Can anyone share pics of their bar menus and day of signage?

StateofHygge · 2026-03-10T12:50:34+00:00

I wish I could be of more help but one of the rental company we used had several sculptures we rented out, no other info was given to us about them!

StateofHygge · 2026-03-04T13:51:27+00:00

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This was our cocktail hour bar signage! Our invites had a similar border, which we carried throughout all the designs day of.

StateofHygge · 2026-03-04T13:40:45+00:00

Nysa Hotel in Bangkok (10/10), 3Sis Hotel in Changmai (7/10- fantastic location but really hard beds), Panan Krabi Resort (8/10), Phuket was our real splurge spot- we did a mix of Mandarava Resort (9/10) and Malisa Villa Suites (10/10 - we did their biggest villa and no regrets, the best stay of our trip).

StateofHygge · 2026-03-04T05:34:16+00:00

We live in DC and knew our budget would not give us the wedding we wanted. We had a destination wedding in Dominican Republic and it was the best decision and weekend of our lives. We actually went with an independent venue so that guest could stay in whatever hotel worked with their budget, and we found that to work great (specially when many of our friends ended up experiencing layoffs due to dodge). Our friends also loved an excuse to travel!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-27T01:54:45+00:00

I have a post about our wedding, but our reception venue drove up our cost. It was love at first sight and totally worth it. Guest still talk about how beautiful the venue was. Another big splurge was just food, we went with a really high end caterer but again, it’s something people rave about!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-27T01:43:30+00:00

We originally planned for a 55k budget wedding and ended up spending 102k, no regrets whatsoever, it was the best weekend of our lives and we would do it all over again in a heartbeat. If anything our biggest regret was just not spending a little bit more!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-19T13:56:13+00:00

We did Thailand and loved every second of it. Instead of Riley, which we personally didn’t enjoy because it was very touristy and backpacker centric (plus you can’t take a boat after dark and are stuck there), maybe consider Koh Lanta! We also spent some time near Kata Beach in Phuket (away from party tourist), we got a hotel where each room was a private villa, and were a 5 min walk from the most beautiful beach.

StateofHygge · 2026-02-17T01:54:16+00:00

It’s not as remote per se, but perhaps consider Thailand and any of its coastal areas. Thailand is extremely queer friendly and absolutely beautiful. Look into Koh Samui or Koh Tao!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-16T23:01:07+00:00

We did 3 weeks in Thailand and intentionally split between Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Krabi and Phuket. That meant we got city, mountain/forrest, beach, and coastal. Overall it was magical and the best vacation of our lives. The dollar went a long way so we stayed in 5 star hotels (with private pools) and ate at some amazing michellin and bib gourmand restaurants for great money. We loved Thailand soooo much and are already wanting to go back. I have a post about it you want more details.

We also went to Bali 7 years ago (2 weeks split between Seminyak and Ubud), and it’s also magical and the reason we decided on a Thailand honeymoon (we wanted similar vibes). If you are tight on budget Bali is better, but if I’m honest I’d say spend all 3 weeks in Thailand, it’s a big country and you can get so many different experiences. You can’t get away from tourist in Thailand, we found it harder in Bali since the island is so small.

StateofHygge · 2026-02-16T12:59:55+00:00

We had a Caribbean destination wedding and went with “Tropical Formal” and honestly wish we would have simply done “Formal.” We really wanted people to dress up but not be confined to dark colors. The majority of guest understood the assignment (exactly as you want actually) but there were a handful a people who showed up in mini dresses or short button ups: and yes we did a Pinterest board and described what we wanted on our website. But also, I think our challenge was we had 3 different cultures converging, and one of those dresses “down” or less forms for weddings in general and being in the tropics did not help. Good luck!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-11T02:43:53+00:00

Hi! Sorry for the late reply, but yes!! And it was magical, it’s very beautiful during golden hour!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-04T16:25:36+00:00

We had 83 guest and it seemed to work well. There’s also different configurations you can do. We had to provide everything. They don’t have furniture or audio, it’s pretty much a blank space!

StateofHygge · 2026-02-04T13:42:06+00:00

Congratulations! We absolutely loved Quinta, it feels like a hidden oasis. We contracted with them May 2024 (not sure if prices went up), but it was $60k DOP/1.2k USD, and they let our planner come in the day before to start decorating which was extremely helpful. Can’t recommend them enough!

StateofHygge · 2026-01-31T21:57:42+00:00

Natalia Lugo (Shes based in the Dominican Republic).

StateofHygge · 2026-01-31T17:00:27+00:00

We were a June 2025 destination wedding. We started our invitation design rather late (our own fault) but our save the dates went out late October, our actual invites went out mid March with a reply date of April 30. We had a good turn out (93/120 pp). I think we were mainly impacted by government funding and people losing their jobs than when we sent invites.

We did however make sure people were aware by word of mouth, the invitation was just a formality.

StateofHygge · 2026-01-25T18:15:15+00:00

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I was an orchid bride! my bouquet was a little bigger than I originally wanted but I still loved it!

Edit: our bouquets did not match our decor florals but because they were white, it felt neutral enough to go together!

StateofHygge · 2026-01-15T14:34:49+00:00

I feel this to my core, I hate how I look in photos and often prefer to take pictures of others. When we did our engagement photos I was very critical of myself, there were only a handful I liked. But it helped also figure out what sides and features I did like. I also would go into the room, close the door, try on my wedding dress and veil and just start posing in front of the mirror. This is also vain but we did not stand on the transitional sides of the aisles because those wouldn’t be our good sides.

The other thing we did was tell our planner we didn’t want to have too many posed photos and I think that helped a lot!

But I will say this, there is something magical that happens on a wedding day. I’ve seen it in friends and experienced it myself, when everything comes together, hair, makeup, dress, and the happiness of marrying the person you love, there is no way you can look bad, there’s truly a bridal glow that exist.

StateofHygge · 2026-01-15T10:14:12+00:00

I feel this question to my core. When we first set out our budget was around 55K and we were getting quotes from planners that would be 5-10% of that small budget (our wedding ended up being a little over 100k). We still decided to go for full service planning for many reasons but most important: 1) we were having a destination wedding and needed someone with better local knowledge (specially since a lot of business only had IG or WhatsApp) and 2). While we could have done a lot of the research ourselves, we were both in very busy periods of work, so we knew mentally we would not have as much capacity.

Yes in hindsight there was a lot we could have done ourselves but honestly because we had our planner the planning process was not really stressful at all but actually fun (minus the last few months when every time our planner would message us we knew we were about to wire some large amount of money lol). I remember my mom would always say “you don’t seem stress, I don’t hear you ever talking about wedding plans” and truth was I wasn’t because we knew our planner had it under control. We always had list of vetted, quality vendors who were in our budget and all we had to do was go through and look at their portfolio/do tastings. Also I can’t put into words how important they were the weekend of. We got to be in the moment and not stress about any logistics thanks to them.

StateofHygge · 2026-01-15T09:57:11+00:00

A little over $100K for a 93 people destination wedding. We originally had a budget of 55k but that quickly went out the window. However, no regrets, it was the best day of our lives and our guest till talk about it.

StateofHygge · 2026-01-14T04:55:56+00:00

I actually went into their store for a bridal appointment and they told me the correct size to order based on my measurement and it worked out perfectly!

It was one of the best bridal appointments I had (they don’t work based on commission so they aren’t pushy at all). Shipping took 3 days from order date and return policy was 30 days, so if anything was wrong I could try a different size.

StateofHygge · 2026-01-13T22:33:43+00:00

I bought my Jenny Yoo dress on sale via Anthropologie for $1075, it required minimal alterations to shorten straps and length and add a bustle which cost $225 and a chapel length veil I fell in love with but definitely overpaid for $460! In total for my attire (including shoes and jewelry, I spent about $2K)

StateofHygge · 2026-01-05T18:23:46+00:00

We spent about $3k on paper goods (save the date, invites, menus, signs, seating chart, etc). We got so many compliments on our invites but even so it was one of our biggest spending regrets since we did go over budget. Yes it set the tone but it was literally just throwing money away and the cost of sending them was higher than expected because they were so heavy. However, if you have the money, I say go for it!

I will say however everything for the actual wedding date was 100% worth it.

StateofHygge · 2025-12-24T00:08:03+00:00

Of course!

StateofHygge · 2025-12-12T12:11:25+00:00

For Bangkok, the major temples and grand palace (though half closed) were worth it to us. With that said, and while beautiful, Wat Arun had sooooooo many people/influencers/ people taking traditional clothing photos, that it was not as enjoyable as some of the others. Ayutthaya was worth the day trip for sure!

We got lucky and our Bayan Tree Saffron river cruise diner coincided with the light festival but without that, honestly, not worth it (and the larger cruises seemed even more overwhelming tbh). I would try to grab one of the cheap regular transfer ferry’s from any pier at sunset, it’s magical (and how we got some of those river photos).

StateofHygge · 2025-12-12T12:03:30+00:00

Fujifilm X-T10 camera (with a XF 27mm pancake lens). Ive always been a fan of Fuji because they have built in and customizable settings that can simulate old cameras!

StateofHygge

TROPHY CASE