After choosing the right wedding style, the couple has to gather a team of experienced wedding vendors that will be able to carry out the desired aesthetics.

Wedding style selection is an important task in itself. What makes it more complex, is finding wedding vendors that provide signature wedding services and are well-suited to realize your imagined aesthetics and experiences. The right vendors transform abstract ideas into tangible, beautiful realities. In this article, we explore the importance of choosing the right wedding vendors and how their expertise and dedication can make all the difference by discussing personalized wedding services with renowned wedding planners, photographers and videographers.

Building a team of unique wedding style providers

To achieve a tailored wedding style, it is crucial to not only find the most suitable individual vendors but also build a team where these vendors seamlessly complement each other, and by collaboration, a cohesive wedding style is achieved. Usually, the ones building and orchestrating the wedding vendor team are the wedding planners.

As Marian Darder, the founder of Pasion Eventos, explains, at a wedding, you work not only with your internal team but also with a large external team, which are the vendors. Therefore, as part of your team, it is imperative to work with vendors that share your vision, style, and quality standards. The team at My Sicily Wedding agrees and stresses the importance of the connection and communication between the wedding vendors that makes the collaboration much better.

Stress & Success Event Planners adds that, when designing events and offering bespoke wedding services, it is essential to work together with all of the suppliers, from décor to gastronomy, to achieve a cohesive look and feel. Most importantly, working closely with all of the vendors is important to be able to act and resolve any issues that may arise during production, particularly, on the wedding day.

Johanna Lane from Lane Productions shares that coordinating the work of different vendors is essential in achieving the desired wedding style. Lane Productions prides itself on having long-standing amazing relationships with the best vendors who work alongside their vision with the couple to deliver something unique on every occasion. Johanna believes that the execution of a perfect wedding is a team effort, and only if everyone works in harmony together can you achieve absolute perfection for your clients.

Consuelo Wedding Planner agrees that collaboration is everything, it is fundamental. Only by selecting suppliers with characteristics of a certain style, of a certain level, we can achieve the result we want – a realized custom wedding style. The secret is to work as a team, all united towards the objective of realizing not only the couple’s expectations but going beyond!

Ivan Marangio, a wedding videographer, can approve that the synergy and the right collaboration between all the suppliers who work on the wedding day is the essential element for it to be a successful event, and it remains in the memories of the people who experience it. All of the wedding vendors are united to make the couple and their guests live a dream, thus, each vendor has to think as a team, not as an individual.

Wedding vendor selection criteria

Individualized wedding planning includes selecting each particular vendor, reviewing their portfolios and making sure communication with them will be easy during the wedding planning. Consuelo Wedding Planner says that to select suppliers, you must know their style and their philosophy and evaluate if they are really in line with the customer's needs. My Sicily Wedding adds that quality plays an important role, as well as a good approach with clients and between vendors. Stress & Success Event Planners mention another important aspect – shared values and ways of doing.

Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, states that the first thing is to look at their previous work, experience, and enthusiasm because motivation is very important. The team at Pasion Eventos are also very intuitive, and therefore, they consider the feeling that people give, and they lean towards honest people, people you can trust. But Johanna Lane from Lane Productions explains that they have great relationships with a variety of incredible vendors. Some are quite adaptable to different wedding style implementations, whilst others have a unique style, which can work with clients who have a specific vision.

Speaking of the unique and distinct styles of different wedding vendors, videographers and photographers are the ones to pay close attention to their aesthetics before booking them. It is worthwhile to study wedding videography and photography styles to choose a professional whose work will align with your vision. Ivan Marangio, a wedding videographer, believes that every videographer has a unique style and point of view that leaves an imprint on the wedding video. Each in its way and through its style is identifiable and unrepeatable. By watching their films, couples can and must identify, and it is essential to choose a videographer who can make them feel emotions and be reflected in them.

Speaking of signature-style weddings, Vanda Scazzari is a renowned wedding photographer celebrated for her distinct, minimalistic, and elegant style. Her elevated approach captures the essence of signature-style weddings, blending sophistication with a keen eye for detail. Vanda's work stands out through its refined simplicity and timeless appeal, making each wedding an exquisite visual narrative.

While The Luminous excels in artistic documentary photography, blending creativity with authentic storytelling. Their unique approach captures genuine emotions and candid moments, creating compelling visual narratives. With a keen eye for detail and a flair for the artistic, The Luminous transforms ordinary scenes into extraordinary memories. These two wedding vendors are an excellent example of how the style of the chosen professional can influence your wedding day in different ways.

Common challenges when carrying out distinctive wedding styles

As already mentioned, the choice of wedding vendors is crucial in achieving your desired result. Thus, one should always carefully select the professionals they work with. Not only because of the possible differences in quality but also in values and vision of how a wedding day should be.

Consuelo Wedding Planner adds that, when selecting exclusive wedding service providers, experience is a fundamental starting point. Thinking about her journey she can’t enumerate many challenges, and she’s lucky enough to work with suppliers who put their soul and passion into trying to satisfy the customer's requests, always respecting professional guidelines. As for unconventional requests, Consuelo Wedding Planner likes them, it's always stimulating to face new challenges.

Marian Darder, the founder of Pasion Eventos, believes that communication and being able to understand the concept and wedding style is crucial to carrying it out adapting to the budget and planning. Stress & Success Event Planners mention that different practical and logistical challenges may arise in the wedding vendor selection process. However, after 10 years of experience, they have to say that other than having availability for the wedding date, overall they have a wider range of vendors from each sector to choose from and collaborate. Johanna Lane from Lane Productions agrees that experience in the industry is crucial, and during their 15 years in the industry, there is nothing they haven’t been able to work out and deliver.

Speaking of challenges that wedding videographers may face, Ivan Marangio shares that the most important one is to ask themselves once they have been chosen by the couples to be themselves. For Ivan, the biggest challenge is to amaze couples and remain true to themselves.

Wedding style customization by the available budget

One challenge that is present in almost every wedding is budget restrictions. The task of a wedding planner is to balance a couple's budget with their style expectations when selecting vendors. To achieve that, the team at My Sicily Wedding indicates what is most important for a couple, the best is direct communication, and explains how they can manage different aspects of the budget and if is feasible or not.

Consuelo Wedding Planner agrees that, as regards the budget, it is necessary to be clear from the beginning and have a clear and detailed financial balance sheet. Most of the time, the starting idea comes from the client, and the wedding planners have the role of realizing what they have in mind with their budget, so planners may have to refine some aspects to meet their expectations as well as their needs or proceed following priorities, always trying to get closer to their desires.

Stress & Success Event Planners assume that it is important to work an overall budget, which is realistic to the couple’s expectations. They do this exercise from the very beginning to make sure they understand their priorities, for example, gastronomy over décor, entertainment, and so on, so they can start selecting those and balance the rest around it; always keeping up with more or less the same quality to achieve a good result.

But Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, and Johanna Lane from Lane Productions stress the importance of knowing the vendors and being able to determine who is the most suitable for each client. This and their price points can only be achieved after many years of working with them. So, from the offset when the client's budget has been initially mapped out, Lane Productions know the direction to go in terms of suppliers, ensuring that their style and budget can be matched accordingly to each vendor they select.

Wedding vendor booking orders and how they influence each other

When asked what the first few vendors they typically secure and how they set the stage for others, wedding planners have different strategies, depending on their working style as well as the preferences and needs of the couple. However, there is this recommendation to have a consultation with a wedding videographer and photographer before booking the venue because they could provide their opinion on how the venue will translate into the visual material that is often very important to the couples.

Ivan Marangio agrees with that and believes that photographers and videographers are the main and first elements you should choose when starting to organize an event. They have so much experience that they can also advise, for example, on choosing the right location best suited to the couple's style and what they expect from the images.

Another aspect to consider – choosing wedding vendor teams, such as a photographer and videographer duo like Poeticae Studio, offers significant benefits. Their close working relationship ensures seamless coordination. With their synchronized efforts and shared vision, they create a cohesive and harmonious visual narrative, enhancing the overall quality of your wedding memories and ensuring a smooth, stress-free experience on your special day.

Consuelo Wedding Planner says that the first fundamental step is the choice of the wedding planner, especially if you have a distinct and unique wedding style in mind, then you should look for specialized wedding planners. The future spouses must look for someone who represents them, who follows their needs and is in line with their way of thinking about the organization of the wedding.

Once they are booked, Consuelo Wedding Planner certainly starts with the choice of the venue, which is the home that hosts their big day and which, therefore, is where to lay the foundations of the whole event. Then the wedding planner has to guide the spouses in choosing all the suppliers necessary for the success of the wedding - there is a basic scheme, but Consuelo Wedding Planner works by personalizing each wedding, so she has to follow the client's requests and needs each time and understand which suppliers to give priority to.

My Sicily Wedding shares that wedding venue, catering, and photography are the first to be booked because these are the aspects of a wedding where the quality truly matters. Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, agrees that first, you have to secure the wedding venue and date. Once those are confirmed and booked, the next most urgent items are photographer & videographer, makeup & hair styling, and ceremony celebrant. They are not usually big companies that can do several weddings in one day, so it is important to secure these professionals as early as possible.

Stress & Success Event Planners elaborate that before searching for wedding vendors, an approximate budget has to be established. Once that is set, wedding planners can start working on wedding venues, catering and those professionals who can do only one event at a time, like photographers, videographers and DJs. Finally, they work on production and décor, including florals and rental suppliers.

Johanna Lane from Lane Productions adds that generally speaking, the first is the venue, the second the photographer and the third the videographer, closely followed by entertainment. Essentially, this is because there is only one of each of the first three elements. Meanwhile, wedding florists can deliver more than one wedding per day, as can production. In selecting wedding vendors, Lane Productions has a completely dedicated focus on the client.

For example, some clients are open about their ideal date because they are set on having a particular band perform or a photographer shoot. In this case, the wedding planners work the other way around to align availability from their side along with the chosen venue. The most stressful part for most couples is the initial stages of trying to lock everything in, and that is where wedding planners can take the pressure off and work out all of the options, resulting in them ending up with a list of dates to choose from that incorporate their most important elements.

As already outlined, the choice of one vendor influences the selection of others. For example, choosing local planners who know the vendors at iconic locations like Lake Como is crucial for a flawless wedding experience. My Lake Como Wedding planners excel in this regard, offering in-depth local knowledge and connections. Their expertise ensures you have access to the best local vendors, from florists to caterers, as well as carry out creative wedding style choices, ensuring your wedding is perfectly tailored and stress-free in this stunning destination.

The team at My Sicily Wedding agrees that it is very important to understand the context of location and different vendors. Wedding vendors have different approaches and services. After so many years in the industry, My Sicily Wedding has experience and can recognize who is the best one for a couple. Speaking of consulting with other specialists before securing the wedding venue, it can be done, however, it is advisable to make all the bookings from the very beginning, together with your wedding planner.

Stress & Success Event Planners underline the importance of choosing the right venue where it is possible to carry out your desired innovative wedding style options. The wedding venue will influence the selection of other vendors as some venues have exclusivity with production or catering, for example, while others are completely open. In the case of working on the client’s property, the location may influence the wedding vendor selection due to distances from their base office. In this scenario, Stress & Success Event Planners try searching for local vendors.

Johanna Lane from Lane Productions believes the venue is the canvas to create each couple a bespoke wedding perfectly reflective of their style. Before showing venues, Lane Productions has a long consultation meeting with the clients to get a real understanding of everything they want, their likes, dislikes, and what’s most important, as well as adding ideas they haven’t thought of for a unique wedding theme selection. Once they have had this meeting, they are then able to suggest the venues that would work best according to their budget, style and wishes.

Consuelo Wedding Planner resumes that the wedding venue has certainly a huge impact. Some venues have exclusives with local suppliers, such as catering, music or light design, so the bride and groom must know from the moment of choosing the location which suppliers are eventually mandatory to understand if they can respect their tastes and budget. Fortunately, there are so many good professionals, and it is always possible to find the right compromise and match. It is difficult not to find someone suited to the couple’s needs, Consuelo Wedding Planner's advice at most would be to start with the organization in time at least a year in advance to develop a personalized wedding theme and thoughtfully select the right suppliers.

Returning to the mutual influences between the wedding vendors, Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, says that everything is connected in a wedding and, therefore, must be in harmony. The wedding planners are the ones in charge of giving sense and consistency to the whole project and recommending the right suppliers for each event.

Making compromises in wedding planning

In wedding planning, there are always some compromises that couples have to make – sometimes some of the vendors the couples are interested in are not available, and sometimes available vendors don’t perfectly match the desired style. Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, believes that, with good advice from a wedding planner, a supplier can meet the client's expectations. It is all a matter of guiding them and supervising their work well.

Wedding planners and couples must give opportunities to new professionals, many times they will surprise you. Sometimes enthusiasm, motivation and effort can make up for a lack of experience. The team at My Sicily Wedding agrees that sometimes it is very difficult to find the match, but not impossible, and in these cases, really good communication between the couple, the wedding planner and the vendor, as well as flexibility, the desired result can be achieved.

Johanna Lane from Lane Productions says that clients' style will always be delivered, that factor is non-negotiable. If they have a situation where, perhaps, a certain vendor the client wants is not available, photographer, band, etc. Lane Productions is fortunate that they have a huge portfolio of professionals they can recommend and can often be well suited to the clients and exactly within the style of what they originally wanted.

Stress & Success Event Planners also have a huge range of great suppliers in Barcelona to work with, regardless of availability and style. For most of their clients, they tend to offer more than one option for each set of suppliers as it is important for them to have a good connection with all of the vendors hired and understand the differences in budgets, as well as desired style.

Speaking of bringing a wedding vision to life and wedding style individualization, there are many important details. For example, as wedding videographer Ivan Marangiotells us, the essential details that will be most seen in the videos and make an overall impression of a wedding are the choice of an exclusive location, the setups and an excellent synergy in the couple.

Communication between the vendors

To ensure cohesive execution, there must be excellent communication between the vendors. Having experienced this, wedding videographer Ivan Marangio believes collaboration and communication between the various suppliers is the essential element to ensure that an event is perfect. They need to compare themselves and perhaps help each other as suppliers. Plan times and schedule together to carry everything forward. For example, those who deal with the video sector must explain their needs and requests to make a great film, like indicating the perfect moments and places where light can give the images the splendour they want.

Johanna Lane from Lane Productions explains that once the venue is secured, wedding planners design a bespoke mood board incorporating the couple’s chosen style with their chosen venue. Using a selection of their favourite images alongside wedding planners’ designs and ideas. Each mood board contains inspiration for every part of the day, from hair and make-up to invitations, flowers and decor to lighting and furniture design.

The team at My Sicily Wedding agrees that sharing a mood board and timeline with all the vendors is crucial. Stress & Success Wedding Planners also work on a script of an event, containing all the suppliers – production, entertainment, florals, and table settings. They also design a mood board, establish a colour palette and render the venue with the décor, so the clients can visualize the concept and experience wedding planners propose for them.

Marian Darder, founder of Pasion Eventos, shares that, to know what the couple wants, the wedding planner has to find out what they like, listen to them and understand them. When they have a clear idea, they can communicate it to the supplier. Finally, they can have a meeting between the client, suppliers and wedding planner. Once the vendors are booked, Pasion Eventos provide all the information in detail with pictures, mood boards and everything necessary for a better understanding of the idea. Consuelo Wedding Planner also stresses the importance of providing mood boards, photos, videos, sketches, and everything that can explain in detail the vision of what is being created to both customers and suppliers.

Selecting wedding vendors: from meeting the budget constraints to establishing good communication

Selecting the right wedding vendors is crucial for achieving your desired wedding style. Building a reliable and talented team requires careful research and consideration, ensuring each vendor aligns with your vision. Overcoming challenges, such as budget constraints and availability, demands flexibility and creativity. Establishing clear and consistent communication with your vendors fosters collaboration and helps translate your dreams into reality. By taking these steps, you can create a seamless and memorable wedding day that reflects your unique style and vision.

Author: Renāte Berga

Wedding planners: Pasion Eventos, Consuelo Wedding Planner, My Sicily Wedding, Stress & Success Event Planners, Lane Productions Luxury Wedding Planners, My Lake Como Wedding

Wedding photographers and videographers: Ivan Marangio Films, Poeticae Studio, Vanda Scazzari, The Luminous