Our wedding was amazing! We had a couple of small hiccups throughout the day, but overall every single thing was perfect! Here's a VERY long post with our reviews.
Rehearsal Dinner - The Original Fish Market, Pat Lisanti
Grade: A+
Since our out of town guests were staying at the Westin, it made the most sense to hold our rehearsal dinner here. The food was great and the staff was very nice and accommodating. We couldn't have asked for anything better.
Church - Saint Paul Cathedral, Jean Hartman
Grade: A
We brought our own Priest, so I can't comment on how the Cathedral works with that. They do lay out all of the paperwork needed/payments made in their welcome packet. Jean ran the rehearsal flawlessly. The only hiccup was that supposedly our Priest was to contact the Diocese to fill out a few questionnaires with my husband and I. We had no idea about this, but immediately after our rehearsal Jean took us to her office and we were able to complete them there. It took about 20 mins and frustrated us since we didn't have a clue this was to be done, but it got done. The cathedral is gorgeous!
Reception - Carnegie Music Hall Foyer, Eileen Twigger, Liza Reed
Grade: A
Before we were even engaged we knew we wanted our reception at the Music Hall. It is soooo gorgeous and grand. We toured the day after we were engaged with Eileen and booked our date. After that, Liza was our main contact. She was awesome and so organized. They made it easy. The day of the wedding was amazing. We had 2 slight hiccups with that they didn't have the lights on in the Hall of Sculptures for photos (we requested this beforehand) so we had to wait for the maintenance man to show up and then after dinner when the dancing started, they couldn't get the lights dimmed. I had to ask 4 times for them to turn down the lights until they finally got it. Other than those 2 slight issues, it was perfect and beautiful. It wowed our guests.
Caterer - Parkhurst Catering, Bill Jones, Allison Hines
Grade: A++
The music hall only has 1 caterer choice and they were awesome. Bill and Allison were so accommodating. My husband is stationed in California and they were more than amazing with working with our crazy schedule to arrange our tasting. The food was delicious! We wanted to have every we tasted at the wedding, but ended up with the stuffed chicken with mushroom cream sauce and beef tenderloin as our entrees. Both were mouth watering. They also do your cake as it is included in the price of catering. Alice is the baker and is so cute and sweet. We ended up with a 5 tier chocolate cake with praline filling and buttercream frosting.
Photographer - Beth Insalaco, Beth and Sam
Grade: TBD
Beth and Sam are a husband and wife team. They were so very nice! I can't grade the, yet since we haven't seen our photos, but from what I can tell, they will be amazing. They both laid low and we barely knew they were there all day, yet they took thousands of photos!
DJ - Klicker Productions, Sarah and Dan
Grade: A+++
Sarah and Dan were perfect. They are very reasonably priced, made it so easy to plan with their online form and about 2 weeks before the wedding, I met with them in their home to finalize everything. The day of the wedding they were incredible. Dan does all the announcing. He kept the dance floor packed all night and even after the last song of the night, when everyone started chanting "one more song", he actually played one more song for us! Lol It made our night.
Florist - K.S. Kennedy, Kerry
Grade: A+++
Kerry is absolutely amazing!!!!!! He worked with my budget and created an absolute dream for our bouquets and reception center pieces. I just gave him my favorite flowers, some basic idea of what I wanted and he created it exactly how I envisioned it. So so so beautiful!
Limo - A Tortorice Limousine
Grade: A+
Our driver, Denny, was great! He was 15 mins early to pick up me and the girls, drove us everywhere we needed to go and made it back to pick up the boys in time and got us to the reception with time to spare. Since it was snowy and slushy, he even wiped off the door every time we got in and out to make sure no ones dresses.
Shuttles - Pittsburgh Transportation Group
Grade: A+
We arranged for shuttles to take hotel guests to church, then the reception then they ran a loop from the reception to the hotel from 9:30-10:30pm then made one final trip back to pick up us and the rest of the guests around 11pm. Everything ran so smoothly and the drivers were very nice and polite.
Invitations - DIY, Cards and Pockets
Grade: A+
Cards and pockets paper and products are great quality. We would definitely use them again.
Calligrapher - LMM Calligraphy, Tracy
Grade: A+
Tracy was great! Her work is beautiful. Our guests loved the invitations!
Favors - Sarris Candies
Grade: A+++
Great, easy to work with and reasonably price. We had 2.25 ounce milk chocolate snowflakes. yummy!
Dress/alterations - Michaels Bridal, Yolanda
Grade: A+
Yolanda was awesome! My dress was perfect and the alterations made it fit like a glove. She worked wonders on altering the neckline and re working the beading.
Hair - Philip Pelisi Ross Park Mall
Grade: A+
All of the girls and my mom got our hair done here at 10am the day of the wedding. We all had separate appointments so were in and out in the same amount of time. We all loved our hair and the price is very reasonable!
Accommodations - Westin Convention
Grade: A+
The Westin was great. We had no issues and everyone loved their rooms. They even handled my welcome bags perfectly.