When we started planning our event, I remember feeling so exhausted with finding a venue. The whole process of inquiring and squeezing in weekday walkthroughs between work was mentally and physically draining! Mind you, I have been the default event planner for my family and friend group for years, but having to do it for my own wedding with a super sweet fiance who has told me "I don't really care how, I just want to marry you" felt like too much. I still needed to exercise, find a dress, propose to my bridesmaids, etc. I told my now-husband, "It's either you have to deal with me being moody and frustrated for the next few months, or we add a planner to our budget so we can return to being excited again." That's when we booked Cortney for her partial planning package.
Cortney was immediately warm, reassuring and able to meet our moments of indecisiveness with patience and a multitude of suggestions. I was able to tell she's a creative right off the bat as she gave me the impression that the challenge of making all our wedding day wishes come true within the parameters of a timeline, chosen venue and financial allocation genuinely excited her.
I wasn't the type of bride who had a dream wedding, so I had to sit and reflect on what it was I wanted at first. She sent me a quiz to do and asked if I could poke around Pinterest a bit. Once I had found inspiration, she made vendor suggestions and also helped us vet some of the ones we found on our own. Over the course of ~6 months, we Zoomed, emailed, texted and met up at our venue in person. She had even gone to the venue without us to help a vendor take measurements and dream up where our furniture would go. Our space was long and narrow, but she found the best spot for our sweetheart table that took advantage of the LA cityscape view we liked!
During every interaction, we always felt like we were her only client -- even though she seemed busy on IG every weekend! As the event drew near, she dealt with our vendors and only brought to our attention what was necessary. My groom had a less-stressed bride because she was able to direct her focus on the fun parts (choosing our songs, getting facials, making memories, practicing dance steps with mom, etc.). Cortney bore any venue/vendor drama behind the scenes and let us maintain our portion of peace.
On the day of the event, Cortney came earlier than expected. We had brought a lot of knick-knacks to display and set up. Cortney handled all of that and executed display placements perfectly. She was able to herd our rambunctious wedding party and family members for our mini rehearsal and group photos. From my perspective we ticked off 90 percent of our jam-packed timeline, which is good! At the end of the night, she handed us a box of all our valuables. The next morning, as we were getting ready to leave the hotel, I found that all our display items were neatly packaged, returned to their respective boxes and loaded onto a bellman cart, ready for us to take to our vehicles. THAT was one of the best parts! I could not imagine having gone through this whole process with high success without Cortney's help. Our guests kept sending compliments about how well put together the event was and how much fun they had! It was literally theeee best day of our lives! Thank you so much for everything! read more