The making of a Happy Z Wedding Bride

Today marks THE day when we settled Darling’s wedding gowns! We have already chosen some gowns for our indoor and outdoor shoots but short of a “spectacular” Cheongsam to truly match our Grand Shanghai Theme…..until today!

Darling is the one making all the research for her gowns, browsing through hundreds and thousands of pictures on the internet, flipping through the online catalogue of Z wedding gowns, as well as catalogues of Dang Studio, Le Grand etc, in order to find her perfect gown. Well well well, 皇天不负有心人, Darling finally came across her perfect gown after months of research!

We signed with Z wedding about maybe 3-4 years ago? At that time, we were attracted to the gowns already. We were curious to find out more about Z wedding and their services after we signed the package so went on the Net and searched….to our horror, Z Wedding has many mixed reviews. They even banned 1 forum from listing a thread under their name coz of too many bad reviews! We were worried, Darling more worried….did we ganna cheated again? Regularly, Darling would pay the Z Wedding website a visit to view their latest gowns over the years. The gowns of subsequent years after we signed were not as impressive and Darling was having second thoughts about continuing with Z Wedding. Luckily somehow from late last year, Z Wedding gowns actually picked up standard and became beautiful again. And it picked up the standard at the right time coz we are in need of beautiful gowns for our wedding on 17 March 2012!

We have both indoor and outdoor shots, all done in a day. 3 outdoor locations and 2 indoor themes. We have 2 indoor gowns and 2 outdoor gowns. How can we take it lying down to have only 4 gowns? There’s 1 evening gown which Darling like but not available on our Actual Day for Darling to wear. Our coordinator Grace actually is kind enough to allow us to use that gown for our photoshoot only and also allowed us to choose ANOTHER evening gown for our Actual Day! We initially have a White Can-Can wedding gown as well as a pink evening gown for our outdoor shoot, and a White Can-Can wedding gown and a Victorian style green evening down with black lace for our indoor shoot.

Darling set eyes on a Le Grand Cheongsam a few days earlier and has been dying to try it on! So we fixed a meeting with Z Wedding today and got Darling into the Cheongsam and OH MY GOD!! It fits her almost perfectly! Almost like made to measure gown!

So we decided to pay s$1788 for the rental of the LeGrand Cheongsam for photoshoot and for actual day wear! Totally worth it, 简直一见钟情!

After some negotiation today, we managed to fix a more favorable arrangement. A total of 6 different gowns for Darling to wear!

—– Outdoor shoot —–

1 white wedding gown

1 pink Chiffon material evening gown

1 Cheong Sam from LeGrand (special request to bring for outdoor shoot)

1 Casual wear (Most likely our ROM gown)

—- Indoor Shoot —-

1 white wedding gown (also for actual day wear)

1 green with black lace evening gown

1 Cheong Sam from LeGrand (also for actual day wear)

—- Actual Day —-

1 White wedding gown (same as indoor shoot)

1 Qun Kua for tea ceremony (to be rented)

1 Grey with black lace Victorian Evening Gown (only for Actual Day wear)

1 LeGrand Cheongsam (same as photoshoot)

The photoshoot is happening on the 6 Nov…hope everything goes well! I am choosing locations for our photoshoot in the meantime.

I am so so so Happy to see Darling in such a Happy mood when she has her perfect gown! Wish that Darling will be this happy forever!!

I love you Darling. XOXO

It’s been fixed! Our fastest decision ever… …

Yup, it’s been fixed! Our AD banquet venue has been fixed!
We are planning on having a 20 table banquet and have shorlisted a few candidates:
HOTELS:
1) Mandarin Orchard (Mandarin Court) with the wondeful theatre style layout), Food by Pine Court
2) Carlton hotel with it’s new Empess ballroom, Food by Wah Lok
3) Goodwood Park hotel with it’s nice Victorian style Tudor (smaller) and Windsor(bigger) ballrooms and of course the assured food quality by Min Jiang
RESTURANTS:
1) Peach Garden @ Hotel Miramar: The food quality is confirmed but the hotel looks lao-bok leh
2) Peony Jade @ Keppel: Food good, place nice but the problem with accessibilty and no bridal suite
3) Pine Court @ Mandarin Orchard: Award winning, nice oriental chic decor
4) Grand Shanghai : Food good, sevice good, decor good good. attached to Grand Copthorne watefront hotel

After collecting the studio shots that we took in our graduation gowns, we decided to go on a banquet hunting trip. Our first stop is the Grand Copthorne Waterfront @ Clarke Quay, to see Grand Shanghai. It’s a long stoll from Raffles place to the hotel but we had a good relaxing stoll along the Singapore River with a small breeze. Darling never complain too much of the walking distance….probably because she’s quite excited with seeing venues too. After a good 15-20 min walk, we arrived at Grand Shanghai and the place immediately made us fall in love. There is a dedicated drive thru up till the resturant door and the decor truly showsthe Shanghai glory. We were peeping through the glass doors at the wedding setup for tonight’s banquet when a friendly manager ushered us in. The manager quickly went through the hotel banquet packages! Pro! And even gave us a quick tour of the place…basically he talk non stop….haha just like when I was seeing patients in walk-in clinic, talking non stop and avoid unneccessary questions from the client.
Darling fell in love immediately…so did I. The packages are so attractive! There is 100% confirmation for car park and free flow of beer and mixers! 1 bottle of Red / White Wine per table….and there is 1 night stay at Grand Copthorne Waterfront executive suite FOC! It’s everything a couple can ask for. Then the bomb came… … there is 1 couple in front if us choosing 17 March 2012! What the heck, we are slower! We left our name with David and proceeded on to other venues.

After seeing Grand Shanghai, I crossed out Peony Jade and Peach Garden as both will have nothing to fight against Grand Shanghai.

Off we go to the Mandarin Orchard. The hotel looks posh and the mandarin court is at level 35 (although the view isn’t very nice…just buildings and a construction site). The ballroom is gorgeous too and looks spacious. The tiered seating makes it special. The walls are padded and there are nice chandeliers leading from the corridor to the ballroom. The round table looks smaller compared to the ones at Grand Shanghai, so can only seat 10 guests per table, unlike the 12 max at GSH. We liked the place as well! Really nice and cosy and special and we can have a movie themed wedding banquet too!

We had a break at Starbucks to go through the package at GSH, short discussion on the venues….Hmm….both darling and I feel like we should go for the GSH! Good food, within budget, good themed wedding, WHY NOT?

Stat, I made a call to David, sounded our interest, then David called up the initial couple to stess them…Haha, they gave up the date and darling and me got it! We have our wedding banquet venue! We bia the bus down, signed on the dotted line, paid ou deposit and there we are…..HAPPY and SATISFIED couple who got what we wanted.

We are the Grand Shanghai Bride and Groom!
“夜上海夜上海你是个不夜城
华灯起乐声响歌舞升平
只见她笑脸迎谁知她内心苦闷
夜生活都为了衣食住行
酒不醉人人自醉
胡天胡地蹉跎了青春
晓色朦胧转眼醒大家归去
心灵儿随着转动的车轮
换一换新天地别有一个新环境
回味着夜生活如梦初醒”