography - we weren't able to afford the photographers in the outer banks so we hired one from raleigh and he drove up. he was terrific! i stupidly forgot to call him when we started getting ready, so i missed out on a few of those photos, but everything else was fantastic. he was easy to get along with and i already have my online proofs and i love them!
dj - john harper - john rocked the house. he comes off as a little gruff in email and on the phone, and i had actually been worried about booking him, but he did our ceremony music as well as reception music and he was wonderful. we loved every single song he picked out, he got everyone moving on the dance floor, and he even coincidentally picked the perfect last song of the night. the night we got engaged, we drove down to the outer banks and 'to make you feel my love' by garth came on and my then-fiance sang it to me. well, that's the song john harper picked as the last song, so we danced, he sang to me, and i cried. perfect
limo - outer banks transportation - since ceremony and reception were at the same location we didn't really need a full on limo for transportation. so we worked out a deal with outer banks transportation to just be picked up by their jaguar at the end of the night to take us to our hotel. they were great. we even used their shuttle service to pick up a couple of bridesmaids earlier in the week and she gave us a discount!
makeup - all eyes on the bride / lauren owen - she was so prepared and organized and so wonderful to work with. i never wear makeup and so she had her hands full trying to figure out what i wanted, but she ended up making me look great. she was so good that the one bridesmaid who didn't want makeup changed her mind when lauren was there because she wanted to look as good as we did
she showed up to the house on time and ready to go.
hair - bangs salon / kim parks - lauren recommended kim so i went with her. she was... ok. she double booked my day and called to try and coordinate times. that stressed me out a little bit. the times worked out fine, but since she doesn't do anything in emails, she never told me a travel fee. probably my fault for not asking about it, but not the kind of thing you like to get caught off guard with the day of. if she had a contract or even a form she could email, that wouldn't happen. plus, my hair wasn't sprayed quite as much as i thought i needed. when i did a trial in my home town, the girl sprayed every single curl while it was on the curling iron. i told kim about that, but she didn't go that route. it was windy, so my hair was never going to hold the entire day, but just walking from the house to the car, the curls were falling like crazy. that said, she seems to specialize in up-dos, and the bridesmaids who had those looked great.
ok, well, that was quite the novel. but hopefully it'll help some of you out as you try to find vendors
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