Palm Springs Wedding Planning to Perfection.

By Barbara Beckley

The perfect venue, the ideal hotel, the best vendors—check, check, and check! Palm Springs offers everything to make your wedding the magical day you envision—from front-and-center glamor to behind-the-scenes experts.

There’s a lot to orchestrate before The Big Day. Florals, food, The Cake, photography, and entertainment. Even if you’re eloping or want a tiny wedding, there are still key elements to plan. No worries. Palm Springs has A-list wedding-tested vendors – many celebrity favorites – to make your Big Day the best of them all. From planners to floral gurus, award-winning cake designers, caterers, top DJs, and even custom tailors (last-minute alternations).

Palm Springs Wedding Planners

Whether your dream is haute luxury or Boho off-beat, and your plan of action is do-it-yourself up until the ceremony or let the specialists take the bouquet and run with it – Palm Springs’ has planning experts for every style.

Artisan Event Floral Décor is “where flowers, fabrics, light and one-of-a-kind accessories create magical weddings,” explains owner/wedding planner Joey Lizotte. He and his team are true to their word – going over the top for whatever you desire. Want special entertainment in addition to a DJ?  Joey can give you celebrities, circus and specialty performers, orchestras, strings, fireworks, and light shows.

He does it all, from venue search and contract negotiations to on-site wedding day coordination. His florals are gorgeous – often local blooms mixed with trendy succulents and desert plants. His overall wedding services include custom floral design: arbors, arches, and chuppahs; dramatic entryways; table arrangements and landscapes; architectural design: A/V, tents, custom structures, floor plans; lighting; stage; and décor: furniture, accessories, chandeliers.

If you desire a slightly wild and crazy wedding yet expertly executed, look to After The Engagement. “We don’t do boring,” says owner/planner Courtney Tibbets. As she explains to her team, “We’re a gal and a couple of (really fun, really stylish) gay guys, Johnny and Thomas, here at your service. We like to make things more fun, more experiential, more real.” She’s the planner to trust, as her website states, “If you think too many cocktails at a wedding is never enough. If you feel comfortable foregoing wedding traditions that don’t make sense to you or even creating your own.”

Stacey Jones Event Design is dedicated to “anti-cookie cutter” bespoke weddings with custom details and unique, quintessential, and modern sophistication. From rehearsal dinners and welcome parties to pre-wedding spa days, Stacey goes the extra mile.

Wedding Cake & Desserts

Wedding cake as art! Gone is the white layer cake. It is the cake/dessert that reflects the two of you – think donut walls, chocolate-dipped churros, and vividly colored tiers of floral, frosted love.

History-making Over the Rainbow Desserts (OTR) will make whatever you choose an Over-the-Top memory maker. OTR invented the “Chocolate Covered Potato Chip” cupcake back in 2008, and it was featured in Food & Wine magazine. Choose this signature marvel—a rich chocolate buttercream cupcake topped with chocolate-covered potato chips. Or other sensations such as their “Citrus Hostess Look A Like” cupcake or Toasted Key Lime Coconut cupcakes. They also create custom flavors and design wedding cakes to your specifications.

Palm Springs Wedding Florists

Florist to the stars Palm Springs Florist is Palm Springs’ original florist, founded by the owner’s grandfather and the FTD master design instructor in 1947. Serving celebrities like Frank Sinatra, Elvis, Lucille Ball, Bob Hope, and Liberace – remember how flamboyant Liberace’s florals were – their floral artistry is in high demand from classic to trendy florals-and-succulents for brides’ bouquets, table florals, boutonnieres and more.

When haute elegance is your dream, Vaso Bello Celebrations is renowned for fine floral design and event décor for luxury weddings. Rated among the nation’s top 100 wedding florists, owner/designer Ronn Burns explains, “We collaborate ideas with our clients to execute their vision with the ‘Bello’ touch. Bellissimo! Together, we’ll design a blueprint of color, style, and texture.” Vaso Bello also offers hundreds of choices of fine linen tablecloths, napkins, and table runners.

From simple and impactful to impressively untraditional, Prism Floral Design gets your style. “My style is modern, colorful, playful, and slightly off-beat,” says owner/designer Karin Williams. Guess what, her mother was a Hippie, so she gets it. “Your thoughtfulness and talents were ready to accommodate our special brand of weird…we will never forget how beautifully and perfectly ‘us’ it was,” wrote one bride. Bouquets, boutonnieres, centerpieces, corsages, bud vases, you name it. If you’re thinking small, its Micro-Wedding and Elopement packages include the bride’s bouquet, groom’s boutonniere, two boutonnieres, or two small bouquets, and a small keepsake arrangement.

As a florist for the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes, all of President Obama’s Los Angeles fundraising events, five presidential inaugurations and inaugural balls, and numerous charity events, including The American Cancer Society, My Little Flower Shop is a premier full-service floral and event design studio in designing, planning and executing one-of-a-kind high profile events and weddings. “Let us get to know you and help you celebrate in style!” say co-owners Special Event Artist Gregory Goodman and CEO Alan Kelly. The duo is committed to “our customers and our community, so a charity of each bride’s choosing receives a percentage of the event total as our way to give back,” explains Kelly.

Speaking of giving back. The well chosen Palm Springs wedding vendor and flower-driven collective, Hermano Flower Shop, designs and sells its floral arrangements – using the freshest seasonal flowers – as a way to support the desert’s local creative community in arts and music. The arrangements are different every week due to the available florals, allowing the lead florist the creative freedom to express himself in a continually new form – and always a fun and wild aesthetic. Perfect for your elopement or tiny wedding.

Local Caterers… And More

The opportunities are limitless. From classic sit-down dinners to fully loaded burgers, maybe even a street taco stand, Palm Springs caterers are as creative as the two of you desire.

Led by Event Designer and Culinary Artist Chad Gardner, the Dash and a Handful catering and event design company is known for creative presentation, exotic, bold spices, unique flavors, and full-service wedding planning. In addition to artisanal dining, Chad’s team can make your venue selection, wedding stationery, wine selection, custom cake, flowers, table and event décor, entertainment, photography and videography, limo and car service, valet parking service, and more.

Seed to fork is the passion of Wheat & Fire, mobile wood-fired pizza catering handcrafted by award-winning owner Chef Anthony Acker, who cooked with James Beard at Beard’s Seaside Oregon Cooking School and counts A-listers and celebrities among his clients. He specializes in creating remarkable food-centric happenings for all wedding events. Choose Wedding Menus that are “Farm Fresh” or “Organic.” All are non-GMO, focus on flavor, and include all-natural dinnerware, utensils, and service ware. Not only is everything from scratch – Chef Anthony grows his own herbs, beets, peppers, radishes, berries, eggplants, microgreens, tomatoes, edible decorations, and more, all from heritage heirloom seeds! Poultry and eggs are free range. Meat and pork are humanly raised.

Known for the originality of its food and perfectionism, The Butler Did It Catering is a long standing Palm Springs wedding vendor that boasts more than 35 years of full service catering “from design to wine” and event planning. Founder and Creative Director Bryan Tuggle and Executive Chef Francisco Colmenero take pride in making wedding dreams come true, designing “a more custom experience — real nouveaux, chic, state-of-the- art menus and craft cocktails,” using the freshest, highest quality ingredients. “Thank you for making my wedding day absolutely perfect,” wrote one bride.

Carousel Catering, a full-service premium planning organization, combines innovative menus with the best venue for lasting wedding memories – in addition to high profile events such as a month of full-service catering for corporate sponsor of the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics. Owner David Erickson has been in business for 40 years and in Palm Springs for 20 years. In addition to custom menus using locally grown produce (organic when possible) – often trending toward gluten-free, vegan, vegetarian, and fish and chicken – at your request, David’s team can support your vision from start to finish and create a special theme. Including venue options, food, floral arrangements, décor, entertainment, and rental needs.

Many of Palm Springs’ favorite restaurants have catering departments. Lulu Catering & Events is famous for creative, innovative, exceptional production skills and culinary excellence, just like Lulu California Bistro. Full service 849 Events & Fine Catering specializes in fresh, delicious menus, impressive presentations, and attention to detail as befits Eight 4 Nine Restaurant & Lounge. F10 Catering + Events creates fresh, seasonal, sustainable menus tailored to the couple’s “wildest dreams,” including elaborate food stations and traditional sit-down dinners, rehearsal dinners, receptions, ceremonies, and day-after brunch. It’s owned by the Birba café, Mr. Lyons steakhouse, and Seymour’s classic cocktails folks, so you can use one of their venues or your own.

Entertainment

You will find DJ Mod Girl at many local events and is always very entertaining. With decades’ experience as a writer/director/producer/choreographer/emcee for television, film and live tours, DJ Modgirl (AKA Kellee McQuinn), is a collaborative partner as well as a performer. She innately understands the “flow” of the Run of Show and is known for her innovative approach to content creation and interactive entertainment, always ensuring the highest level of production quality. She fits the Palm Springs vibe.

Add a royal spin with Palm Springs own British DJ Chris Paul. He’ll make your wedding party the best ever – just like he does for Palm Springs’ hippest hotel pool parties – and did for Sir Richard Branson and Virgin Airlines, the Queen Mother’s 90th birthday at Grosvenor House London, and Princess Diana at the Hippodrome.

Custom Tailor

Tailor to the stars Art Lewin Bespoke Suites in downtown Palm Springs is at the ready with a custom wedding package, custom suites, dress shirts, formal suits for men and women, and bridesmaids alterations.

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