The making of Kathy + Matthew’s wedding

This was the wedding that had my operational team and I have sleepless nights thinking of how could possibly complete the hanging wisteria installation of this magnitude in such a short time span. After all, most styling of a wedding is carried out on the day and that makes it a massive logistical and team resourcing challenge that we thought would be such an impossible feat to accomplish. Sure had the hanging installation been a small 3x3m dance floor one filled with much more sparingly hung wisteria, we could’ve completed it in over a few hours, but this wasn’t to be a hanging installation like any vendors have done. And after all, I’m passionate in doing it right, creating a mantlepiece that is worthy of not Anna Wang, but of the couple.

We came up with the idea of adding some jazz to the usual hanging installation; why not start it from the backdrop and follow it high up? I figured that’d be totally amazing! And as usual, my crazy ideas weren’t going to be that easily achievable with the limited time we were initially provided of 4 hours bump-in, so after numerous amounts of phone calls, meetings with the venue and their in house rigger (Tommy who is an absolute gem and pinnacle in making this happen), re-negotiations of start time (from 12AM that night before) we managed to (pull out some teeth) let ourselves in several days ahead. Why wouldn’t a venue want us to come in to do what we do? It’ll create a wondrous setting for the guests and the couples that were scoping the venue throughout the week.

Makes sense right? I’m all for venues who provide freedom and flexibility to their couples, after all if the place has been booked for the day and there is nothing on prior – why not? Even better for the ones that are kind enough to not charge extra for earlier access – so girls don’t forget to to ask this before you book your venue, especially if you’re wanting to transform the venue. I’d highly recommend to have a chat with your chosen stylist as they’ll be able to guide you on which venues are perfect for certain looks, installations, flexibilities and ultimately how long it’ll take to create your dream wedding.

So begins our 4 day installation of this behemoth of a 15m hanging wisteria that involved a lot of fun being on the scissors lift and hanging every single one of the 4000 stems. Sure it’s not unlike the other hanging installations that we do where they’re not pre-made fabrications that are just hung up, to me that just doesn’t make sense a creative perspective because each ceiling and shape is different so the exact humber required will always differ. Certainly it makes more business sense to pre-make these ceilings of panels and chandeliers of flowers (it’s a great way to make more money out of each piece’s rental and the labour costs would be much lower each time), and it makes sense for others to offer this type of product, but we customise our styling pieces every time, so it fits each wedding. Afterall, that’s what our couples come to us for right?

And as always, thanking the vendors involved in putting this together!