Another testimonial :)

As we finish our busy June we are getting so many thank you cards and emails we are delighted to have created such special days for our clients and most of our weddings will be uploaded onto the blog when we receive the photos but here is a lovely testimonial received today from one of my bride´s mother. It was a gorgeous wedding at the Finca de la Concepcion for Chris and Faye and our congratulations goes out to this charming family whose day we shared with many fabulous details created over the past year.

Hi Laura

I just wanted to thank you for making Chris and Faye´s day so amazing! The sheer beauty of everything you created took my breath away, especially the beautiful flowers. So many people have complimented on the decor saying they had never seen such uniqueness. All the hard work paid off and it was a pleasure dealing with you, exchanging all the emails, ideas and finishing touches. Also a big thank you to Anoulka, I know she contributed to a large part of the creativity!

Thank you so much for all that you did to make the day so memorable, it was everything that Chris and Faye wanted and so much more.

Lynn x

Fabulous photos to follow soon ;)

Delightful Shabby Chic Style Wedding in Benahavis, Marbella, Andalucia

Rachel first contacted me at the beginning of this year as she was setting up a company specialising in villas for wedding particularly around the Benahavis area and was also planning her own wedding.

It was at this time she found the fabulous Cortijo de los Cabellos and started her unenviable project of updating this venue.

Talk about a busy lifestyle, having just had a little girl that has just turned one, Rachel seems to grab both horns and get on with it with the most amazing sense of energy, style and taste, and I am thrilled to have got to know her over the past 6 months and do admire her artistic eye.

Nothing surprised me when I showed up to do the twinkly bits at her wedding to see her in her bikini and sarong bustling around and doing the last minute touches to her own wedding day, is was beautiful and she had emailed me a few times to ask my advice, in particular the last few touches of adding the fresh green to the blue colour scheme she already had in place.

The end result as you can see was beautiful and so shabby chic, so much style had been bought into her wedding from the bowls of granny smith apples to the fabulous cupcakes by Lola´s cupcakes to the charming bowls of turquoise heart shaped chocolates and the beautiful birdcages she had created.

In fact the list is endless, there were die for table covers in a pale blue rose organza, another detail queen for me to revel in which was fabulous!
We love the photos taken by Anna of this glorious day and all the lovely details to share with you of Rachel´s hard work and our twinkling bits! I think there will be a job here for Rachel should she decide she wishes to use her skills, but she did email me thanking us for our input and also mentioned she had no idea how I did this day in day out with the heat!! There is a magic wand waving all the time here on the Costa del Sol albeit I get hot!

Anna, thank you for the lovely gift but still cannot bring myself to test it until I have a clear week!

Reviva Weddings Planning Service

Reviva Weddings was set up by me at the end of 2007 and it filled a huge gap here in the market specialising in styling weddings and events offering a complete service including decorations, linens, flowers, stationery and all the lovely accessories it takes to make a special day perfect.

What makes us different? We are not florists that also do funerals and deliver flowers and leave, we specialise in weddings and events and are with you throughout your planning and helping you to create your individual style. No wedding is the same, every special day is unique to that couple and reflects their personalities, their dreams and of course their union as a couple which is a very special moment.

It is this high level of service that lead Reviva onto planning weddings, and it all started with the Los Monteros hotel shutting suddenly. Because I was working closely with some of our brides there to create their dream days it was me they turned to when this disaster happened asking me to find them new venues and desperate for help. I am a creative person and did not trust myself to become a ´planner´so I asked Carla, who is hugely organised and efficient to help me and the rest is history.

Carla took over the weddings and reorganised them all with a huge success and since this day she has been by my side eversince as the extremely organised and super efficient wedding planner managing many weddings for Reviva and I don´t think there is a better wedding planner on the coast here than Carla, albeit she can be quite bossy with me now and tells me off when I am slacking on the paperwork!

I know most of our suppliers here all say the same thing and rave about her which is lovely.

As this side of our business was launched two years ago, I think it confused some of our clients as we are of course still known as the wedding decorators, but to the delight of our suppliers and our very happy clients over the past two years, we are growing at a super fast rate and overseeing some lovely weddings with our planning and coordination services which Carla now heads up full time. We have even being booked to fly up to Barcelona to manage weddings there which has been interesting, very exciting and very successful.

Carla and I, together, are quite a formidable team and are completely devoted to creating our stunning weddings here with our fantastic team behind us and word is spreading fast! We both have extremely high standards and this is obvious in the weddings we create and manage.

We have received a lovely testimonial from Fady and Antonia who had organised most of their wedding here in Elviria at the end of May but just wanted a few loose ends tied up and someone there on the day. It was a stunning wedding set in a private villa with some fabulous suppliers such as Roberto Silvosa and these fabulous photos from Anna Gazda.

We do not tie our clients into any other services, including our decorations, and are happy to be the planners for the day, Fady and Antonia were already thrilled with their chosen florist and had all their details already organised, and seeing Roberto´s work and the result you have to agree was stunningly beautiful.

Here is their testimonial about Carla´s services for their day.

We are so glad we had Carla as our wedding planner, she is utterly reliable and dependable and always responding quickly and thoroughly to our requests. She has many contacts so finding a band or a photographer is trouble free. Most importantly she is really lovely and flexible, making organising our wedding hassle free, personal and as pleasant as possible! Even if you can manage without a wedding planner to help you organise your wedding, I would really recommend having someone like Carla there on the day itself, she took all the hassle out of being the host, from dealing with suppliers, managing timings and sorting out the inevitable unexpected issues. It meant we could just really enjoy our wedding day and not worry about a thing

A Beautiful Wedding and Candy at Cortijo Bravo Hotel, Velez Malaga

As our weddings started to get well and truly underway in May, we were very excited about decorating Michelle and Andrew´s wedding at the Cortijo Bravo Hotel in Velez Malaga. It is a beautiful venue and a fairly new one for us to decorate which is always exciting as we like a challenge so we did head off earlier this year to take a good look around this hotel to see what we would create for our weddings booked here this year.

Michelle and Andrew´s wedding started with a beautiful church ceremony in Nerja and then back to the Cortijo for a wonderful night of festivities and entertainments organised by Moira at Perfect Spanish Weddings.

The venue do supply some flowers so we woofed (I love this word!) everything up by supplying glassware which we filled with water, pink crystals and floating candles and then added in the pink roses we had ordered from the hotel, we also bought our mirrors and finished the centrepieces off with tealights and scattered the tables with crystals.

Peonies are delightful at this time of year and perfect for huge fluffy balls of loveliness, we created Michelle´s bouquet with ivory peonies and the bridesmaids in a fabulous combination of pink. They were delightful and huge! We were not allowed to decorate the pew ends at the church with our bows, which was disappointing but soon made use of them back at the venue by using them on the orange trees on the terrace so all was not lost!

Our highlight was the Candy Bar, there was a big clap all round from us and the staff, at the hotel, when we switched the fairy lights on, I think they were wondering what we were up to and it looked fabulous. Anoulka had done a fabulous job creating all the candy bar signs and Jeremy and Rob did get a look in later in the night when no one was watching!

We love the photos of the terrace that we decorated with lanterns, fairy lights and candles. It was a gorgeous wedding and lots of fun was had with the photo booth supplied by Jeremy, a gorgeous wedding cake from Fi, and dancing all night with fantastic music, lights and sounds from Rob the DJ. The A team were out in full force and here is our lovely email from Michelle and Andrew that was posted on our Facebook page

Hi Laura, sorry it has taken so long but I just had to thank you for helping me create my dream wedding. Your attention to detail goes way beyond what I had even imagined and it was only when I looked back at Jeremy´s photos I could see the extent that you and your team went to. Thoroughly breathtaking. The flowers were amazing and just what we discussed and of course all my guests are still talking about the sweet table (can I add they lasted the whole week we were here in Spain) such a treat. You were like my fairy godmother that waved her magic wand and made all my dreams come true, once again thank you so much, Michelle and Andrew xxx

Our thanks to Jeremy again for sending me these photos so we can share these fabulous photos of our work with you

A few more testimonials

I do know that many of our brides are waiting for our recent weddings to be posted on this blog and bear with us as we finish June and start to blog our fabulous weddings, all of which without exception have been stunning and we are on such a high at the moment albeit rather tired!!!

We do now though have a few days off to clean up, recharge and prepare for our next few weddings, again that are going to be fabulous with a US couple and a green, blue and orange theme, a relaxed country garden intimate wedding, another US client with a coral and ivory theme and a Madrid football candy bar we are all looking forward to and another beautiful wedding at the Hacienda San Jose.

I do think it is important though to share our brides experiences of our services with you and we have had some lovely posts on our Facebook wall this week from Sarah and Michelle so do check out our Facebook page.

Two more emails received this week though firstly from Candy whose wedding was held at the stunning setting by the turquoise lakes at the Hotel Vinuela.

Dear Laura

Jamie and I are now back home and floating down to reality after an amazing wedding day, it was incredible, the best day ever and like a dream. Thank you for being a part of it and making it extra special for us. The flowers and bouquets in particular were absolutely stunning, we loved them and the table decorations were gorgeous, not to mention the chinese sky lanterns that were a complete surprise to me and really, really magical. Also thank you for your help in the preparations I believe at one point you were zipping up my mother´s dress, thank you so much you were great!! Thank you so much Laura

Candy and Jamie xxx

Sue and Gunther got married recently at the Hacienda San Jose and here is a lovely email received from them

Hi Laura

I just wanted to thank you for all the beautiful flowers on our wedding day. I can still smell my bouquet now, which was stunning!! All the table arrangements were gorgeous, please thank Anoulka and Loraine for all their help on the day as well.

We had the most perfect day and wish we could do it all over again ;)!

Sue and Gunther xxx

Finally I would like to say a big thank you to Chris and Faye and their stunning wedding we created this week at Finca de la Concepcion, a delightful couple and thank you so much for my beautiful and very thoughtful present :) This wedding has indeed been the talk of the wedding town ever since and we are delighted that Jeremy took the photos so we will be able to share all the gorgeous details with you soon.

Many weddings to be posted after our marathon June and what a lovely time we have had waving our stylish magic over Andalucia!

A bit about us!

We are now bustling through, in the middle of our popular wedding season and I don´t think we have ever had such a busy month before, with many beautiful weddings being created, decorated, planned and coordinated here at the moment. Wings are flapping frantically, magic wands are being waved and ribbons are flying around as we create beautiful and magical days for our clients here!

We are having a lovely time and are thrilled to be receiving so many testimonials, cards, and emails from our clients, it currently feels slightly like Harry Potter! There are a lot of letters coming through the post box and magic in the air!

Here are a few thanks yous and testimonials we have received just this week from Puente Romano Hotel, the Butterfly Ball, and some of our recent weddings.

First was a beautiful card from Ingrid who got married yesterday at the Ritz Carlton Villa Padierna.

"I just wanted to say a big thank you, throughout the organising and run up to the wedding you have been amazing, you are brilliant at your job and I know you will never be short of business. All the best in your future again appreciate all your hard work and help"

Carla received this lovely testimonial from Antonia and Fady whose wedding we ´took over´ at the end of May, so they could relax on the day.

"We are so glad we had Carla as our wedding planner, she is utterly reliable and dependable, always responding quickly and thoroughly to our requests. Carla also has plenty of contacts so finding a great band or photographer is trouble free. Most importantly she is really lovely and flexible making organising our wedding hassle free, personal and as pleasant as possible. Even if you can manage without a wedding planner to help you organise your wedding, I´d really recommend having someone like Carla there on the day itself. She takes the hassle out of being the host, from dealing with suppliers, timings, to dealing with the inevitable unexpected issues, it just meant we could enjoy our wedding and not worry about a thing.

The Butterfly Ball that we decorated and sponsored on Saturday sent us this lovely email this week.

The flowers were beautiful thank you and the biscuits were divine and the giant cupcake was delightful and won by the 6"9 boxer Tyson Fury who planned to carry it all the way back to the UK to give to his wife and daughter! He was over the moon and a big thank you!

Fi was an absolute star and supported me to provide all these delightful goodies for the Butterfly Ball with a giant cupcake decorated with butterflies and 250 beautifully decorated butterfly cookies for our goody bags, I am indebited to her, the most talented and gifted cake maker and decorator here on the coast!

Finally last but not least is an email I received this morning from the Marbella Club for the Suite del Mar opening party

Thanks Laura it was a beautiful party and looked amazing

Fi was with two clients of ours this week and also sent us this email to us about two separate clients we have booked for September

Lastly I was speaking to Mairead and Sarah, both of them sang your praises and said they would be lost without you and sang your praises

Finally and I have to share this with you is my beautiful little daughter, Twinks aka Elizabeth at her school show the Feria del Verano last night, I did have to leave a wedding with Anoulka in charge to shoot off to see her La Bamba dance and it was such a lovely evening apart from her wedgie!

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We are now embarking on our busiest week of June with some fabulous weddings we have worked very hard on with a very dramatic spanish theme, a gorgeous vintage style theme with peaches, ice blues and silvers, a silver shell theme at Los Monteros and the list is endless so pop back to see our lovely weddings being uploaded as we receive the photos.

Gorgeous French Style Shabby Chic Wedding at the Hacienda San Jose

Wedding world has truly descended here in Marbella now we are into the lovely month of June and yesterday someone switched on the heat button! May was still slightly iffy but thankfully all our weddings came through unscathed and our beautiful French style shabby chic wedding was no exception and the storm held off until the early hours of the morning at 4am, long enough to everyone to have a fabulous day:)

Over the past month we have created some beautiful weddings and now we are receiving the photos we will be able to share these with you. We loved this wedding we created and designed with Sarah´s ideas to pull them all together. We were working away to create fans and parasols for the church in Marbella, the cocktail blackboard, to the gorgeous table centrepieces with those die for fluffy hydrangeas, beautifully simple yet stunning. The bridal flowers were a shabby chic ivory rose bouquet and the bridesmaids were the huge ivory fluffy peonies that smelt divine.

Anoulka created our fabulous flip flop sign for our basket and we are in love now with our new Mr & Mrs signs for the backs of Fiestasol´s new style chairs!

Cake Marbella provided yet more yummy cupcakes, without again making extra for us!! I will have words and apparently the garden was twinkling in the evening with all our lovely fairy lights, lanterns and candles, a truly magical wedding for a truly special couple and our warm congratulations to Sarah and Daragh.

Our thanks to Owen Farrell for sending us these delightful images of the day, without these we could not share our work with you.

Our thanks also to Heather at Fiestasol who yet again, as I practically live with them in the summer!, delighted the guests with Heather´s efficient planning and catering.