Post Wedding Survey: Joya and Emre

 photo by Callaway Gable Photography

Joya and Emre took some time to fill out my questionnaire and not only gave some good advice and insight into how they feel looking back at their wedding day. Enjoy!

Q. What was the best part of your wedding day?
A. The best part of our day had to standing up during our ceremony and looking out at all our family and friends gathered there because of us. We had so may people travel so far to be with us (from all across the U.S., Canada, Mexico, England, Ireland, Sweden and Turkey!), and to have them all meet in one place to witness our marriage made us feel incredibly blessed.

Q. What do you feel was totally unnecessary?
A. All of the details we put into our wedding were made with love and inspiration, and looking back on how it all came together we wouldn’t have wanted to take anything away.

Q. What would you change, if anything?
A We would have worked on approving our wedding invitations much sooner. I had time over the Christmas holidays to get all the design details worked out, and I let it drag all the way through January. I didn’t know that the letterpress would take almost two weeks to print and, as a result, our invitations got sent out two weeks’ late.

Q. Who was your dress made by?

A. My dress was made by R-Mine Bridal Salon in Studio City, based on an Amsale design.

Q. What was unexpected that you loved?

A. We loved that during our ceremony, and especially when we had our first kiss, a flock of birds flew right over us! All of our guests couldn’t stop commenting on it all night - it was just a purely beautiful moment. Emre also loved that I surprised him by singing a special song to him at our reception, accompanied by a swing quintet!

What are your fondest memories of your wedding day?

Doing a “first look” before our ceremony took so much stress out of the day for us, and really let us relax that much more and spend time with our guests. We had a whole hour for the just the two of us, and that calmed us down and made the rest of the day so much easier and more enjoyable.

Saying vows that we had written ourselves ended up being a one of the most memorable moments for many of our guests. When our officiant first suggested we write our own vows, we were pretty nervous. It is so much easier to just “repeat after me.” But we each took the time to write them down in a small leatherbound book which we read from at our ceremony, and now, we have them to read years from now, and remember how we felt, and we cherish that so much.

Shooting a music video -- even though the mere thought of it seems stressful, i.e. adding a whole extra element of execution to our schedule -- actually kept us less stressed all day. We had these amazing little moments to sing, to get our groove on, and above all smile and laugh, which made the day so much more fun. Once everyone saw the completed video, it truly became the most talked-about highlight of our day! And the fact that we have this incredibly cool memento featuring so many of our family and friends, that is something we will never forget.

Q. Is there anything you wish you had spent more time or money on, or less time or money on?

A. No. All the decisions we made, whether it was to spend more in certain areas or to cut back in others, was made carefully and we were happy with how all our budget was allocated.

Q. Were there any unexpected surprises or issues?

A. We knew that the week of our wedding would be hit or miss weather-wise. Our ceremony was outdoors, and I was concerned with out guests being cold. Originally we had planned to have cucumber water on hand for our guests while they waited for the ceremony to start, and instead we opted for hot cider and chocolate which was much appreciated! It also sprinkled the morning of our wedding, and was overcast for most of the day. We decided to cross our fingers and keep our ceremony outdoors, and, while this definitely upped Amber’s stress level, we were so glad we kept our Plan A as the clouds began parting during our ceremony and ended up being just perfect (especially for our photographers who actually prefer it cloudy than awash in sunshine - who knew?)

Q. What's your number #1 tip for future engaged couples?

A. Hire a wedding planner! That decision set the tone for our entire year of planning. Having access to a superlative list of vendors and expert advice at your fingertips, not having to monitor your budget every second because someone was taking care of it for you, not having to coordinate all the minutiae of vendor requirements and day-of schedules, I could go on and on...but we were really able to take our time with all the planning and never felt that  pre-wedding stress you hear so much about. If you’re on a tight budget and think it’s an expense you can’t justify, I will say it is so worth it! We ended up saving so much precious time and money by letting Amber handle our wedding coordination, and could not have imagined having such a perfect day and overall wedding experience without her help!

Q. How did you feel after the wedding?

A. Tired! But truthfully, we felt so lucky to have had such a beautiful day surrounded by the people who mean the most to us. We felt that all the work we had put in -- on the vendor choices, on the details, and the last-minute DIY projects -- was so worth it. It’s so amazing to have this vision of your wedding day months before it all happens, and then see it actually come together before your eyes. It was a sight to see! We soaked it all in, spent as much time with our family as we could, and then jumped on a plane to our honeymoon, excited to start the next chapter of our lives :-)

Thank you, Joya and Emre, for being such amazing a gracious clients!