First of all, don't ever try to plan a wedding without at least a little help from a wedding planner/coordinator. Second, if you're looking for a wedding planner, look no further, Corina's your woman!
Corina is an absolute joy to work with and her knowledge of the industry after 10+ years in the business is invaluable. We had a short engagement of less than 9 months and didn't realize how much there was to do in that amount of time, even though we chose a venue that had built-in catering services which took out some of the guess work. We also had no idea the cost of having a wedding in Northern California and had the idea we could do it for about half the amount than was realistic.
Corina is a friend of ours, so we were lucky to know exactly where to turn when we realized we needed help, and it was such a pleasure working with her on a professional level. The venue required a coordinator for the day of the event (which you'll see is so necessary), but to use Corina for only the day of is wasting her amazing talent as a wedding planner. She worked with us every step of the way during the short planning period. She was clear about how much to expect to spend for the kind of event we wanted, and knew where we could cut costs and where we shouldn't. She worked within our budget, listened to our needs, and spent tons of time with us hashing out all of the details. The vendors she recommended were also wonderful people, especially our DJ (Patrick @ Golden State Productions), and having them both there celebrating with us on the day of added another level of joy to it all.
Wedding planning is STRESSFUL, and there's no avoiding the stress, but having Corina there put us at ease knowing she was taking care of everything. You don't realize how many issues and questions will come up along the way, and especially the weekend and day of, that you will be so glad to have her there to discuss. For example, I had a hair fiasco the day before, and literally spend a full hour problem solving with my husband and Corina in the hotel room. Needless to say, we figured it out and my hair was amazing for the wedding, but I'm not sure what would have happened if she wasn't there at least to work through it with us. These things WILL happen to you too, and you'll be so happy you have her there to help you out!
Lastly, as I mentioned, Corina has a deep knowledge of the industry and has strong opinions since she knows from her experience what works and what doesn't. She isn't afraid to express her opinion, which can be interested when you're pretty opinionated as well. I would say that there's nothing I regret listening to her on--and furthermore, I WISH I would have listened to her on a few things that I didn't. So unless you are absolutely sure about something, listen to her advice and you won't be sorry, especially when it has to do with design or something that you're being stubborn about b/c of budget. For example, the venue included free white tablecloths and very ugly chairs, and I really didn't want to spend the extra $ on rentals, but thanks to Corina insisting that we rent colored tablecloths and nice wood chairs, the reception room looked so much more beautiful than it would have otherwise.
If you need any more details on why you should hire Corina as your wedding planner, feel free to PM me as I have loads more to say about it and you have no idea how much you need her. Hindsight is 20/20... :) read more