Amazingly, everyone we hired for the wedding was absolutely wonderful, and we'd recommend them all. Here are the people we worked with:
Venue
The Inn on Lake
Waramaug
Sadly, the Inn closed its doors on February 23,
1998. The Inn is now a private home, and the land across the street
where we were married has become private property as well.
Photographer
Maureen
Edwards DeFries -- you can get a sense of her pictures from this site;
she's very good, unobtrusive, and professional -- and her pictures are
beautiful.
Phone: (203) 758-3170
Musicians
Trio Da Camera
-- baroque and classical chamber music -- flute, violin, and cello --
lovely music, professional musicians, wonderful people, and very
reasonably priced
Contact: Peter Standaart
Florist
Kent Greenhouse
-- beautiful work, great ideas, fresh and dried/silk, willing to work
within a budget
Contact: Debby Bennett
Phone: (860)
927-3480
Justice of the Peace
Barbara
Reynolds -- Very nice, flexible, and a great reader (this is extremely
important!). She told us there was only one line she had to say to make it
legal, and the rest of the ceremony was ours to write, although she'd
provide suggestions if needed.
Here are some of the stores and services we used, and our reviews of them:
Tiffany's Wedding Dress
Jessica
McClintock -- the Paramus, NJ store in the Garden State Plaza -- they
were very helpful, the store is beautiful, and the gorgeous dress arrived
weeks ahead of schedule! (They don't do alterations, though.)
Phone:
(201) 291-9757
Jim's Tuxedo Rental
Gingiss
Formal Wear -- Stamford, CT -- helpful, professional, and reasonably
priced
Tiffany's Veil
Affordable
Elegance -- Dobbs Ferry, NY -- I wouldn't recommend them
Phone:
(914) 693-5798
Wedding Dress Alterations
Mary
& Patty Alterations -- Thornwood, NY -- nice people, good work,
and affordable prices
Phone: (914) 741-2045
Wedding Rings
The Clay
Pot -- Brooklyn, NY
The salespeople are great and extremely
knowledgeable about different designers, metals, and stones. Most of the
rings they carry are handmade by American craftspeople, and are available
in a variety of metals, from white and yellow gold to platinum.
Phone:
(718) 788-6564
Favors
Godiva --
White Plains, NY -- they were nice, helpful, and accommodating -- and the
favors were ready ahead of schedule
Invitation Wrap & Ribbon
Kate's
Paperie -- New York, NY -- quite expensive, but absolutely beautiful
products
Phone: (212) 633-0570
Invitations
Heart
Thoughts -- definitely on the expensive side, but I was very satisfied
with their service and timing
We registered with the following stores; here's what we thought of them:
Crate & Barrel
Everything
was smooth and went very well; the only complaint I have is that they
didn't have the registry guns, so we had to write in all the SKU numbers,
descriptions, prices, etc.
Macy's
Despite the many
complaints I read on the wedding newsgroups, we didn't have any problem
with them. We used their registry guns to register, which was fun; the
people were generally very nice to us and knew what they were doing --
with the exception of one NJ store; we added to our registry at Macy's
stores all over the tri-state area, which worked out perfectly well;
special orders took awhile to get to us, but they arrived exactly when
we'd been told they would; I wish they'd put prices on the registry
printouts, however; and their prices are a bit steep sometimes, but then
again they have big sales too.
