We used Ryan Hogarth. He is a professional key note speaker who happens to be an amazing marriage officiant. It was compressed into an authentic, beautiful ceremony. It was lighthearted yet soul touching and we laughed so much during the reading. His reading was relatable, connecting and he has a crisp and clear voice.
https://www.ryanhogarth.com/
Since my husband has an event company and have orchestrated 800 weddings to date and I have arranged several corporate events, we didn't feel the need to hire a planner. We quickly realised why an enaged couple needs one especially when you are trying to plan a wedding in 4 months and have extremely demanding jobs. We had to roll with the punches, delegate, embrace our big boy pants, bite the bullet and allow ourselves to be consumed by daily to do lists. It was overwhelming and got the best of me on some days, but on the wedding day, I took 5 minutes, breathed everything in, the decor, the scenery, the guests, the music and said to myself: " We did this and it is perfect and it was sooooo worth it"
Ferdie Heyns prepared our harvest table which was a rainbow spread of fresh fruit, gourmet cheeses, charcuterie, nuts, pates, preserves and an array of gourmet breads. This was accompanied with a gin bar.
Carina Sephton from The Hothouse Wedding Venue prepared our starters and mains. Our main goal at the wedding was to serve food that that left everyone talking way after the wedding. Carina prepared a trio of trout, unique to Dullstroom as the starter. She orchestrated a heavenly spread of fillet with cognac and Gorgonzola sauce, salted caramel pumpkin fritters, pan fried garlic potatoes, Mediterranean roasted vegetables, sticky marinated chicken and strawberry, cranberry, danish feta + almond served with balsamic glaze.
Desert and wedding cake was made by the unrivaled Jacqueline Righi-Boyd from Dolci cafe. She prepared caramel baked cheese cake for desert and our wedding cake was a Macaron tower.
http://dolci.co.za/
To be honest, we kept the stationery absolutely limited. The only printed item was the seating chart. We did a wedding website designed by Monique from Brand pointe. I was so incredibly impressed as the website depicted us as a couple and the executed it extremely well. It was classy, stylish, simplistic and contained all the guest info without being bulky. She also designed the Save the date which me e-mailed to our guests. The theme that originated from the Save the date pulled through to the wedding website and setting chart.
Micheal and Ruben from Wedding Tunes (an affiliate of Up a tone events) was on top of their game. The ensured music was provided during the canapes, made sure the live entertainment was taken care of, they were 100% on par with the run sheet and queued every song when it was it's time to shine. they maintained their level of professionalism right to the bitter end, which was after 2 am! We had several live acts during the wedding which included Pieter from Marcato, Warren Garvie, Boki Ntsime and one of my great friends, Nadya Pretorius. The lighting they provided created a romantic ambiance which quickly converted into the ultimate party vibe.
