Tag: wedding malaysia

Part 2 Wedding Preparation

This is Part 2 and final post on our wedding preparations. Part 1 is here.

Makeup and hair

I knew exactly which makeup artiste that I wanted for my wedding even before I knew I was getting married. The person is Cassandra from Dominica by C, a ‘Boh’ Cameronian Award winning make-up artiste.

I have always loved Cass’ work – her brides all look really natural, beautiful and glowing! And I am pretty sure I was all that on my wedding day :) Thank you Cass, so much.

# – Cass doing her magic on me.

My hair was done by Cindy, Cass’ partner. I really love my bridal hairstyles, classic, chic and timeless. I especially adored my second hairstyle on that day! Also I must add that no matter how many times and how hard I have sat on my veil, my hair was perfectly intact and coiffured.

# – Gareth with Cass and Cindy.

Dresses & suit

I wore 3 dresses for our wedding while Gareth wore only one bespoke suit.

Gareth got his suit tailored at a place called Ah Loke Tailor in Kuala Lumpur, recommended by Shah, our amazing blog manager and one of the most stylish men we know. I love Gareth’s suit and his bowtie, so classy and classic :)

For my main dress, I knew very early on what type I wanted – mermaid cut, with a train, lots of lace and and conservative. I wanted to look like a virgin haha.

I tried A LOT of dresses before finally finding the perfect one at Faye’s Bridal House, at Jalan Loke Yew.

We ended up taking a basic bridal studio photography package (which we were sure we didn’t want) with them too because it makes more monetary sense than just renting the dress alone. I was pleased with their service and quite enjoyed the pictures from the studio shoot :)

# – Gareth and me in my main dress.

My second dress is this fuchsia piece that’s mermaid cut with silver lace trimmings. It also has a train.

# – In my second dress.

My third dress is the most special one. It’s a qipao that my mom wore at her own wedding day. The dress is 32 years old!

# – In my mom’s qipao.

Shoes

I bought 4 different pairs of stilettos for the wedding. I wanted my heels to be really high and really simple.

Got 3 of them from Payless Shoes (red and silver pairs from Sunway Pyramid and gold pair during my trip to Melbourne) and the blue pair from Bangkok.

# – Blue (still wrapped in plastic), gold, silver and red.

Photography

As we were very happy with our ROM pictures by Anna-Rina, we engaged her again for our wedding day shoot. I have said this numerous times; Anna is an amazing photographer. She is great at capturing the right moments and I am just in love with her picture compositions.

I love, love, love all the pictures from my wedding! Much thanks to Matthew, Anna’s assistant on that day too.

# – A picture of us with Anna and Matthew at the end of our wedding day.

Thank you Anna and Matthew for being so accommodating, patient and wonderful. You guys are class-A professionals!

Emcee

Boy this one was tough! We really had a hard time looking for emcee. I wanted someone who speaks not just immaculate english and cantonese but also has a fun personality but not too much. We asked around a bit but when I checked out their youtube videos, I was like…cannot lah T_T

There was this emcee that I encountered in an event many years ago, who left a deep impression on me. I thought his voice was just wonderful – velvety, calm but still commanding. I was having such a hard time trying to remember who it was and then lo and behold….Gareth remembered!

The man with the velvety voice I heard many years ago was Kevin!

In fact, it’s TRAXXfm’s Kevin, who does The Morning Zoo show. I was so, so, so happy when Kevin agreed to emcee our wedding.

And he truly was fabulous. His english is perfect but his cantonese is even better. I am proud our our wedding emcee, man! /fistbump with husband

We received so many compliments on how good our emcee sounded and had so many people asking for Kevin’s contacts after our wedding!

# – Kevin interrogating one of my bridesmaids, Celine.

If you’re thinking of engaging Kevin as your emcee, just reach him at his facebook page ya. No need to email me please ;)

Music

We didn’t hire any band basically because we wanted to listen to our own favourite music. Also, the agenda was so packed that there’s not really any downtime for a live band. Also, am terrified of bad singing hahahah

Anyway, there were two songs that were chosen specifically for our grand walk-ins. The first one was Perfect by Fairground Attraction. Upbeat, fun and of course the lyrics:

Perfect by Fairground Attraction

Don’t want half hearted love affairs
I need someone who really cares.
Life is too short to play silly games
I’ve promised myself I won’t do that again.

It’s got to be perfect
It’s got to be worth it
Yeah.
Too many people take second best

But I won’t take anything less
It’s got to be
Yeah
Perfect.

Young hearts are foolish
They make such mistakes
They’re much too eager to give their love away.
Well
I have been foolish too many times

Now I’m determined I’m gonna get it right.

It’s got to be perfect

Young hearts are foolish
They make such mistakes

It’s got to be perfect

It’s got to be
Yeah
Worth it
It’s got to be perfect.

Our second walk-in song is a version of Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered by Cher & Rod Stewart. I had always known this song was somehow going to be in our wedding because it is damn cheeky hehe. Here are the lyrics:

Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered by Cher & Rod Stewart

[Rod Stewart]
After one whole quart of brandy
Like a daisy I awake
With no Bromo Seltzer handy,
I don’t even shake.

[Cher]
Men are not a new sensation;
I’ve done pretty well, I think.
But this half-pint imitation
Put me on the blink

I’m wild again
Beguiled again
A simpering, whimpering child again
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I

[Rod Stewart]
Listen, baby
I couldn’t sleep
And wouldn’t sleep
Until I could sleep where I shouldn’t sleep
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I

[Cher]
Lost my heart but what of it?
My mistake I agree.

[Rod Stewart]
Oh she’s such a laugh, and I love it
Although the laugh’s on me.

[Cher]
Oohh I’ll sing to him
Bring springs to him
And worship the trousers that cling to him
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I

Oh you’re so cute
Oh she’s kept enough, she’s slept enough
And yet, where it counts she’s adapt enough

[Both]
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I

[Cher]
When he talks he is seeking
Words to get off his chest.

[Rod Stewart]
Horizontally speaking
She’s at her very best.

[Both]
Oh we’ve seen a lot
I mean a lot
And now we’re like sweet seventeen a lot
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I
Oh, we’re vexed again
Perplexed again
Thank God we can’t be over-sexed again
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I

Slideshow

This slideshow was made entirely by Gareth. Trust me it took a lot for me not to interfere with the making of the slideshow but after he finished and I watched it…I am so proud of my hubs cause I LOVE it! The music is Take Me Over by Cut Copy.

I wouldn’t have been able come out with anything close.

We played it at our wedding but there was some technical issues hahah (that ALWAYS happens at wedding, doesn’t it?) so here it is again:

Videography

We had a slightly hard time deciding on a videographer too. Luckily, a blog reader tipped me off about 3PM Studio. Love their work! Not too cheesy, no powerpoint action like effects, slightly hipster (hehehe) – just love them. Their charges were very reasonable too, compared to some whose work I think are far inferior.

This is the short edit of our morning session.

We still don’t have a full edit video of our wedding day because we haven’t gotten around to passing 3PM Studio the scenes we wanted….we’re talking about many hours of footage here to look through haha :P

And there…done blogging about our wedding preparations. Next post will be about the wedding of course!

Again, thank you everyone was was part of our beautiful wedding.

Thank you for helping us make the happiest day of our life so freaking awesome!

Part 1 Wedding Preparation

This is an entry about what we did in preparation for our wedding.

We had about a year after our registration of marriage to plan for our wedding.

Right after the ROM, I was contemplating getting a wedding planner but abandoned the idea shortly after finding out the fees that they were charging. I think wedding planners deserve every single cent that they ask for, however we just couldn’t afford the service.

Hence, the birth of Kimzilla the bridezilla. Hurhurhur….

Invitation card

The entire theme of the wedding was inspired by our invitation card. Designed by Gareth’s lovely and very talented colleague Chee Ling, who spent so much time making so much changes because I was am crazy.

We did not want our faces or likeness on it. We insisted on having fist bumps. We wanted something kitsch but still stylish. We wanted colourful.

Chee Ling also came up with the awesome idea of putting a candy into every card.

# – Front and back of the card.

# – Inside of the card. I photoshopped the eyeglass candy in – like how a guest would receive it but with a real eyeglass candy. There’s a phrase near the candy that says, “SWEET LOVE x INFINITY”. Geddit, geddit?

# – The card closes to reveal a fist bump with the word “Woohoo”.

Thank you very much Chee Ling, this is one of my most favourite part of our wedding – the invite! It really represented us as a couple :)

Venue 

You can read about my high strung search for a venue here. Now that I read the post again, I am like….woah I was fucking crazy.

In the end, we settled for The Saujana Hotel. There are several reasons for our choice:

1. The perfect ballroom size with no pillars. We didn’t want a space that’s too big as we’re only taking around 30 tables. We ended up having 35 tables and it was just nice.

# – No pillars.

2. Parking was free for everyone and there were plenty.

3. Nice, spacious reception area and it has its own bar too!

4. There’s no noise restriction as the ballroom is located in its own building away from the accommodation.

5. Within our budget (this is not an advertorial)

I was very happy with our choice of venue because the service was just fantastic. Everything was really well taken care off.

They even helped us hang up the DIY multicoloured ribbons on the ballroom ceiling without additional charges and trust me it wasn’t easy because I was there overseeing the work.

They also made us the backdrop exactly how we wanted it. When I saw it I almost cried because they really kept to the theme /sniffs

# – Our wedding backdrop.

# – Customised menus were happily printed out for us as well. It was designed by my husband :)

Food-wise we were happy too. It was also very nice to retreat back to a suite overlooking greeneries and large pond after the wedding dinner.

I would personally recommend The Saujana Hotel.

Decorations

We did not pay for fresh flowers at all although I did have them at our wedding because it was part of the banquet package. I just personally couldn’t justify the cost of fresh flowers.

Instead, I bought a lot of fake flowers and different coloured fabrics from a shop called Apple House Enterprise in Klang. Almost the entire wedding decorations were made out of materials from this shop. I also bought ready-made corsages from the same place.

Thank you to my awesome bridesmaids who came weekend after weekend after weekend to help me DIY the wedding decorations. They cut and shredded fabrics into ribbons until their fingers were blue and sore (hugs).

# – Ribbons, ribbons, ribbons everywhere.

# – If I remembered correctly, we made about 40 metres of this.

# – Celine, Sin Loo (maid of honour w00t) and Jayna.

# –  Haze in charge of whipping out the flower bouquets. By the way, you got to check out Art Misfits, Haze’s new venture.

# – The main bouquet. The wonderful thing is that I can keep this bouquet foreverrrrrrrrrrr!

# – I made a matching boutonniere for Gareth.

# – Girls taking a break from the back-breaking work.

# – End result.

I also bought a lot of photoframes from Ikea for decorations at the reception area. I printed both our faces out and glued them to candy sticks for photo opportunities.

# –  Our faces. This blog is not called “Narcissism is Necessary” for nothing, you know.

# – One of the signages made with Ikea’s photoframes.

# – Kim & Gareth House Rules

The hotel had provided us pre-dinner titbits at the reception area but we wanted something more aligned with our dinner theme – nostalgic technicolour frenzy.

I bought loads of old school candies and snacks from a confectionery shop in Klang. Then I made a sign for every type of snack.

# – Must have ChupaChups.

# – Haw flakes and jelly.

# – Rabbit sweet and eyeglass candy.

# – Bubble gum and lemon tablets!

# – Even got nostalgic bottled soft drinks :)

They were a hit because there was nothing left after dinner was over haha :)

# – Mom-in-law and Gareth’s aunt Jean also made us this beautiful and traditional ring pillow <3

Car decorations

My mother-in-law, Susan made all car decorations! There were 8 cars altogether in the entourage so there were 32 pompoms she had to make.

Sounds little?

It’s not. I can’t remember how many times she got burnt by the glue gun and poked by needle. Thank you mom <3

# – Mom made 32 of this #likeaboss.

She also made the heart shaped pompom for the bridal car :)

# – Heart <3

# – Our black bridal car, followed by the entourage’s white cars.

Am probably the only bride I know who decorated her own bridal car. As in, I tied all that shizz…haha. It took me 1/2 a day to do it and I was happy.

Again, couldn’t justify few hundred ringgit for some car decorations picked out off a catalog, so I did it myself!

Because we both like our cars, I should probably mention that we used the rare Lexus IS F as our bridal car – the only one in whole of Malaysia and some say South East Asia. Thank you for lending us the beast if you’re reading this!

# – Sexy beast.

Bridesmaids and Bros

I bought the bridesmaids dresses from Ladies Fashion Trading. They are infinity dresses that can be worn many different ways.

Despite my selfish, crazy and ridiculous demand – that the girls are not allowed to wear any tube top or use any transparent bra strap, the dresses fitted really well. My bridesmaids looked so gorgeous!

# – My lovely bridesmaids in the apple mint dresses. Back – Haze, Celine, Sin Loo, Whey Lu, Carol, Yuki, Jayna, Li Ling. Front – Ee Laine and Ruby.

As for the bros, they wore their own white shirts and jeans. I made DIY green mint bowties to match the girls’ outfits. Fabric bought from Kamdar.

# – The DIY bowties.

# – The handsome bros – Derek, Michael, David, KY, Zess, Terence, Sam, Lance, M (bestman w00t), Damien, Horng and little Seb.


Okay, this is the conclusion of Part 1 of our wedding preparation. Thank you to each and everyone of you who had put in your time, money and most of all love in our wedding. We love you!!!

Till next post! Part 2 here!

What I went through seeking the perfect wedding venue.

Warning: longass post that is probably only interesting to myself.

++++++

Our initial plan was to throw a 9-course banquet on the grounds of a nice baroque style bungalow up in the hills, which I found through extensive googling.

The pictures of the place online completely blew me away, and for a while I was super secretive about the venue.

I was even hesitant in telling my friends the name of the place because I fear word might escape and another couple might end up using the place before my wedding takes place!

# – Inspiration 1.

I even made G drove me to the place to have a look at the entrance before making an appointment to check the place out and even then, I was already like totally & utterly in love with “the grand gate that has an old tree towering over it”.

I fantasised about hanging loads of long ribbons & fairy lights on the tree branches which would greet my guests upon their arrival.

# – Ribbons in tree. I wanttttttt.

If we were to have our wedding at this place, we would have to handle the food bit ourselves so I was also researching frantically for a caterer that could do sitdown 9-course banquet and let me tell you, it’s tough.

Most caterers in Klang Valley only do buffet style. Of the 9 or 10 caterers I contacted, only a grand total of 1 was willing to take up the job. ONE!

I was so desperate to have my wedding at this bungalow that I had already decided in my mind on using said caterer eventhough their experience of handling a sit-down banquet was a major suspect.

Said caterer also happened to have the style of chair that I wanted and according to the quotation, it would cost us almost RM10,000 just for chairs alone. I am ashamed to say that I was mad enough to think that ten thousand ringgit for chairs was okay.

NEVER MIND right, as long as I can have my wedding at this bungalow with the grand gate and the damned old tree and my bleeding chairs!

# – Inspiration 2.

Gareth is awesome. Even when I mentioned the stupid chairs, he was merely silent for a few seconds before giving me his approval. I was like, “REALLY????”, he’s like, “As long as you’re happy”.

That said, have you seen a white man turned a whiter shade of pale? Well, I have.

And what do you know, after that I got an email from the management of the bungalow saying that they had a look at the place recently and they didn’t think the garden could fit more than 100 people.

I WAS CRUSHED. I hadn’t even seen the place and my dream was being single-handedly torn apart by this damned email.

I was so upset I wrote back immediately to cancel the recce appointment, only to write back several hours later to un-cancel the cancelled appointment.

I refused to let my dream die. I must see the bungalow (and its garden) with my own eyes before making a decision.

# – Inspiration 3.

So, with the impossibility of hosting more than 100 people at one time, we started considering holding two wedding functions.

First, the dream wedding at the bungalow (with smaller crowd) and second, a 9-course banquet at a decent chinese restaurant for tradition’s sake.

With this new development, I was thrown another thing to stress over – finding venue for the 2nd function. Almost all the chinese restaurants we went to were fully booked through the year!!!! WTF!?

2012 is really a popular year for weddings.

Anyway, the only place left available with my desired date was one where I would have to make my grand bridal entrance from an actual roadside curb, with the pride & joy of the restaurant – a gigantic dried shark fin staring back at me.

And although this was supposedly the 2nd “unimportant & unsentimental” function, it still chewed me from inside out that I might have to associate my wedding with it. I was a complete wreck from then on.

Long story short (hurhurhurhur), finally, we went to see the bungalow. No more pictures. No more text description. Real, brick & mortar, grass and all.

We saw it with our own eyes. And my very first reaction was….. “Meh”.

MEH.

And right just then, my shoulders felt lighter. Random urges to choke myself with my own bare hands stopped. I started breathing normally again.

My dream had been extinguished and in its place, an epiphany.

I was freed! I don’t have to worry about finding marquee supplier that’s willing to drive up a hill anymore. I don’t have to worry about inexperienced caterer anymore. I don’t have to worry about where my guests have to park anymore. I don’t have to worry about the weather anymore.

Wow, I wish I had seen the actual premise much, much, much sooner!

With the evil, all-consuming dream now a definte no-go, we also didn’t have to go through with the 2nd function at the chinese restaurant. That made me really happy too, you know.

Hence the start of our search for the right hotel. Which took only a day. So yeah, finally, we’ve confirmed our wedding venue! Sorry for the anti-climax.

The moral of this story is: don’t get conned by professionally taken pictures on websites. Go see the premise first before pre-maturely filling your head with illusions of grandeur.

Now all I need to do is attempt to bring the initial plan into the hotel’s ballroom. But that’s after finding THE PERFECT DRESS!

Thanks for reading.

Signing off,
Kimzilla.