A Beautiful Wedding at the Hacienda de San Rafael

We posted our testimonial from Claire yesterday, but today we were able to go onto the link to see the photos of this beautifully designed wedding we had created for Claire. 

I think what is slightly unusual, but does happen to use quite a lot, is that we did not meet Claire prior to this wedding, we did everything via email to envisage the style, the look, etc, although we did make a mad dash to the venue shortly before the wedding as I hate decorating a venue without seeing it beforehand.

The wedding was held in the stunning Hacienda de San Rafael, just outside of Seville, with a church ceremony at a very impressive church in the centre of Cabezas de San Juan.

 It would be difficult here to ignore the fabulous vibrant pinks of the bouganvilla at the Hacienda so Claire had decided to use this to compliment the wedding design. 

Claire's bridal flowers were a beautiful shade of pink, and we used dolce vita roses which were huge, the bridal bouquet was really quite heavy!

We then added in all the details from the decorated cava bottles at the church for the guests to enjoy on the coaches back to the venue, to the fans at the church which were very useful given it was 48 degrees and some fun confetti cones for the guests to throw when the bridal party came back to the Hacienda.

Once back at this amazing venue for the dinner, we had decorated it with lots of fairy lights and our famous lantern and candles to add that romantic feel to the evening.

We loved Claire's photos which she had sent me before the day and we hung them along a washing line between some lemon trees by the bar.

I think from these fabulous photos by Jeremy Enness you can see the style and creativity we managed to create via email for a very beautifully designed and hot day!

We created another wedding here one week later for Imogen, and are dying to see the photos, as this was a very different style wedding with the ceremony at the venue, navy bridesmaids with a very vintage style to the flowers and decorations using sahara roses and golds.

Another lovely testimonial received today

Claire's wedding was held at the beautiful Hacienda San Rafael near Sevilla, and we travelled up there at the end of August in the hottest day of the year there.  Whilst we were working the staff there told us it was 48 degrees, to be honest when it gets that hot you get past caring and I spent most of the afternoon in the air conditioned room pretending to fiddle about with the flowers, whilst our team were out in the heat putting up the lanterns and candles for me :)

Claire had a photographer from the UK so we are in contact with him and hope to post the photos of this very stylish wedding soon, it was a fabulous church.  We had a lovely day as the host for the venue, Anthony, is one of those people you are glad you have met, he is totally charming and hugely helpful.  We created another wedding a week later for Imogen at this venue, as well, so again more photos, but here is our lovely email we received from Claire today.

Hello Laura

Just wanted to drop you a line to say thank you so much for all your help at the wedding. I was delighted with the flowers, they were absolutely stunning, and all the other little details came together perfectly. The dining area looked amazing with all the lights, and we had the best time ever.

Thank you so much again for everything.

Quick update!

We have been in a wedding whirlwind these past few weeks with many fabulous weddings that we hope to post on here throughout the winter as we receive the photos from the amazing photographers that have been involved. 

We have been promised so we watch and wait, we so hope we will receive some as we have created so many fabulous weddings but sadly do not have the photos, although it is my plan to email all our brides this year and get them to send me their favourites.

I have been really naughty though and stolen some photos from a wedding we created yesterday.  Mark from Cake Marbella has taken some delightful photos to give you a brief insight in our wedding we created at the elegant Villa Padierna hotel and we have stolen them for our blog :)!

Yesterday's wedding was a beautiful wedding with a last minute change from red and white to pink and white due to the bridesmaids dresses changing.

We created a fabulous ceremony area in the amphitheatre which is a stunning setting, with our new rather impressive gazebo, aisle dressing and pew ends.

In the main area on the Linares terrace we dressed the chairs with covers and sashes, beautiful pink and white centrepieces on mirrors with lots of tealights with pink crystals and white candles to compliment the scheme plus scattered the tables with crystals to finish it off.

We also decorated the napkins with pink ribbons and white paper roses to add a touch of glamour and colour to the tables and created the table seating plans to match along with table names, then lots of candles, petals and red love hearts tied with pink ribbons hanging on the trees to finish the romantic setting off.

We heard from Heather today to say the bride was delighted with the decorations and flowers :)

Jeremy and Jenny were the photographers for the day so we are hugely excited to see the real pro photos, no offence Mark :)!!! 

Sadly Mark did not have any extra cupcakes so had to do with a caramel bar late last night instead!

Monda Castle is on our blacklist

Whilst it is not something I wish to promote, there are some businesses down here who really are offering a most appalling service.  You would consider in a recession that venues would be bending over themselves to offer the best service and work with the best suppliers in order to attract what is still a very busy wedding market.

However this cannot be said for a few venues down here.

I have recently been to Monda Castle, El Castillo de Monda, to decorate a small wedding there for a new planner here.   My first impression, as I do know Monda Castle well, was the hideous artwork on the walls, it really is quite tacky.  There was also some awful drapes going on in the main hall, which could have been so beautifully done.

Considering the stunning setting of the venue and it could be presented so beautifully but it is not at all, it is dreary, dark and tired.

We had a small project there just to dress 90 chairs with purple chair sashes, after we had completed this we decided to pop into the restaurant area for a drink and some lunch before we headed off to Malaga.  Lunch never came, albeit only tuna sandwiches ordered, so we paid for our drinks and left.

I returned there today to collect the chair sashes, and a rather haughty receptionist just sighed as if I was inconviencing her rather hectic life behind the desk, and after one phone call with lots of snearing, told me they had thrown them away?!  They had not been collected within 24 hours so they were binned?  Shrug of shoulders and back to her hectic lifestyle of probably filing her nails.

I am sorry but although of course we understand our property is not the responsibility of the venues, we don't think it is much to ask if they can store our items until such time as they can be collected.  Particuarly if it is such a small amount of decorations.

 If the venues make our lives difficult and treat us with such disdain, I suppose we are fortunate enough to be in a situation where we can black list venues, we don't want to work with them.  It is just disrespectful to the suppliers and their property when these venues to have this sort of attitude.

Luckily they are few and far between here on the Costa Del Sol, although I did have another one in July that is now on our blacklist, again disdainful towards our presence and rude to not just our staff, but other professional wedding suppliers and entertainers involved, they will be revealed.

We have since spoken to the new planner who organised this wedding and she said that Monda Castle were a nightmare to work with, perhaps the management of this venue need to take heed otherwise they will put paid to being able to offer any weddings here with any great suppliers involved.

I rest my case on this one and if anyone finds a bin liner full of purple chair sashes please do return them to us!

We had a fabulous weekend again though working in some stunning locations here on the Costa Del Sol with some extremely friendly and helpful venues, one that springs to mind this weekend was the beautiful Oceano hotel, I have no doubt whatsoever, that the charming Glen there will have our chair sashes neatly stored away ready for us to collect!

No matter how stunning the venues here are if the service is not up to anything it let's down the whole venue, both from the client's point of view and the suppliers that work and recommend the venues.