Best Of: THE KNOT!

We are proud to announce that Antonia Christianson Events has been rated by local brides and

 voted The Knot Best of Weddings 2011 Pick.

A Groom's Perspective: Hire a professional planner.

I wanted to introduce you to my clients Rachel & Mike. They are a very fun couple that we helped plan a reception for...they were married last year in NYC and wanted to be able to share their wedding joy with friends and family... so they decided to hold a reception at the Bay Breeze Club on Ft. Monroe. After the wedding Mike wrote me an email about how Antonia Christianson Events had changed his perspective on hiring a wedding planner (something he previously thought was unnecessary)...so I asked him to share his thoughts with us. 

I am honored to feature him today and thankful that our work does not go unnoticed (by anyone involved). Below is the post he wrote.  

(We look forward to sharing more details of their wedding in the coming weeks.) 

Above is an image of Mike and Rachel at their New York City Nuptials in September.

As the wedding planning proceeded I agreed with most ideas that my bride-to-be, Rachel, suggested concerning wedding plans.  However, I disagreed with hiring a wedding planner because we could save cash by doing everything ourselves.  We were busy, but we had plenty of time to get things done.  Is this stuff that complicated?  Invites, minister, cake, DJ, booze, food and add water... you got a wedding.  Anything we don't know we can Google, right?

I was wrong.  Very wrong. 

Rachel and I began the festivities planning and we realized that there was more to planning a wedding than expected.  Also, we were new to town so we had no idea who we should hire.  We didn't want to get ripped off, or worse hire someone substandard.  Finally, I conceded that we should bring a subject matter expert.  Rach interviewed some folks and we hired Missy.  It was the best decision we made concerning the wedding.  She had great ideas and taught us how to throw a great party.  

More importantly, I need to emphasize that Missy worked within our budget! Before I met Missy, I assumed that she was going to try to sell us on stuff we didn't need.  Once again, I was wrong.  We (and by "we" I mean Rach) made the centerpieces and invites and Missy worked with all our materials and gave Rachel solid suggestions.  Missy was also candid when it was needed.  For example, we wanted a "candy bar" but Missy stated those are very popular but can be expensive.  I read that to mean, "Don't waste your money on something that is overdone already." 

Then the big day.  Rachel and I didn't lift a finger the entire wedding.  Missy took charge of the all the moving components involved with the wedding.  And there are a ton of moving parts.  Missy and her staff were all over the place taking care of everything.  Complete set up, directing the vendors, managing the flow of the event, checking on us, directing guests, etc.  If it wasn't for Missy, it would have been me and Rach doing all the management and not enjoying ourselves.  I guarantee that I only noticed a small percentage of the work that Missy was doing.  Everything at the wedding was seamless so she had to be behind the scenes making things happen.  She got to know us, knew what we wanted, as was able to make decisions without us knowing that there was even an issue so we could enjoy our time with our loved ones.

Antonia Christianson Events is a must hire for wedding.  My wife, family, friends and I had a blast. The money we paid to Missy we saved with her cost saving ideas and a very low stress wedding.  We owe Missy and her suggested vendors for all of our wonderful memories.

Bride & Bloom Magazine

What an amazing year 2010 has started off as! We have great clients that we are excited to work with, a "Take Charge" sort of event staff and great opportunities brought upon us...such as the one I'm going to share today.

A few months ago I was presented with an opportunity to become one of the three event planners/designers featured in the ever popular magazine Bride & Bloom. We were given Turquoise as the "must use" color for the feature and chose Emerald as our accent. After a little soul searching through one of my favorite blogs we came up with the idea of using a "Secret Garden" to help us tie all of our design ideas together.

With only a few weeks to create and implement all of the design details for the shoot, I knew it was imperative to pull together our "A Team" of vendors that have the same take charge attitude that gets us through our amazing weddings week after week. Daevid Reed was first to come on board along with Patti Cakes, Inc., the ladies at RSVP Stationery, Maya Couture and of course the ever fabulous Eleise Theuer Photography. The entire team understood our vision which helped in more ways than I can explain!

Of course, our "secret garden theme" could not have been believable unless it was at one of our local gardens: The Hermitage Foundation Museum. (an amazing place for weddings!)

After much anticipation, the edition of Bride Bloom that we were featured on, hit news stands last week, here are a few more images from the shoot:

They picked quite a few images to feature, but I thought you might enjoy a few more.

This is our favorite picture of our good friend Daevid! He provided us with amazing floral arrangements! Thanks so much!

We almost forgot... this beautiful bouquet was featured in the same magazine under the header

 "25 Best of Bouquets". Congrats Daevid! 

Brides Choice Awards 2010!

Virginia Beach, Virginia – January 19, 2010 - WeddingWire, the nation’s leading wedding technology company, just announced Antonia Christianson Events has been selected to receive the 2010 Bride’s Choice Awards™ for Wedding Planning!

The annual Bride’s Choice Awards™ recognizes and celebrates excellence in quality and service within the wedding industry, as determined by recent reviews and extensive surveys from over 500,000 newlyweds.

Antonia Christianson Events is among the top five percent of all vendors in the WeddingWire community, which includes over 100,000 wedding professionals across the US and Canada. Awards were given to winners across 19 different service categories, from wedding venues to wedding photographers.

“We are excited to recognize and honor the success of the top wedding professionals within the WeddingWire Community” said Timothy Chi, WeddingWire’s Chief Executive Officer. “The annual Bride’s Choice Awards™ program has given us the unique opportunity to highlight the best wedding professionals in each region as reviewed by brides and grooms who have utilized their services in the past year.”

We are happy to announce that Antonia Christianson Events is among the very best Wedding Planners within the WeddingWire Network, which includes WeddingWire and Martha Stewart Weddings. We would like to thank our past newlyweds for nominating us for the 2010 Bride’s Choice Awards™.


For more information, please visit us at http://www.antoniachristiansonevents.com/.

Antonia Christianson Events featured on a National Wedding Blog

We recently started a series for our blog called "Your Mom Is Not A..." (fill in the blank) with our first article called "Your Mom Is Not A Wedding Planner" and it was a great hit! It took me months and months to start this series because I really wanted to get a point across without insulting any of our readers.  I wanted brides and their mothers to understand we were coming from a place filled with support and understanding...and we wanted this series to help them understand the reality and stress that comes along with a complete "DIY" event.  Much to our surprise brides, their mothers, their sisters, their friends and even other planners loved the post. So much so that when celebrity wedding planner Sasha Souza was looking for guest bloggers we thought what better place than to publish our second post in the series on Sasha's blog... and we did!

Visit our latest post on http://www.sparkliatti.com/ ... "Your Mom Is Not A Florist". (unless of course, she is)

Halloween Tips as seen on Fox 43

Last week Cheryl Tan with Fox 43 came to our studios to get a little insight in how to decorate for a DIY halloween party. We were able to show her some inexpensive fun ideas that can really spruce up your house this halloween.

As Seen in... "VOW" Magazine

I have been blessed to work on many amazing events throughout my career and I am always honored when we get mentioned in the press. In recent months we have been both quoted in a great article and had the beautiful wedding of Joe and Natalia featured in VOW magazine. You can pick up the most current issue in bridal stores and around town now.

Great Compliment!

There is nothing better than receiving compliments on your work as a planner...or any work for that matter. The below email is from a very fun and relaxed MOB Val...Her daughter Stephanie got married a few weeks ago...Thanks Val! We had a blast and can't wait for Christy's big day! Here is just a snipit of her sweet letter!


"...I wanted to take a minute to say "Thank You" for all you did to insure that Stephanie's Wedding Day was everything she ever wanted....and more! I sincerely appreciate everything you to did to keep up organized and on track, and for relieving me of "the details" so Ray and I could enjoy the day as well.
Our best wishes to you for continued success! ..."

Video Blog: Episode 2

Check out our video blog...Episode 2.

Video Blog with Natalia

Every Wednesday at z104 Natalia posts a video blog. This is one that we did last week together, we had the best time. Keep checking back for more video blogs to come.

A Kind Word

One of the best parts of being a business owner is hearing kind words about your hard work after you finish a "job." I received a letter yesterday from a "mother of the bride" which really brought a smile to my face...

I am the "mother of the bride" and I have nothing but praise for Antonia Christianson Events. My daughter got engaged in February and chose to get married in September. We decided that we would need a wedding planner about two months later. After meeting with Missy, my daughter thought she would be a good choice for the big event. Missy was the perfect person to help plan the wedding. She was punctual in our meetings, prompt in returning emails and always pleasant and interested in how the wedding was progressing. If questions were asked about wedding vendors, Missy always researched and came back with a choice of answers.

The services we requested were mainly for the day of the wedding. I do not know what we would have done without her! She was a true lifesaver! On the day of the wedding, Missy arrived early and jumped right in, setting up and arranging, checking on everyone and taking the pressure of "worry" out of "what should we do next". Organization is a major issue when getting married and Missy had the wedding day so well planned, everything fell right into place. One of the traits I appreciated about Missy was her positive, calming attitude. When everyone else was getting wedding day jitters, she kept a smile on her face and helped calm the situation.

Some people think having a wedding planner is an unnecessary expense. The "father of the bride" was one of these people. But after seeing the terrific job Missy did, he decided Missy was a great investment in the wedding! If we had another wedding, we would use her again in a heartbeat.

Thank you again Missy for everything you did to help make our daughter's wedding so special!

Paula Barrett
Sterling, Virginia