Beautiful wedding for a sweet bride

What a joy Ina was to work with, Frank Salas (thanks for the photos), Flowers By Cina and I kept saying how lucky we were to each other.

I always use TMMPRO for the dancefloor/chairs/lighting but this time we even had Jack himself as the dj, love it.

Another Sunset Terrace and Plaza beautiful intimate celebration, xoxoxox

Till next time

Lisa

lisa@lisasimpsonweddings.com

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Add a comment July 3, 2017

Beautiful couple and beautiful Ritz wedding

Working with Erika and David over the past year was just a joy.  Very busy couple with kids going here and there and travelling and busy with work, so sometimes wedding planning halted and then we would get going again.  That is the beauty of how I work, I could pull your wedding together in a week, but for most brides that would freak them out, so anytime longer than that means you can halt anytime you want/need to  and there is no panic/pressure from me!!!

Erika had inspiration pics that she pretty much stuck to through the process and they were very much a reflection of her, soft, lovely and in love with love

All the tables had these lovely floorlength linen overlays and we did not use the Ritz baseplates (2 to choose from) this year my brides are loving these new chargers I get through one of my vendors.

The furniture setting on the balcony was actually copied from a wedding they had gone to, but we added florals to the wrought iron and Erika provided the rug which means when she sees it at home it will remind her of her wedding, love that

In 16 years of doing weddings in the Plaza Room no one ever brought up the idea of draping the whole room, but over the years I had brides who wanted to cover paintings in there so we had been creative with draping particular areas, placing trees and placing something on the mantle to cover the fireplace picture, but draping the whole room, hmmmmm. So when Erika said lets do it, I was excited to see the outcome, and it was

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beautiful, and now all my brides are doing it.  It totally transforms the room and makes it soft and romantic and elegant, intimate and I think it makes the room feel a bit bigger.

We had an awesome candy table setup in the foyer during dinner and guests made to go bags or grabbed some to eat later in the evening when they felt the need.

I love it when a bride lets me guide them to the perfect team for them for their vision/style and budget, and when I say budget, anytime you look at the pics from my couples weddings, whatever you think they may have spent, in reality they probably spent less because I know the right people out there.  Our awesome vendor team on this wedding was: Frank Salas for the pics above and some were mine, Design Visage for the beautifying of all the ladies, Elegant by Design/florals, Chiavari chair rentals, TMMPRO, The Sugar Philosophers, Peter/Vive Ent, Naples Strings, White Flite Dove Release, and my fave Rabbi, Rabbi Ian!! And of course the wonderful ladies and gentlemen at the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel xooxoxo

Till next time

Lisa

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Add a comment June 24, 2017

Ritz/Laguna, Sunset Terrace & Plaza Room

Just so hard to beat, this beautiful backdrop to a ceremony, with a 5 star/5 diamond hotel attached and a wonderful intimate room/balcony to have your lunch or dinner and dancing celebration.

A lot of my couples take advantage of the private beach cart/driver for a fee to head down to the beach and get some pics down there.

Great shots by Joe Latter above, I have to say Joe you are the first I know of to do the shot above with the B&G in the window, kudos to you.

A lot of couples want just one more practice of their first dance, so of course we sneak them in.

Tammy wanted an intimate/gardeny feel and only low centerpieces, great job Karla/Elegant by Design the flowers were lovely.  We also went white chiavaris (which could be my favourite) and white dancefloor to offset the creamy/ivory hotel table linens.  The room really had a lovely feel.  We pulled together a great cohesive vendor team to ensure their day went well and they were looking forward to working with everyone. Elysium Video, OCASV lighting, Noemi/Posh Beauty, Jeff Holmes/Moondance Mobile Music- kept that dancefloor full, Monico Décor/rentals, and of course without them none of this is possible, the awesome ladies and gentlemen at the Ritz-Carlton, Laguna.

Till next time

Lisa

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Add a comment January 30, 2016

Plaza Room, Ritz-Carlton Laguna

I love it when a bride picks up on something that most people are ok with, but Sally hated the railings around the balcony and wanted them prettied up.  Both bride and groom love flowers and have flower gardens at their homes, so were really into sharing with Karla/Elegant by Design and had long discussions about flowers.  It was lovely.  Karla totally came to the party with the end result and both B&G were thrilled.

We came up with such a pretty vision, it was really an elegant beautiful celebration for an older very much in  love couple.  One of the best vows from a groom to a bride I have ever heard ‘I promise you will never fly coach again’!!  Yeah baby.

We pulled together the perfect vendor team for this couple, James Johnson photography/thanks for the photos above, Karla/Elegant by Design florist, Enchanted Evening strings for our ceremony and cocktail music, Essence Entertainment for the band that kept the white dancefloor full, Monico for the rentals and Paul Uhlar for doing a great ceremony as always.  To my friends at the Ritz-Carlton, you make our weddings 6 star events, so thank you very very much.

Till next time

Lisa

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Add a comment January 23, 2016

Ritz-Carlton Laguna, Sunset Terrace/Plaza wedding

Fabia wanted an intimate celebration with an ocean view and wanted the feel of the ocean to be a part of the floral design/feel.  So the Ritz Carlton’s Plaza was the perfect location and Karla/EBD floral Design pulled the feel together perfectly, the ceremony site was just lovely.  Fabia was thrilled.  Thanks to my vendor friends who made up the team to ensure a great celebration for this fun couple.  Andrena of Andrena photography (and thanks for the photos below/above), Marc of The Emotion Picture Studio/video, Larson Lighting, Naples Chamber music for great cere and cocktail music as always.  Brent Edwards for a lovely wedding ceremony, and my A1 guy Peter/Vive Ent for the great music/environment/good time he created inside.  The B&G were loving the music so much they and one other couple danced alone, everyone else was gone, for the last hour of the event.  They were having a great time

Till tomorrow

Lisa

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Add a comment May 25, 2015

St Regis/Ritz-Carlton Laguna combo celebration

Well as you can probably guess, I hear a lot of really good stories on how couples met/got engaged etc, and I love hearing them. Mine involved meeting in a bar in a country I was not from and him following me back to NZ, and a ring in a box of my fave chocolates which was in the fridge, and 27 years later we are still married!! Exciting, fabulous, not really, but it’s my story so it is endearing.

Well the wedding you see the pics from below, is what I would call a fabulous story, kept me on the edge of my chair, and our planning process was even exciting, as it involved three way calls with me, the bride at the Pentagon and the groom on base in Afganistan!!!! Can’t reference their names or I would have to kill you (lol), but the bride was flown in to a base in the war zone for a meeting and the groom happened to be their consulting for the US government, a friend of the grooms happened to take a pic on his phone of them from a distance as they were meeting which is really cool, because at that time, no one had any idea what was going to happen in the future. The chemistry in this photo is incredible, she looks like Laura/Tomb Warrior (or whatever that Angelina character was) and he is just a really good looking, debonair English gentleman, that all the vendors and hotel staff feel in love with, believe me if this wedding wasn’t going to work out, there was a line of woman ready!!! So a long distance relationship started, with rendevouz in various parts of the world, India, Morocco, Scotland, I mean this is a fabulous story, and it ended up with the three of us coming together (everything is fate) to help plan two very special events to celebrate them finding each other.

So to find a location was pretty easy, her parents and some family live in the OC, but there were friends and his family flying in from all around the world, so no brainer, the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel it must be with the Pacific Ocean as a backdrop, but we needed to do a pre-event celebration where everyone would get to meet for the first time, well ……….. I do this quite a bit and it is so fabulous, we have two 5 star/5 diamond hotels within a mile of each other, different ambiances/views etc, so of course the pre-event needed to be at the St Regis, but do we do the wine cellar (which is awesome) or a smaller banquet room that has a balcony that looks out across property, well, as luck will have it, and how often does this happen, Club 19 was available on a Sat night in the middle of the season (great for my couple but not for someone else, if you get my jist) and we got it. So the best venues at both locations were ours for a group of our size, check!

The pre-event was the grooms, he wanted a Raffles/Singapore type feel without going over the top in spending as he did not want to take away from the actual wedding event. Having been to Raffles myself, I knew exactly the feel he was looking for (it’s a very English/downunder thing, the whole Raffles/Singapore thing), so I called in Keith Laverty/floral designer who I knew would get it and could pull it off, and then be able to come up with something that would be fabulous for the Sunday day time wedding at the Ritz. As you can see below, he did a great job, and they were soooo happy. Pulling these two events together with the bride and groom and the three of us in three different parts of the country/world was not a problem, I actually do it a lot with the couple in one part of the country or world and me here, and sometimes we are in different parts of the country and the wedding is in a totally different part of the country, so thanks to technology, email, websites, etc, it’s so much easier now than it ever was years ago, which is why years ago intimate/un local weddings had to have so much time for planning.

For the Sat night pre-event, we had my fave band/Full Spectrum playing, and they danced and danced (Teri oversaw that event as I was doing a wedding elsewhere), for the wedding day we had my fave dj/Peter of Vive Ent, Katie Clark did the photography for both events, Fusion Decor supplied the linens/chairs/furniture etc for both events. We had Naples Chamber Ensemble for the cere/cocktails on the wedding day, we had a Catholic style ceremony with Father Brian, Design Visage had my bride looking fabulous for both events. My teams/family at each hotel from the office to the staff on the day helping us orchestrate both events, as always did a top-notch job, as you would expect, never have to worry about the food or service with both of those hotels.

For the Sat night event, we had everyone at the one table on the outdoor feeling dining patio at Club 19, and on the Sunday lunch wedding, we were inside the more formal/yet not stuffy Plaza room with a chandelier and fireplace and had everyone at rounds and the B&G at a sweetheart table. So between the music, room layouts, floral look/feel, we were able to create two very different events, and everyone loved both of them. Great, great compliments from everyone, including two beautiful letters, one from the bride and one from the groom, afterwards.

Till next time
Lisa

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Add a comment April 12, 2014

Ritz-Carlton, Laguna celebration

Had such a wonderful time planning this brides wedding with her lovely New Orleans mother. Such a wonderful southern lady, people seem to like my accent, but I am a sucker for a wonderful southern US accent and the people who come along with it.

As always, it takes a team to create a great experience for the couple/guests and each of us working, thanks to the RC team upstairs and downstairs as always – love love you all. Katie Clark-thanks for the pics to post, Naples for being the best string ensemble out there, so easy to work with, Design Visage for always making my brides look fabulous from beginning to END and the moms/bridesmaids too, Shane Productions for the video and being so in the background at every wedding we do – no one even knows you are there, and Karen Donovan for the florals/decor for both areas. The one vendor mom jumped on, never even worried about, was the band, even for a 50 person wedding they wanted to dance/party and a band was important, I told them I love Full Spectrum, she said book em, I did, and they danced and danced and danced.

Till next time
Lisa

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Add a comment April 2, 2014

Ritz-Carlton Laguna, intimate wedding

Wow, November came and I had some great weddings that month and have been on a roll since then, the blogging stopped, yikes.
Back on track now, got to do it before this season gets up and running.

Loved helping this wonderful couple pull the vision together and a great vendor team. Of course the location and backdrop certainly helped make this a celebration to remember for the couple and the guests attending.

words words

Thanks to the wonderful Irmina for the photos, always fun to work with, my couples love you. Shannon/Hoo Films-great to work with her, had heard such great things, my fave harpist did the ceremony and cocktails, and one of my fave djs that one of my brides actually had found a few years ago and from that wedding on I started referring him, DJ Mister Bill, and one of my long time best kept secret florists. We had a dove release after the ceremony and a talking photobooth that opened the same time as the dancing/party began after dinner. A great celebration. I’m going to miss Patty & Edward, loved my time with them.

Till next time
Lisa

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714 305 7112

Add a comment January 10, 2014