Calgary Brides!

I've seen a lot of us on here and thought it would be great to be able to share our local vendors and resources.

Share any and all of the following!

What travel agent/agency did you use?

Where are you having your AHR (if you're having one) and which caterers/DJs/florists are you using?

Where did you buy your dress? Where did you have good/bad experiences?

Great OOT bag finds?

Looking forward to hearing from some fellow Calgary brides!

Hi Krama,

There are a few other threads on here for us Canadians looking for online stores, OOT bag items, and just where the best deals are in canada. You should take a look at the thread " Canadian OOT bag info....where to shop?" This thread has a lot of information, not just on OOT bag stuff but just general info on purchases in Canada.

The only thing I can add to this thread, is that if you are looking for your dress and are planning on going to Ethos on 17th Ave SW, make sure Betty is there to help you. She is by far the best one there and I have used her twice. Once 10 yrs ago for my first wedding and now again for my next wedding. She found my dress, "THE" dress both times, and it wasnt one I would have picked out myself from the rack. She was phenominal and I never felt rushed or bombarded. She by far is the best bridal consultant in that store. I would not hesitate sending any of my friends or family to her as she was such a pleasure to be around.

oh and avoid "Jessica Bridal" they sell shotting bridesmaids dresses. I used them for my first wedding and my gf unbenounst to her at the time, bought her bridesmaid dresses there 6 months ago and all the dresses are tearing due to "old material" as per the seamstresses that are trying to fix them. The semastresses know all to well about Jessica Bridal, as they fix their products all the time.

Other then that, I have nothing else to add as I am not using any other services or stores in town for my DW.

I will be interested to see what other Calgary DW brides have to post on here.

Congrats to all my fellow Calgarians and enjoy!

Hello ladies!

I am using a destination wedding specialist who works through travelmasters. I was referred to her through a good friend of mine, and she has been great so far. very knowledgeable.

I bought my dress at The Parisian. they used to be on 4th street, but are owned by the same people as Cameo and Cufflinks (who were awesome as well)and are now in the same building as them in Dalhousie. Parisian has been great, even when I have been back a few times to "visit" my dress!

I was talking to another Calgary bride on another thread, and she was interested in going for drinks sometime. Anyone interested in meeting up and sharing details with other brides who are not sick of talking about weddings?

Hello fellow Calgary brides!!! Great thread, good idea hopefully we can swap some helpful information.

I am using Uniglobe Travel for our travel agent, and so far my travel agent has been so helpful. We are traveling with Signature Vacations, who have given us tons of headaches, but our travel agent has been there sticking up for us and keeping me sane along the way.

We've decided not to have an AHR because about 99% of the people that we wanted to come to our wedding, are coming. Unfortunately there's a few that can't attend, but we don't have a lot of money to spare for the AHR for only a few people that won't be in Mexico with us.

I bought my dress & veil from Blissful Bridal, on Macleod Trail by the Cactus Club. The lady there who found my dress for me was wonderful, her name is Calinda. She picked a dress that I never would've tried on after she saw a few dresses that I had picked for myself, and she got an idea of what I was looking for. I tried the dress on, and it turned out to be the one. it's perfect. I didn't have a good experience at the Bridal Center, I found that they treated me like lower class because I was having a DW. "Oh THOSE dresses are in the basement....", and no one even came with me. How do they know what kind of dress I would like!?!?

Anyway, this is a long post. hehe. I would love to go for drinks with other Calgary Brides if anyone is up for it, it would be great to talk about what we've done, and what our next steps are, etc. I love talking about weddings, but I think my friends get tired of it sometimes. haha.

Cara

hi all

I am also a Calgary bride and getting married in just over a month now! woot!

I totally lucked out and walked away with a $100 Nicole Miller dress from Evalina Couture down on 11th Ave SW. I ordered all our girls dresses from jcrew.com and got the boys outfits from banana here in town.

Most of our OOT stuff we have picked up from the dollar store, although I ordered our travel mugs from 4imprint.ca and I ordered our bags off of ebay.

We are not having an AHR b/c that defeats the whole purpose of why we are going away! Nice to meet you all!!

Yay! Great to hear from more Calgary girls!

I got my dress from Mena's on Centre St and 12th. She was fantastic!! I had a similar experience to CaraW in that she brought me a dress I never would have picked out myself and it turned out to be THE dress! My experience at the Bridal Centre was ok. The girl was pretty helpful other than the fact that the dresses she brought me were $1000 over my stated budget!

We're having our AHR at the Highwood Community Centre. We have 42 people coming to our DW but another 100 coming to the AHR. It'll be a cocktail reception with lots of dancing so more of a big party without all the wedding formalities.

I'm still browsing for OOT bag stuff. I can't really decide what I want to include! We're definitely doing mugs though and I bought travel size hand sanitizers from B&BW. I'll start hitting the dollar stores soon for more stuff!

I really recommend Blissful Bridal as well - I actually bought a bridesmaid's dress from there 4 years ago for my friend's wedding (back when it was located in the NE). My mom and I stumbled across it again when we were looking for my wedding dress in August of 2008 at the new Macleod Tr location. Tammy, the owner, remembered my friend whose wedding I was in - she actually has pictures of her brides behind the front counter and even pointed her out to me! She made the experience really fun and relaxing and did not push the sale at all. We tried the bridal salon over by Spence on Macleod Tr too and they were totally different. I almost felt like in order to get any service there, I should have walked in in a couture wedding dress lol

I ordered all my OOT bag stuff online (yay Ebay!) and we did not have an AHR. Anyhow, great thread - I'm sure this will help a lot of brides to be.

kayley- I also got the hand sanitizers from bath and body works! They are perfect. We are also including puzzle books, pens/pencials and spf 15 lip balm. I still need to get tums and advil and then we will probably leave it at that

Hooray for a Calgary bride thread!

I used Janelle at Boulevard Travel for my travel agent. She has gotten a mixed response on helpfulness. She has been fantastic with me but some people in my wedding party have been having problems getting ahold of her. I would NOT recommend Ethos, Ive never been helped by such rude people; Jennybell, I guess I should have asked for Betty I actually ended up buying my dress in Edmonton at Pure Bridal and loved their service and dresses!

Who are you guys using for alterations?? Im booked at this place called Lillianas in Kensington because Ive heard good things about her but Im still scared haha

Im using a girl that my gf recommended and am actually taking it in next monday for my first fitting! yikes! She lives way in the south but thats alright. I wish I had known about kensington b/c thats so close to my house. oh well