WARNING: DO NOT TRUST SONYA I hired Sonya in May 2020 as a full-time planner to help me plan a wedding for Aug 2022. I worked with Sonya for 4 months before I terminated the contract. In the 4 months, Sonya did not do anything except e-mail some venue options. I found Sonya to be highly unprofessional and dishonest. Sonya does not communicate and kept making excuses for not being able to accomplish any tasks. I got frustrated with her lack of progress and started planning my own wedding. It took me only 3 weeks to tour multiple venues and book one. Sonya would send me venue options via e-mail but never followed up or scheduled tours. She blamed the venues and claimed they were not responding to her. Weeks would go by and I would hear nothing from her. I checked up on her every 2-3 weeks to even get any information. After 3 months, she calls me saying she found a venue. She tells me it is within my budget and allows outside catering. She askes me to send me my availability to schedule a in-person tour. I send her my schedule and don't hear anything back. Two weeks later I call her and ask what happened. She again makes excuses that the venue isn't responding, etc. A few days later she e-mails me a contract for the venue with no information except the attached contract. The contract did NOT match anything Sonya told me over the phone. It was double the cost and did not allow for outside catering. I asked Sonya and she said it was just an "example" of a contract for me to see (what?) and that she will work it out with the vendor. Guess what? Never heard from Sonya again about this venue. We communicated to Sonya about our concerns with her work she never addressed them. I got frustrated and decided to contact venues on my own. In two weeks, I set MULTIPLE in-person venue tours and within 3 weeks I secured a venue that was within my budget and had flexible catering options. I fired Sonya after that. I did not have any issues contacting venues or hearing back from them. Sonya was being dishonest. I asked her to refund my deposit and she has not. I have filed a formal complaint to the BBB. Because of Sonya wasting 4 months, I was not able to secure the date I wanted. TLDR - Sonya took our deposit and accomplished nothing for 4 months. She barely communicated and she did, it was constant empty excuses and lies. She has refused to refund us. Because of her negligence I was not able to get the date I wanted at my venue. read more

I only wish I had hired Sonya earlier; my husband and I would have enjoyed our wedding prep and maybe even our wedding day a lot more. Who knew that was even possible? Sonya was kind, understanding, helped me find vendors, created my wedding timeline, ran errands, and so much more. Everything was so easy from the beginning. It starts with an initial consultation and she lays out all the details of her services. She was direct and genuinely does all that she can so the bride and groom can enjoy their day. She is also incredibly creative, energetic, and will go out of her way for you. I don't know what we would have done without her! read more

I love Soya! From start to finish she was AMAZING! From the first time I met her I was treated like a friend of hers. We started off with a consultation, so that we would both be on the same page when it came to colors, sizes , types of flowers, decor etc.. From there she knew exactly what I was going for and nailed it. My bridal bouquet was stunning, I was absolutely in love with my bridesmaids bouquets! and flower girls headpieces. Sonya was a pleasure to work with and I definitely will be recommending her to everyone! I seriously can not thank her enough! read more

Dream Events by Sonya - Wedding Planning Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

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Sadly, Sonya had great reviews which is why we chose her. She did help us out in a pinch due to our prior wedding planner who did virtually nothing. We had high hopes and Sonya did help us pre-wedding but when it came time to the details of making sure the contracts were read and the details were all communicated to all parties (like the DJ communicating with the venue to make sure everything was okay), etc, those details went missing. When one event we were doing at a hotel in Milwaukee was pushing back on things she just didn't fight back with them and try and push our point but instead just caved in to what they wanted so we didn't get what we wanted. She was not able to come to our wedding as she had another event and instead sent her folks who were okay. But they were not included in all prior discussions so they got there and were a bit clueless. Here are the mishaps that occurred of which I asked Sonya to take responsibility for but she has refused. 1) She was to review all our contracts and make sure all communicatin happened. Because the DJ never got the indoor Sparklurs approved at our wedding location (which we paid $1500 for), they refused to allow him to use it. And now he doesn't want to pay us back and Sonya is like this is out of her control but had she reviewed this (she said she never got the contract but I re-sent it to her showing I sent it to her) this never would have happened. 2) A Day before our wedding festivity, the DJ demanded a hotel room and she said we have to get him one. And the city was sold out of rooms. So instead of my wife enjoying all family in town she had to spent hours getting this guy a hotel room when it was not even in our contract to get him one, which she would have known had she read the contract. 3) We ordered a whole bunch of flowers to be used at the wedding but the planners there never gave it to the wedding party like brides bouquet and bridesmaids bouqets! Tons of conversations about this and we got nothing! 4) We gave her seating assignments and when she printed out the layout she did it all opposite from what we gave her! So everyone was sitting in the completely wrong area! 5) Sonya told my fiancee at the time that she would handle place cards and menu cards but then she tried to push that off on me to do! 6) How many weddings have you had that the wedding party gets announced ALL WRONG! Well in mine it did! It was so embarrasing how they said the names wrong, they placed all the people walking out for the introduction wrong, etc. Horrible! 7) We had a cake topper that was to go on top of this fancy made elephant cake topper. When I saw the cake, I saw no cake topper and they said well they made the cake wrong so we had them change it...little did I know, that the elephant on the cake took weeks to make and it got taken off to put on the cake topper. 8) Then the timing was so bad that they said right when we sat down that we had to skip the father-daughter dance and another dance! 9) They had the cake put right in front of the grooms face at the dining table so when the speeches started about me. I could not even see the people giving the speech due to this cake being in my way! 10) We have in writing many times we wanted a feasting table for 18. They failed. They made one long table for 16 and had to scramble last minute after the head table walked out to get others to find two more chairs to put on each side for our wedding party to sit down at the main table! There is so much more I can say but needless to say, I did not have a good experience with Sonya. She is nice and tries but she failed us miserably and I am very disappointed that my one and only wedding ended up with so many colossal failures due to very poor wedding planning!!!! And this was not a cheap wedding at all!!! read more

My husband and I hired Sonya to work as the day of coordinator for our 11/25 wedding and we were very pleased. Sonya is extremely organized, knowledgable, and had great suggestions when questions came up during planning. I was really nervous about the wedding since we had our reception at a venue that we basically had to set up from scratch but Sonya made sure that everything looked just right and did everything that she could to ensure that the day ran smoothly. She was extremely on top of things so when the wedding came around, I was confident that I didn't need to worry about it. I actually couldn't believe how smooth the entire day went, and was so happy that I was able to enjoy it instead of worrying about what was coming up next or where I would have to be. She had worked with us to set up an extremely detailed timeline and shared it with all of our vendors in advance of the wedding. Sonya worked closely with our caterer in particular and together they brought our vision to life of having a cocktail style reception with stations. Sonya spent the day prior to the wedding helping with set up and making sure everything looked perfect which it did. She even helped with a couple of decorations and jazzed up our card box. There was some family tension/drama involving my mom that Sonya had to work around (we had some disagreements about some elements of the wedding) but we felt that Sonya was advocating for us throughout the process and maintained her professionalism in some difficult/awkward situations. I also have to commend her on her responsiveness. It put me at ease knowing that she either got back to me right away or would get back to me within a day if she was working another event. I would absolutely recommend her if you want someone to make sure your day goes off without a hitch. read more

I don't know WHAT my husband and I would have done without Sonya! She made every step of the process run smoothly. Sonya took my vision and ran with it for my August wedding at the Armour House. She was so helpful when it came to literally everything- she was always one text away to answer questions or help me pick out invitations/flowers/rearrange guest lists/etc. She also accompanied me on every appt we had with vendors. She not only went above and beyond for me, but was always willing to help my mom with her questions, too! It is almost hard for me to articulate how wonderful Sonya was because I'm honestly 100% sure that our day would never have been as perfect as it was without her. She is passionate and truly cares about her brides and grooms. I cannot recommend her enough! Thank you for everything, Sonya! read more

Sonya did a great job at my daughter's wedding. She is truly a wedding planner with a heart. We were so fortunate to have found her. Right from the beginning, she took a very direct approach which we appreciated. She was there at all the events managing everything. She was firm with people which is really needed in the Indian culture as everyone has their own idea on how things should be done! There were so many things that she did out of the goodness of her heart. Putting up the mandap, making garlands are examples of going beyond our expectations. She stayed up late putting up the beautiful mandap that she really did not need to do. She made garlands for the bride and groom - one with real flowers for the bride and with fake flowers for the groom as he is allergic to real flowers. She matched the appearance of the fake garland to the real one. She has that eye for detail. By the way - Sonya has the best hair and makeup artists. My daughter tried several before Sonya found her the perfect makeup and hair artists. Thank you Sonya for that personal touch. We love you! read more

A week after the wedding and I am still blown away by the work Sonya and her team did. I would trust them with raising my first born. They were efficient, knowledgeable, decisive, and always two steps ahead of what I needed before and throughout the wedding. I had never given a wedding much thought before I got engaged and had a lot of parts of the wedding I had no idea what to do on; Sonya always gave firm, well thought out advice, and picked up on my style and preferences early so she was never suggesting something I didn't like. She was also very cognizant of my budget which I really appreciated. read more

Sonya did an amazing job. She made our special day even more amazing than I could have thought. Honestly she would have been a bargain if she charged twice as much. After the wedding I got so many compliments on the venue decoration, and it was all Sonya. I honestly cannot recommend her enough, she just blew me away. read more

Sonya provided the decor for our wedding at the Carleton of Oak Park. She did an amazing job making the place look beautiful and working within our budget. We had an issue with my husband's boutonniere breaking during our pictures and she came back with not only a replacement flower but extras in case anything else happens. She was a pleasure to work with! read more

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Picking Sonya was the worst decision we ever made. The only thing she knew how to do was bully me into agreeing with whatever she said. She said she was an expert florist and planner but my flowers were awful awful awful they were wilted and broken and dieing before they even arrived. The boutneers were sooo ugly and nothing like the pictures i showed her they all broke when they tried to put them on. The groom one was just a huge ugly wilted rose on a piece of plastic that fell apart almost immediately and same with the mom one was super ugly it had two small beads and and fell apart imediately because it was dry small and dead and was over priced and the groomsmen ones as well. Even her employees agreed, were terrified and were trying to fix them. She over books over promises and under delivers. The bride bouquet was lop sided and not round like promised and wilted like it had been made days ago by a two year old.The only good thing that came of Sonyas services was her assistant Alyssa who was trying to fix all of Sonya 's mistakes. I also had ordered 2 large vase arangements of flowers and specified i want them in vases not in sponges like funeral flowers but the were exactly what i asked them NOT TO BE ALSO the vase was Broken . PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE BRIDES EVERYWHERE DO NOT BOOK WITH HER IF YOU WANT YOUR DAY TO BE SPECIAL. read more

Hiring Sonya for my wedding (7/13/19) was the single best decision I made during our wedding planning process. I took a chance and found her based on the reviews on Yelp, and I'm so glad I did. From start to finish, she listened and delivered on everything that we wanted to happen in our downtown Chicago wedding. She is super experienced with large weddings (ours was about 175 people), so I was confident right away that she could take care of our wedding. She has great taste and I trusted her opinion on most things related to design, layout, etc and all of those things came out fabulous. I work full time and was not able to correspond with many of the vendors as much as I wanted, but she was there to make sure all communication was solid between everyone. She told me she really doesn't start "working" on a wedding until a month beforehand, but she was preparing things for my wedding months beforehand. There are so many moving parts to any wedding/reception, and she/her team made everything flow flawlessly. If there was anything that went wrong, I definitely had no idea (which is the perfect situation for any bride). I was able to truly enjoy the whole day of my wedding which was priceless for me! Sonya is so talented and SO good at what she does, she always made herself available to me (responds in a crazy quick time, even late at night) which is so appreciated. I felt like the amount of money I paid to hire her paled in comparison to the amount of work and time she put in to my wedding (other planners that do similar work charge at least double!). THANK YOU so much again Sonya + team, you were a HUGE part in creating the best day of our lives!! read more

Let me tell you I didn't even get a chance to work with Sonya cause someone contacted for the same date before but she literally talked to me for an almost an hour or more just the initial phone conversation. she's super responsive and reliable, I was going to have an Indian wedding and first was contemplating signing with her but after talking to countless planners she stood out the most! Why you need to book her is cause she literally went out of her way to find a good referral for me because she couldn't be my planner and I was looking like crazy and just stressed out, she literally went out of her way to find me good referrals, without us working together, like come on, THIS IS A NO BRAINER FOR ANYONE who is even having a Indian wedding and still contemplating if you should book her, do yourself a favor and DO IT! The amount of help she was without me even working with her I can only imagine how easy my life would have been working with her if I had her as my planner! She super good and get signed so book her fast!! read more

I am so glad we hired Sonya as a day-of-coordinator for our wedding! We had a large Indian wedding with many moving parts and small details that were important to us, and Sonya took the time to execute and make sure all items were taken care of! She is very organized and helpful, and knows how to get things done. She always answered random questions of mine over text and even did the beautiful floral bouquets for me and my sister-in-law. Sonya is very talented and a wonderful wedding coordinator. Would HIGHLY recommend her to anyone planning a wedding! She will make your life soo much easier, trust me! She took care of so many small issues and questions from our vendors on the day of the events. I was hesitant to hire a coordinator at first since I thought our families could handle it but I AM SO GLAD I HIRED SONYA! read more

Hands down, Sonya was the best decision we made for our wedding. She is one of the most organized people I've ever met, incredibly responsive, reasonably priced, funny, personable, and full of knowledge about the wedding industry. We hired Sonya to be our day of coordinator and florist. With regard to day of coordination, Sonya was impeccable. Nothing slipped through the cracks! My guests and bridesmaids kept commenting on how smoothly everything was running and how beautiful everything looked (all Sonya!). She was able to organize our large and rambunctious bridal party with ease (and humor! and kindness!). And although Sonya was amazing on the day of, she was a lifesaver the month leading up to wedding. Unlike many day-of-coordinators who only work with you on the day of your wedding, Sonya works with you the entire month leading up to your wedding!! She responded to all of my questions and worked with all of my vendors so everyone was on the same page when it came to the timeline. It took so much stress off my plate and I was able to have fun and enjoy the week leading up to my wedding!! In that month she also develops an incredibly detailed timeline, picks up any special items you want for the reception, assists with seating chart, and so much more. I could go on and on! Also, side note, Sonya worked with a printer to create an unbelievable seating chart which was printed on a frosted mirror. It was so gorgeous and classy! So many of our guests commented on it. Now with regard to flowers, I can honestly say there is not one single thing I would change about our flowers. I booked Sonya as our day-of-coordinator before I booked a florist and I was talking with her about how discouraging the florists were!! Everything was so expensive and I was told left and right that we wouldn't be able to get what we wanted within our budget. Well, in comes Sonya! She told me that she works closely with a florist and would work within my budget to create the exact look I wanted. The flowers she delivered far exceeded my expectations. I showed her pictures from Pinterest and she gave me almost exact replicas. I had big full peonies, gorgeous tall arrangements, tons of beautiful candles, and it all fit in with the whimsical romantic look I was going for. About a month before the wedding, I met with her at her studio and she showed me exactly how she planned to set up the ceremony and reception. She showed me tons of different options and I left feeling like "wow, she's got this!" I'll end with this because this review is already really long...at the end of our wedding my dad, who is really quiet, said "That Sonya is worth her weight in gold. She's amazing!" I would recommend her to anyone and re-hire her in a minute. Thank you, Sonya, for making our day so incredible!! read more

I cannot say enough positive things about Sonya. From the start of our conversations, she was fantastic to work with. She was the day of planner for my wedding, but we felt like she was so much more. If I was worried about anything at all the month before the wedding, she would take it off my plate like getting all the vendors organized, creating timeline cards for our guests, designing and printing place cards, bringing baskets for us to borrow for various events, or creating my bridal bouquet to list a few. During the wedding weekend, if there were things that went wrong, I didn't have a clue because she handled it so well. Everyone from my family to friends asked me where and how did you find her? She's amazing! She always told me if I would ask how is this going or how is that going, "Can you just be a bride?" Lol. I would hire her without a blink for any future events and would recommend her to anyone who needs an organized, enthusiastic, dedicated, fun, and trustworthy wedding planner. Thank you so much Sonya for making my dream wedding come true and running the show so seamlessly! read more

When my then fiancé and I interviewed Sonya to be our wedding planner, we had already completed some of the groundwork. My pretty bride, however, was not the type that glossed over wedding magazines dreaming of the perfect wedding since she was 10 years old. Moreover, we were trying to finish in 2 months what most couples plan in a year. We knew that we would need help. We had just posted online and Sonya was the first to respond and, fortunately, her office was close to the venue we had just finished visiting. From the very first meeting, we were impressed with how she proactively took us through the steps she would take to bring the wedding planning to a successful finish. We interviewed several others afterwards. Sonya, however, would be the high bar that all other planners had to clear. As we interviewed one candidate after another, we came to the same conclusion after each meeting - they just didn't measure up to Sonya. The others just did not give us the same level of confidence that no detail would be overlooked. She also projected the grit and assertiveness to handle any vendor that might step out of line - like a pit bull with a pretty face. We could not have made a better choice. Sonya stood by us every step of the way. Dress fitting, meal tasting, cake tasting, meeting with pastor, vendor interviews, rehearsal - she was there for it all! One Sunday, she was with us from morning to evening as we dashed from one meeting to the next. We introduced her to everybody as our 4-star general - but she more than earned that 5th star in the end. Like a well-seasoned military general commanding their forces, she managed our vendors, our venue, and our wedding party. She even helped us keep in budget by arranging our boutonnieres for less than what a florist would charge. Now, with a heavy-weight like Sonya in our corner everything must have been smooth sailing and gone off without a hitch, right?? If only! 2PM the day before the wedding, just as I'm leaving the barber with a fresh cut and feeling pretty good about everything, I get the most dreaded text from our pastor. He prefaced the text with "I don't want to add any more stress on you" and proceeded to let me know he would be unable to officiate the wedding. Needless to say, I was very very stressed. I conveyed the news to my fiancé who was certain I was joking at first. There were a lot of quick calls with Sonya and our family as we scrambled to pull together a Plan B. God's favor was certainly shining on us that day, however, as we didn't have far to look. Sonya had just recently received her license to officiate weddings. How many planners have that in their emergency kit!?! We tried a last-ditch effort to re-arrange the ceremony to use our original officiant but at 6am on the morning of our wedding, I had to make the call. Me: "Good morning, General. Do you think we can still fall back on Plan B?" Sonya: "Not a problem. Whatever you want." After another call to my cousin, an elder in his church, it was set. He and Sonya would tag team: he would perform the ceremonial parts and Sonya would perform the official parts. My wife and I could never forget Sonya even if we wanted to - she was the one that married us! No one outside our wedding party had any clue to the crises that was narrowly averted. To say that Sonya went above and beyond the expectations of a wedding planner would be the understatement of a lifetime. We are forever grateful and could not recommend her highly enough. read more

If you are deciding whether to hire Sonya or not, you NEED to hire her as your planner. She was our month of planner for our wedding and I cannot express in enough words how great she is. She was there for me and helped with anything that I needed. She came to my dress fitting and took care of our florist when there was a slight issue. I am so grateful to have had her, she helped de-stress me leading up to the wedding and helped make it absolutely perfect! My whole family and all my friends just kept saying "We need Sonya at our wedding!" I can't express enough how wonderful she was! You will not be disappointed, she really is the best! read more

My Daughter hired Sonya for her wedding and it was one of the best decisions she made! Sonya is smart, professional, efficient, and a genuinely lovely person. Her knowledge, creativity and tireless energy helped us through all problems that arose including issues before the wedding day. To have Sonya handle the day of details made everything go smoothly. As mother of the bride, I had no worries - She was there from early morning until end of wedding, kept us on schedule and handled anything that arose. I highly recommend Sonya for any event - she is absolutely amazing and because of her efforts, the wedding was fabulous for us! read more

Sonya is amazing! She did my centerpieces, decorations and head table for my engagement party. Everyone asked me who my decorator was. Everything came out so beautiful and better than I had imagined! I really can not thank Sonya enough. I am also working with her for my wedding. She is very professional, very responsive (which is really difficult to find in the wedding industry), and very reliable. I would recommend her to anyone! read more

I met Sonya at a wedding expo almost 9-10 months before our wedding date (8/2/19). After having that one conversation with Sonya, I just knew she was the wedding planner I was looking for. She is so passionate about her work and puts her heart and soul into making sure your day is above and beyond perfect. I could not have survived without her!!!! She is more than perfect and efficient at what she does. She was one text/one call away if I EVER needed anything! She had solutions to all my problems. She was available to talk to me whenever I needed her. She was always ahead of my thinking and made thing happen before I could even get to her about it. She is very particular about time and for an Indian wedding that is very important. All of our rituals and events took place in a timely manner and I could not be more happier about that. She is very attentive about the little details and that truly helped me be a little less stressed out the wedding. She took care of coordinating with all our vendors and just made sure we had everything we needed for our big day! I seriously could not have asked for anyone better than SONYA because there isn't anyone like her!!! She is one of a kind and a good one....she became my close friend in such a short period of time :) read more