kabrooklyn

envy1922...

Kissing Fish staff did help with all of the lights and lanterns and table decorations. We tied on all of the chair sashes late that morning. We got married in December, close to the shortest day of the year so our wedding started a little before 4, sunset was around 5:15 that day. It was dark when we cut our cake. William John was our DJ and he was really good, played all of the playlists we had made and was chill with a relaxed island vibe.  It wasn't really too hot in December until we started dancing and then Mike at Kissing Fish had the staff take down the one side of the tent that you see in the photo by the speaker to have it be more open.  

Check out some of my other posts which lists lots of details about our wedding and feel free to private message me if you have any other questions!

karamae...

You def need a regular passport, the passport card is not good for arriving by plane, only by boat. I'm glad you got in touch with Joan.

Is Bay Bistro more expensive is hard to say...have you been to Turks & Caicos yet?  I hadn't before our wedding and only went to Da Conch Shack one night (not worth the cab ride there) and Somewhere Cafe down the beach at Coral gardens which was yummy and reasonable. The food at Bay Bistro was good, everyone really liked it. I'm not a super foodie though and am allergic to shellfish and I don't eat red meat and we had both on our menu so can't say a whole lot personally about the food, except the fresh grilled catch of the day which we had at our reception was delicious.

Kissing Fish has all of their catering menus up online to check out. We did a modified version of the Island Bar-B-Que. Below is a picture of our menu that we had for the reception. The thing to remember with price if you do the beach bar-b-que is to add the catering costs on with the tax/tip, so an extra 41% for anything food/bar. So, a $50 meal/$50 bar for a person is actually $141. Plus if you do the beach, you have an extra $14 per person to rent their chair and plates and cutlery, plus $800 for Chef and Staff (1 bartender, 3 waitstaff) fees.  I am not sure if that is more expensive or not than other options on the island, I knew we wanted a fun beach party and decided early on that staying at The Sands and doing both our dinners at Kissing Fish seemed the best. We had our Welcome Dinner inside at Bay Bistro and the cost was considerably less without the catering, chef, staff, chair fees.

I do feel that the tent is key, because it kinda separates your wedding from the rest of the beach. It is a public beach and the restaurant and Sibonne Hotel are right there and with the tent it's a little more formal. Plus you are right about the rain...that would not be fun!

Take care, k

Hi Kara!

 I am surprised that you would not have heard back from Joan at Bay Bistro/ Kissing Fish. She is usually really good about writing back promptly.

Yes, we had our reception on the beach in front of the restaurant. Our ceremony was also there and the staff just moved the chairs after the ceremony.

Kissing Fish was totally fine about us bringing our own decorations.  I brought cafe string lights and paper lanterns for the tents, table runners and chair sashes, purple vintage looking bottles that we put flowers in, starfish and sand dollars to spread out on the tables. We brought a wooden sign that ended up being really funny in lots of photos (people wearing it, etc) and I made a combo menu/thank you card (front and back). We brought a polaroid camera that we set up at the cake table for people to take photos for our guest book and our own cake cutter and forks.

We did not have an arbor or arch, but the beautiful ocean behind us was the most amazing backdrop ever.

I would say that the big thing I learned to pass on if you are not having a planner is to enlist the help of some of your family/girlfriends who are not in the wedding party. My Maid of Honor and I had put everything at the site for the ceremony late that morning, but since all of us girls were getting ready, a few things went awry...it was all fine but with other help it would have been better. For example, the programs I had made for the ceremony didn't get handed out and we had a knot-tying portion that the rope couldn't be found for (we tied chair sashes together) and it was cute and even comical, but could have been avoided.

I'm not sure where Grace's Cottage is but if you are having many of your guests stay at The Sands, which I think you were deciding on? then Kissing Fish is really really nice because everyone can easily stroll back and forth. The cabs there are so expensive and charge by the person, even for small children, so to take a 9 person van just a couple of miles is $100 plus tip. If you have 40 guests that would be about $900 plus tip to take them back and forth. Maybe there are less expensive options like renting a charter bus but def the cabs are pricey.

Happy Planning!

Adding a few photos here:

Hi WCorey!

We tried to use other things we were bringing to help insulate breakables, which def helped and cut down on having to use too much bubble wrap etc.  For example, bags of rose petals between things, used our tote bags that we gave out wrapped around our glass bottles, and used our cooler backpacks that we gave to our groomsmen for insulation.

We kept all of our bags under 50 lbs to avoid extra fees too.

Are you bringing real touch flowers or making the centerpieces with live flowers?

Let me know how else I can help! Take care, k

Hi Icheatham!

We got married in front of Bay Bistro and Kissing Fish (their catering) did the food for our reception.

We had William John for our DJ, he was really great.

For flowers, I made my and my bridesmaids bouquets and brought them. They were real touch calla lilies from afloral.

Budget-wise, we brought all of our own decorations, which really cut down costs.

Let me know if there is any other ways I can help.

Thanks! k

Hi New York Brides!

I recently got married this December in Turks & Caicos and wanted to offer my help and things I have learned to all of you. I live in LA now after 10 years in Brooklyn, so can't meet up but feel free to post here or private message me.

I posted about my wedding in the TurksBride 2013 thread with lots of details.  

Would love to share any advice I can to make your planning easier, plus we were on a serious budget, so can offer some tips for that as well.

Have fun planning your wedding! It will be over before you know it! (Probably why I am on here a month later! Not sure what to do with all my free time!

Take care, k

Whitney:

No, we had no problems at customs. My husband and I brought 1 large suitcase, plus two large duffel bags and our carry ons. When we went through customs the agent asked what was in all of our bags and we told her it was all for our wedding and she told us to have a great time and we were on our way.

My brother brought the towels we gave out as one of our guest gifts. There were 40+ towels and he brought them in the cardboard box they were shipped in and also had no problems.

I was totally prepared and had receipts for everything but it ended up being a breeze.

As far as getting back, since we had given all of our gifts out and left all of our decorations and lights to donate to church/school on the island, we did not have much to bring back. Bringing duffel bags rather than suitcases made it super easy since we could just fold them up in our 1 suitcase to bring home.

I did not ship anything. I looked into possibly shipping sparklers since you can't fly with them and the costs were outrageous. 

KaraMae:

You really can not go wrong at The Sands. We stayed in the one bedroom Ocean Front and it was gorgeous and had plenty of room for all of my bridesmaids to get ready. I had friends that stayed in the two bedroom ocean views and they were also spacious. Out of our guests, we probably had someone in every type of room and all were nice.  The pool area was also beautifully landscaped and the entire hotel was perfect. Especially knowing the rates at some of the other hotels in the area and knowing that almost all of our guests got decent rates made it even better.  And everyone on the staff was super friendly. We really loved it.

I did not get a chance to see the Ocean Club West. The only other hotel I really explored was Coral Gardens, where some diver friends of ours that came to our wedding but did an extended vacation stayed and my college age daughter stayed for an extra few days after we came home.. Coral Gardens was also really nice and the rooms were very spacious, but the pool and hotel outside area was not as nice as The Sands. The one thing that was awesome about Coral Gardens was the snorkeling right in front of the hotel. Plus the Somewhere Bar/ Cafe right there was really cute and fun and my daughter said she ate there every day after we left and loved it.

I can't say about the costs of the officiant as we did not legally get married in Turks and Caicos. Our dear friend officiated our ceremony there, but it was only ceremonial.

Hope this is helpful! Please let me know if you have any other questions!

Take care, k

Hi Ladies!

I just got back from my 12-12-12 wedding on Grace Bay Beach which was wonderful and wanted to offer if anyone has questions some of the great experiences and things I learned:

We had both our Welcome/Rehearsal Dinner and Beach Bar-B-Que reception with Kissing Fish/ Bay Bistro. We ended up having almost 40 people, including us.  The food was wonderful, staff was super friendly and Mike, the on site coordinator was truly awesome.

Most of our guests stayed at The Sands, which was perfect as it was right next door and everyone could easily walk back and forth (cabs are super expensive). The Sands was really lovely, had one of the nicest and widest stretches of beaches that we saw, beautiful grounds, again really friendly staff and did not mind our friends having a really good time late into the night. We gave everyone a year to plan, and many people were able to get good deals on Jetsetter down to 109 a night for the studio rooms (which were very nice). 

Most of our guests also flew on JetBlue and at different points during the year, the flight from JFK was down at 149-157. It was even best for us to fly from LA to JFK and down on JetBlue.

We planned everything ourselves and it went fine. An On-Site Coordinator for the day may have made it a little less hectic, but it was all good.

William John was our DJ and he played all of the Playlists we made and was easy to work with, even as we were making in the moment changes to keep everybody dancing.

Geraldine did mine and all my bridesmaids hair. She was so great and my hair was exactly what I wanted. I left it up for two days because it looked so good and only took the pins out to go snorkeling. Ann did my makeup and she was also awesome. I do wish that I would have given myself a little more time for her (she came at 2 for a 3:45 wedding) as I felt she was a bit rushed and we didn't end up having time to put on eyelashes which I was hoping to do.

We were on a serious budget but wanted this to be as nice as possible and we brought all of our own decorations, which worked out awesome and was much much cheaper than renting them. They were exactly the colors that I wanted and it looked magical on the beach. 

I made all of the bouquets and we brought them in our carry on. I got real touch calla lilies from afloral and they looked so beautiful and I am so so happy that I have my bouquet. We brought these cool glass bottles (that we got at Ross for $3) and after photos a few of the bridesmaids opened their bouquets and put flowers in them on the tables. We brought chair sashes and table runners, cafe lights from target and paper lanterns and it worked out great. I brought a couple things home but left the rest there to donate to church/school. We packed all of our decorations and guest gifts in duffel bags which we just folded up and only brought back one suitcase.

For our guests we had towels made, plus cups with lids and straws and tote bags. It was super fun to see everyone using them all week! For our wedding party we also tried to get gifts that they could use there. Our groomsmen received these great backpack coolers which they used on the beach all week, for our ring bearer and flower girl we got kids snorkel gear which they loved and the bridesmaids havaianas and coconut lotion and a gorgeous sand dollar necklace (from overstock!). Everyone loved their gifts a lot.

I can't say enough about how stunning Grace Bay Beach was. We actually never were able to go there beforehand and trusted in our soulmate hearts that it was going to be perfect and it really was. We are already planning our trip back!

I hope this is helpful. I had looked at this forum a bunch before my wedding but never posted and in a moment of angst about bringing my decorations had spoke with another Turks bride who was so helpful and reassuring that I wanted to pass that good karma along! 

Let me know if there is any way I can help! k