Rosette Designs & Co: Classic Chic Styling Part II

On one fine day, in Rosette Designs & Co compound, when we are feeling a little nostalgic and romantic… we decided to roll up our sleeves and dress up, by digging up our black and white collection and do a little styling.

Here in Rosette Designs & Co, we have a common obsession. We love Black and White. Stripes, checkered, chevron.. love love love…Black and white can’t go wrong. It is listed in one of Kate Spade’s 20 Inspiration Yearbook.

But of course, only the brave ones embrace it for a wedding. Please see our works in our website here.

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast” - this quote by Ernest Hemingway might be one of the thousands reasons why everybody adores the idea of Paris. While the city itself might not be as romantic as the mental image, we are still spellbound by the idea of eloping to the City of Love.

If you are keen to do a Paris-theme wedding, please focus on one specific era of the Parisian life. Whether it is Belle Epoque, the Chanel-era, Renaissance, they have distinct characteristics that separates them from each other. Another way, is to focus on the city itself and it’s beauty.

We created this lovely arrangement that housed the silhouette of one of our couple. Love how it turns out.. graphically poetic..

Introducing our best steals yet, emerging from one of the vintage flea market in Singapore.. this mellowing fellow has been a regular resident in our decor line up.

There’s something romantic about the idea of writing letter on a typewriter, which leads to the trend of having it on a wedding. Although this trend was popular around 2-3 years ago, people still loves it. I used it for my own wedding and for my clients. Vintage won’t go out of style.

What puzzles me is the fake-all metal-China-made-typewriter that actually mimic real typewriter…

But having a typewriter is good just for the display sake… because when I tried to type a letter using my retro Olympia, it frustrates me! Where’s the backspace key??!

Guess I’m not ready to give up my digital life.

Now, lets step aside from the mellow zone to an after party of Minty Dessert!

We love seafoam or minty of tiffany color.. they are look-alikes.. and they bring the same feelings.. coolness personified.

Check out our Facebook page here.

CHIJMES: Walk Down the Aisle in Grand Vintage Style

Getting married in CHIJMES is the closest you can get to a Royal Wedding, think Westminster Abbey. Built in 18th century, this convent building carries a Gothic architecture style and it has been well preserved since then. The last activity for religious and education purposes was in 1983 and it was adapted for public use till now. Thankfully the hall managed to survive over the years and now is a popular wedding hall.

We (Rosette Designs & Co) have planned and designed a few weddings in CHIJMES and are still in awe of their potential & beauty. Having the characteristic of a cathedral with tall columns, beautiful ceiling and huge stained glass, it was perfect for Western and Vintage inspired wedding. The best part is, you don’t have to be a Catholic to walk down their aisle.

The hall can fit in up to 30 round tables, but of course the best arrangement is the long table!

Since the hall is generally sports cream and off white color, it’s a designer paradise! We have done weddings in a few colors.

Purple Vintage

Peach Perfect – Vintage Lovely

This wedding gave us a chance to challenge ourselves.. turning a theatre setting for Holy Matrimony…

to Dinner setting in an hour during Cocktail timing! Challenge accepted and completed!

The trick is to hide all the tables into the side wings and hide them behind the elegant drapes. Love how the draper elegantly merged with the venue.

I even recycled the posies from the ceremony to decorate the drapes gatherings. Not a detail is spared!

What is a vintage wedding without antique typewriter and real old books? The books are imported from the father of the Groom’s library. Since both of them are law practitioner, these law books hold bittersweet memory during their study days.

Check out our full portfolio here!

Garden Setting

One of our favorite flower and somehow a lot of our bride love them too!

So if your eyes are drawn to this look and feel, maybe you can consider this venue. Of course, we will be delighted to plan and design your wedding too! We love creating wedding in CHIJMES! Expect Pinterest-worthy wedding.. haha..

Introducing Our New Website!

Finally our website is up and running!! After a long period of juggling everyday work and designing this website, finally I can proudly say, “Please go to our website!”

The link is www.rosettedesigns.com.

Inspired by a French memory board that I saw in Europe during our honeymoon, this design doesn’t really follow the typical look of a website. I always love pinning my inspiration on a board and while now we have Pinterest to do it digitally, the analog form of an inspiration still holds dear to my heart. So, this is my way to share my obsession of a gorgeous board. The look of the website is non-traditional, fun and whimsical. It reflects on our taste and value in designing every wedding. It should be fun and pretty, without losing your own identity.

Please feel free to click the polaroid icon inside to lead you to different directory.

Start from About Us, a short introduction on who we are and a link to meet the founder and principal designer, (ehem…) Hellen Lie. As most of you might know (or not) that I co-founded Diary & Design Wedding together with a fellow planner. Cut the story short, starting this year, Diary & Design Wedding is no longer in operation and both of us have move on with our own things. So this is my thingy now! Nothing changed, the passion is still the same (even stronger) and the works still fabulous.. the best part, the team remain intact and ready to do bigger and prettier weddings.

 

The Gallery page is inspired by Photo Gallery that we often do for our client, with clothes pegs clipping the pictures.

 

Sp please check it out and let us know what do you think about it!

Love,

Hellen Lie

Real Wedding: Jeremy & Cheryl

It is a custom in most Chinese families to have a proper wedding dinner banquet. Especially in Singapore, where we are based, hotel dinner banquet is the norm. They comes with a convenient package of food, decor, wedding favor and even invitation. Which can be dummy-proof and a very safe option to save money (or spend more depending on how you see it) and for fuss-free couple. However, increasingly we see couple putting more effort and heart into their wedding banquet.

We are featuring one of our client’s wedding, Jeremy & Cheryl. Their wedding embodies the good example of mixing their personality in the traditional setting. Adding their whimsical personality  into the Victorian setting of the Four Seasons ballroom, shows that they’re a fun and loving couple.We designed this board for them, Classy with a Twist. Jeremy who is also a designer himself, wants to have a well-designed, well-coordinated wedding matching their personality.

Here’s the actual wedding montage:

Instead of the usual flower centerpiece, we had a bowl full of windmills doubling up as wedding favors.

The reception area doubled up as solemnisation venue before the the rest of guests flocks in.

Fancy those backdrop stands in the red carpet event that printed the event or company’s name? Why don’t you do it for your own wedding. Jeremy & Cheryl had their names printed all over the photobooth. Talking about branding your own wedding.

The other special items are the wishing table with vintage typewriter for the guests to type or paper to write in their wishes for the couple.

Who says photo gallery can only display pictures? We brought in a vintage cupboard to display their memorable mementos to share with the guest.

We did the bird theme for their stationery and it carries on to their birdcage angbao box.

This wedding proves to us that even a hotel banquet wedding can be fun and personalized. It was really nice working with such a creative and lively couple.

Please check out our gallery here for more portfolio & our Facebook page!

New Design Gallery in our Facebook Page

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone who celebrates! Can’t believe it’s already the new year! We, the team from Rosette Designs & Co, recently revamped our portfolio and branding in preparation for the next move from Diary & Design Wedding. Please have a fresh look on our past & new works here and contact us at hello@rosettedesigns.com for quotation and inquiry!

Here’s some pic to whet your appetite!

 

 

 

 

 

Weddings in Singapore are Going To Get Prettier!

After co-founding Diary & Design Wedding, Hellen has headed the design team to expand into a new company, Rosette Designs & Co which specialised in wedding design & decor. Our website is still in progress, but you can see our portfolio here or in our Diary & Design blog.

Simple set up to showcase our props. Cupcake by Twelve Cupcakes. they are super yummy!

Please check our previous works here . You can visit our Diary & Design Wedding blog for portfolio too!

Pictures by Ian Photography & Rosette Designs & Co

We say: (Secret) Dream Comes True!

We have been waiting for Style Wedding magazine’s September issue for a month after our interview. In the initial stage of our wedding preparation, we secretly wishing that our wedding will be featured in a magazine one day. It didn’t happen on the year we got married, only a year after that, our vendor called us asking if we are interested to be featured, since the theme of the issue is vintage. Yay!

For those of you who wonder how to get featured in bridal magazine, it is actually more complicated than having a very nice looking wedding. It also has to do with whom you engage. Anyway, we are really happy that 2 of our vendors approached us at the same time, without knowing each other’s intention.

A big shout out to Jasmine, who wrote the article so descriptively and positively. Also Adeline from Alvinadeline Weddings & Wansheng from Feldberyl for their referral.

Although there’s a small hiccup (but with big impact!) of our blog address, instead of welovelaughkiss.wordpress.com, it written as welaughwekiss.wordpress.com, we managed to salvage the situation by creating a page with the wrong blog address and direct it to this one! Problem solved!

For you who didn’t have access to Spore’s Bridal magazine, here you go!

She says: Surprise.. Surprise..& My Bro’s Purple Wedding

It has been while since I last blogged. Ever since we started Diary & Design Wedding, I was surprised by the response. I didn’t know that this blog has avid followers. (Apologized for not blogging as regularly like I used to)

I didn’t intend it that way, but it’s a good surprise! This tells me one thing, every brides do want to have a beautiful wedding of their own. Gone are the days of Singaporean way of default wedding.

I have met plenty of couples who didn’t intend to hire a wedding planner at first, but were intrigued by the idea of a customized wedding of their own. It’s really an encouragement when brides-to-be send an email, starting from,” I didn’t intend to hire wedding planner, but…”

I was skeptical over wedding planner too. I did try to contact some of them but they proofed my skepticism right! However, in the end of the day, I have to surrender to a professional wedding coordinator, who happened to be my friend and now my partner in crime.

In Indo, we didn’t even battle an eyelid to hire a Wedding Organizer (WO). It’s a must for every wedding in Indo, big or small. Imagine the hassle they have to go through on the actual day without these handset-armed organizers. Madness guaranteed! I give you one recent example.

I was back in Jakarta for my brother’s wedding over the weekend. It was one of the typical Indo wedding (only better). Fancy, huge ballroom, thousands of guests, extensive decor. Take a look at the pictures and you know what I meant!

Anyway, check out their prewedding photos here.

The venue is one of the biggest function hall in Jakarta, boasts at 32,000 sqm. It can comfortably fits 1,500 of our guests. Although it’s quite a common number of guests in Jakarta, it can be too overwhelming for any Singaporean to experience, as it did to Winston’s parents.

Top : the stage design. Bottom : (left) Me at the photo gallery. (Right) Me and my mom at one of the buffet line

The hallway and photo gallery

Winston + Hellen

Left: Irene (my sis). Right: the purple cake

They even had a small photo studio set up in the ballroom for a quick photoshoot.

In Indonesia, wedding is a family affair. Most of the time, the guests come from the parents side, instead of the couple. Imagine inviting 1,500 people for your party?? Who are these people??? Practically everyone who ever crossed the parents’ path. Business people, relatives, neighbors, friends, anyone they can think of! The basic principle is the same, whoever finance it, has the say.

the in-laws talking. My mom and her beautiful dress

Having been involved in 2 different set up of wedding culture (Singapore & Jakarta), I simply marvel at the endless possibilities of this one lifetime event. It will be awesome when I combine the best of both world.

Greedy me.

PS : just between you and me, I’d choose small wedding anytime.

She says: What does a Beautiful Wedding Means to You?

Being so excited for the past 1.5 years for our own wedding and finally doing it according to what we have envisioned, getting over it and moving on to create somebody else’s dream, makes me wonder: What does a Beautiful Wedding Means to Us [Winston's Edit: This is so Carrie Bradshaw]?

We can be super excited when we see a great inspiration board on Snippet and Ink or Style Me Pretty or over a luscious pearl hand-tied bouquet pictures, thinking, “That’s my bouquet!”

Planning and looking for references are the best part of the wedding. It’s all good while it last and before the obstacle come and crushed our dream. Yet it is the dream of a beautiful wedding that keeps us going. For me, the excitement of having a beautiful wedding last a longer time than I expected, since I am still excited when I see a great wedding theme. After all, we want our wedding to be beautiful, one-of-a-kind and very “me”. Who doesn’t?

But I realized, after the great show ended, it’s the moments of the event that lingers in your heart and sometimes still bring tears to our eyes. Not your gorgeous centerpieces or the vintage-ish chandelier. It’s the moment when you exchanged the vows and you struggled to hold your tears to finish your vow, or your first dance as a couple. Those moments are precious.

So why am I putting so much effort on the details and decoration for my own wedding and now even become a wedding decorator?

Because your wedding speaks of your personality and style. It is the extension of your taste and it shows how passionate you are in something so special in your life. I’m pretty sure I only will get  married once. So I better put my best effort to make it the best, or at least in my own eyes.

There was one comment from my dear friend that made my heart ached. She got married a few years ago and she was showing me her actual day pictures. She said, she wanted a nice-color-synchronized balloons for aisle decoration, and when she first entered the aisle, her heart sank. The church room looks like a children party with mixed color balloons. That’s her first impression of her wedding ceremony. From what I know, she’s not even a design-conscious type. Yet that thought bothers her till now. She had asked her friends to help decorate the room but the friends are not professional and they didn’t ask what kind of balloons she wanted.

I swore that day, I wouldn’t have any regret of my wedding day. Although I need to make compromises here and there because of the budget, but I make sure it’s something that I can tolerate. Beautiful decoration and detailed design lay the foundation of a great wedding. When you enter that room or the aisle, your stage or altar decoration better be stunning!

I truly believe in holistic design in wedding and professional coordination for wedding and every girl deserves these. Not because I am offering that service, but because I was once a bride too. because of that belief, I dare to commit myself for this cause. For me beautiful wedding means one that you truly love, and you can say without a shadow of a doubt, ” I LOVE MY WEDDING!”

Talking about memorable moments, Katryn’s wedding is the true example of a beautiful wedding coupled with tear-jerker moments. The decoration is perfect, the moments are perfect, the weather is perfect.

What does a beautiful wedding means to you?

She says: Honeymoon Route

We were so excited for our honeymoon in Europe on September, until we received news that our tour is canceled! Although they will give us a full refund, I am still upset that we couldn’t go to the designated places we have planned! That’s the downside of choosing a tour for honeymoon, instead of free and easy. Initially we were lazy to plan our own itinerary, but looks like we are forced to do  it. Suddenly we have unlimited options of places to go. I always love the idea of honeymoon in old cities in Europe, bed and breakfast in Edinburgh, lavender field in Provence, Mont St-Michel in Normandy. So I guess we’ll stick to Europe.

I love this dreamy picture of Luxembourg, feels like the scene from 18th century. via Axioo

Depending on your personality and preference, here are different destination for honeymooners (pictures by Axioo)

Urban Couple can visit New York, Paris, London, Tokyo.

This was shot in New York by Axioo, and the guy in the picture is my ex-housemates’ brother.

The beachy couple often choose Maldives, Bali, Hawaii. One more place to consider is Raja Ampat, Irian Jaya in Indonesia. Voted as the best diving site in the world, these islands secretly owned the most preserved coral reef in the world. Although this place is located in Indonesia, most of the visitor are foreigners.

I would love to visit urban city and historical places like in Barcelona, where Gaudi build his Gothic masterpiece…

Or kissing in Versailles…

Or clowning around under cherry blossom in Japan.

No matter where we go for honeymoon, as long as we are together, it’s enough…