Events | Regency Center Centennial Celebration!

A night that I thought I would only stay until 8PM, at most 8:30PM, I stayed until 10:30PM! If it wasn't because my husband had to pick me up, I would've stayed till the end! What a night! What a night! The newly renovated 100 year-old Regency Center was gorgeous and jaw-dropping, especially with all the live performances throughout the night in the Grand Ballroom and The Lodge!

Whenever I go to these networking events, I tell myself to meet at least one person. I met many, but among them, that one person turned out to be another Florist, but one that has been in the business for 20 years and services mostly Sonoma County.

We immediately clicked! The more we talked about our individual businesses, the more similar we found our business models and even philosophy in life! It was like talking to an old friend, and I felt so open to tell her my hidden qualms, frustration and basically everything under the moon! It was so refreshing to let it all out and having someone in the industry COMPLETELY understand you, because they probably went through the same thing just last week! =P

We spent the rest of the night basically partying it up! And even on the dance floor too!! I don't know if i was too young or too old, but when i got whisked onto the dance floor, I felt like I was too YOUNG to know how to swing dance. And after trying to catch up to my partner who was so gracious to put up with my two left feet, my lower back was hurting, then I thought I must be too OLD! =P

Real Wedding | liza & eric

The bride and I met more than a year ago to start planning the flowers for her wedding. She was the first bride to book with me in 2008 for her 2009 wedding, and her wedding date 6/27/09 turned out to be one of the two most popular wedding inquiry dates for us this year. We had to turn down so many weddings for this one wedding, so it goes to show it pays to book early. =P

The wedding took place at the beautiful sun-beaming Ruby Hill Golf Club in Pleasanton - the ceremony in their outdoor oval terrace and the reception in their Grand Ballroom. Chic, black and white - linens, chair covers and sashes, completely accented by our red-delicious perfectly round balls of blooming roses and carnations. Also are dahlias, tulips and hypericum berries found in the bouquets and galvanized buckets along the aisle. A quick peek from my camera:

Real Wedding | sharon & carter

Happy and vibrant were the 2 words the bride used often when we initially talked about her wedding flowers. These two words slowly translated into rich hues of hot pink and cantaloupe orange, with pops of lime green.

My creative juices completely poured out for this wedding. It was truly unique because it was the first time my good friend from high school (the groom) and my husband's good friend also from high school (the bride), were getting married. They crossed paths themselves initially in college, then through the years, with my husband and my help (we like to credit ourselves forever for this union), the two finally started dating. I can still remember the time when they were telling us how they finally got together, and the four of us happened to be sitting on these couches at Macy's. I will never forget when he told me how happy he was - like Tom Cruise jumping on the couch on Oprah. And now, the two were getting married.

So I had to give them my all and more. Pink calla lilies, tulips, hydrangeas, with cantaloupe roses, dahlias, and pops of cymbidium orchids, snowball viburnum, AND KUMQUATS! Ribbons, ribbons, and ribbons tied the theme of these vibrant colors - thick hot pink ribbon outlining the aisle runner sprinkled with orange rose petals, pink and orange ribbons on the lip of the altar vases, ribbons wrapped around the guestbook and centerpiece vases. Because they were working with a budget, using these ribbons was an inexpensive way to add so much color and vibrancy, while using minimal flowers - all to set the stage at Kohl Mansion in Burlingame with the reception following at Hong Kong Flower Lounge in Millbrae.

Here are a few teaser photos from my camera, can't wait to get the photographer's pictures!

Events | Pleasanton Chamber of Commerce mixer at Wente Vineyards

Sweet summer, picnic-ky theme set the stage for Pleasanton's Chamber of Commerce mixer at Wente Vineyards. As one of Wente's recommended vendors, we were invited to sponsor the flowers for this event. The simple mix of white daisies and seeded eucalyptus in glass vases were the perfect accompaniment to the red-plaided, green linens and white wooden folding chairs on Wente's new ceremony setting, The Vineyard Lawn.

It was refreshing to meet some local businesses that were NOT in the wedding industry:

(1) Amelia's Gourmet Deli-Bistro - freshly baked breads daily and is venturing into the cupcake side of the wedding business, coming soon online

(2) Sue Evans Photography - refreshing to meet a photographer who does NOT do weddings, but focuses on "nature and you"

(3) Cynthia Safdari Realtor - buy or sell with cindy (buyorsellwithcindy@yahoo.com) at J. Rockcliff Realtors, Pleasanton location

(4) Red Door Restoration - Z Safdari, Cynthia's husband, has been in the business for 20 years and does everything from new construction to construction management and mold remediation (reddoorrestoration@yahoo.com)

Real Wedding | catherine & dan

The wedding this past Saturday at Allied Arts Guild in Menlo Park really reminded me of why I love what I do. It was a beautiful outdoor setting with the perfect weather - not too hot, a little sunny, with a tiny breeze. I will never forget meeting with this bride at our initial consultation, she said "I didn't come here to chat, I came to buy some flowers!" Needless to say, she signed with me on the spot.

The photographer promised me his team of three will definitely take pictures of all the details, but I can't wait for them, so for now, here are a few teasers from my little point-and-shoot camera:

Events | Luncheon at The University Club, SF

What was supposed to be a casual dim sum for four turned into an intimate luncheon for eight, including Beverly of Especially Yours Chair Covers, Gloria of Gloria Wong Designs, Jubilee of Jubilee Lau Events, Nicole Ha of Nicole Ha Designs, Nancy of Nancy Liu Chin Designs, Laura of Poppy's Petalsworks and of course Barbara Lewis, Catering/Events Manager of the University Club who so graciously offered to host the luncheon for us. Located on Nob Hill, specifically at 800 Powell St, the University Club is the best kept secret in San Francisco!

Real Wedding | wennie & dave

Ceremony St. Regis San Francisco (Conservatory, Level four)
Reception St. Regis San Francisco (Gallery Ballroom, Level two)
Photography Martin Lam Photography

Events | The Knot Wedding Network's Industry Networking Event

WHEN: Wednesday, May 13, 2009, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
WHERE: The Galleria at the San Francisco Design Center

101 Henry Adams Street

San Francisco, CA 94103

www.sfvenues.com

I'll be here tonight! Hope to see you all there!

Featured | www.brides.com

San Francisco City Hall featured on Brides.com's front page! It's their feature on wedding dresses of the season shown in scenes from San Francisco's City Hall. The photos are all courtesy of Chung Li Photography, which are photos from the same City Hall weddings we did together. If you click through the pictures, you'll see our florals in the background!
Here are some screenshots:

Wente Vineyards, Livermore e-postcards!

A few weeks back, I blogged about my sales presentation at Wente Vineyards. Needless to say, the meeting went well, that quickly following, I had my graphics guy rush to put together a "venue postcard" for all the sales managers to send to their clients. It's in a similar format as the one we had designed for our San Francisco City Hall ad, (so that it's easily recognizable as one of our marketing campaigns), but the pictures were swapped out and wording added, so that this new postcard specifically featured the florals we had done at Wente Vineyards.

For now, this new postcard is in pdf format only. I am embracing the fact that Wente and myself don't feel the need to send out traditional packets of information/postcards. Packets mailed out just means wasted paper, wasted time and wasted postage, especially when the same information can be sent faster, with less waste and probably better received via email/internet anyway. GO GREEN!

Photographer Martina Konietzny Photography

SJMA Council of 100 Annual Dinner

Didn't get a chance to blog about an event we did last last week on 3/6/09. It was a sponsorship event that we gladly did for the San Jose Museum of Art's Council of 100 Annual Dinner. The night was themed around the guest speaker, Tony Oursler - an internationally reknowned video artist - and his piece, Slip, 2003. Fiberglass sculpture, which is currently displayed at SJMA. Here is a picture of the piece taken from SJMA's website, but it's definitely something you have to see in person to appreciate...because it's alive and it talks!

So of course we drew our inspiration from such a unique piece and artist. Worked closely with the Director of Individual Giving and one of the committee members, brainstorming and going to town with picking out very interesting textural materials to use. In the end, we decided to be minimal and use succulents, thistle, kale, an orb, waterproof lights and of course gels! That is our final product for each the centerpieces and the registration table.

Recommended Vendor of Wente Vineyard!

With 125 years of history and still family-owned, Wente Vineyards has the ultimate wine country setting for weddings and events...AND it's only in Livermore!

In the last 2 years, we've done a few weddings in their beautiful outdoor terrace lawn. Because we've kept in touch with their ultra-nice sales manager during this time, I've recently been invited to meet their other 4 sales managers in the office to do a sales presentation. Bringing them (including the sales assistants and director) each a little squared shaped vase arrangement - inside leaf-wrapped, of green spider mums, midnight-blue thistle with just a touch of eucalyptus - each laid in a 3X3 squared formation. The whole could be used for a centerpiece but then taken individually as favors - serving double duty in this day and age of reduce, reuse and recyle - this idea was easily well-received by all the managers for going-green! LOVE IT!









(not pictured very good here, but you get the idea!)

Below are some weddings we've done at Wente, which are also clips from our new print portfolio (that we've slaved over to finish within a one-month deadline for THIS meeting and other marketing events in the last few weeks, well-worth it because we are now one of their recommended vendors!):





Photographers
Martina Konietzny Photography (top)
Todd Rafalovich (bottom)

Introducing Oceano Hotel & Spa

I've recently heard so much about Oceano that when I ran into their booth at the Hillsdale Bridal & Expo Faire, I had to introduce myself and learn more about this most-talked about, newest wedding venue in Half Moon Bay! After chatting up a bit, the wedding and event planner graciously invited me to their wedding event the following Sunday to view their venue first-hand.
The "Wedding Event/Fashion Show" was for brides, grooms and families to enjoy a fun and informative day at Oceano while viewing their different event spaces. The ballroom was filled with event professionals displaying their services and a selective panel of vendors spoke about "Unlock(ing) the Secrets to a Successful Wedding" in the Atrium. The room that I fell in love with is The Galleria, (above left), whose original intent was not for weddings, but a street that lined the hotel's boutique shops. But after one bride's request to have a wedding in this indoor (but with an outdoor feel because of the skylight roof), the rest is history!

Some vendors I met are:
Studio Cake - love her business philosophy as well as her complete packaging, from the dainty boxes that held her sample cakes to her logo and website. The cake pictures on her website are as divine as they are in person! You have to check it out at: http://www.studiocake.com/. Here are some of my favorites (below):

That Takes the Cake - love her friendly personality and enthusiasm, plus she's on Union Street Wedding Ring! Located in a high-end location, her cupcakes are surprisingly quite affordable! Cutest red velvets (below):

Cakework - wealth of experience, continued innovation, inspired from just about anything! She is the inventor of those famous and flawless stripes you see on cakes. When asked, she wouldn't reveal her secret! =P Hates fondant and uses only white chocolate. The most renowned stripes (below):