Secrets Maroma Beach: Hotel in general:  A+

The hotel was amazing!  No wrist band or a towel card at this hotel. Unlimited use of beach towels were really nice.  When I stayed at Iberoster in Jamaica last year, I had a tan line from the wrist band and you could only have one beach towel at a time, which was a little annoying to me.  As part of the wedding package, you get a preferential location within your booked category.  We booked the preferred club ocean view room since that would make our basic wedding package free (worth $800).  The upgrade itself cost about $400 for 7 nights. We had a fourth floor in the building 26 very close to the ocean.  Preferred club is well worth it because you get a private check-in and check-out and no wait.  You get extra amenities in the room as well.  Also, we didn’t have to go all the way to the lobby area to get cappuccino every morning, instead go to the preferred club lounge which is right by building 25.  The lounge has 3 computers and a printer. All the staffs at Secrets were always smiling and answers with “my pleasure”. They really cater to your needs and they are prompt on your requests.  I asked for the mosquito repellent wipes a couple times and they delivered to our room within 10 minutes.  Spa was amazing, we had a complementary couples 50 minute Swedish massage included in our honeymoon package, which was included in our upgraded room stay.  I could stay in that Spa all day.  Breakfast buffet had a wide range of selections.  I had strawberry and banana chocolate crepe every morning.  24 hour room service had decent selections and the brownie was the best.  They really spoiled us during our stay, it was hard to go back to the reality

Wedding Coordinator Cecilia Reyes and her team: A 

About a week before our departure, I got an out of office auto reply from Cecilia when I e-mailed her with some questions.  The e-mail said that she would be on vacation until 9/25 which was our wedding day.  I panicked and e-mailed every general email address possible to see what was going on.  Lety and Valeria e-mailed me back quickly saying that they are taking care of our wedding while Cecilia was out.   So I thought Cecilia wouldn’t be doing our wedding.  But she was already back from her vacation and we had a final meeting with her on Thursday 9/23 at 11am. We met at the lobby bar. Cecilia came with Lety and one other person, I can’t remember his name.   We went through the contract and picked the bouquet and boutonnière.  We also added corsage and boutonnières for our 8 guests.  She had lots of options for the flowers which were not listed on the website or the list she gave me through e-mail.  I picked the one with Lily, rose, and one other kind (sorry can’t remember the name of the flower….) but told her to make them all orange with a hint of yellow.  I was surprised that there was no extra charge for that.  The flowers turned out so beautiful, I loved it.  She came to show me all the flowers when I was getting my hair done at the Spa and she delivered them to everyone’s room.

The extra items we paid for which was not included in the package was the following:

1. The stereo system for the ceremony

2. Corsages and boutonnières for the guests

3. Flower for my hair

3. Chair bows

She also did not charge an outside vendor fee for our photographer, Cecilia Dumas. 

I also showed her the songs for the ceremony in I-pod.  Cecilia seemed very experienced with the music and the sound system and how it should work during the ceremony. She explained to me they will tone it down while the minister speaks and after the ceremony they will turn it back up, which they did very well.

We didn’t choose the restaurant or the place of ceremony beforehand since I wanted to look at the options in person before I make a decision.  We dined at Oceana restaurant the first night and decided to have our reception there since it is right by the pool that lights up blue at night and you could see the ocean from the restaurant and has nice breeze.

She took us to the alternative options in case of rain.  The first option was one right next to the Desires club, which was nice, but I really wanted the outside feel, so she took us to the second option which was the entrance to the theater.  She explained that they will put up a white curtain to block off the theater area. I really liked the white stone walls and the grass roof so we chose the theater area for the rain day (and it did rain on our wedding day since the tropical storm was nearby…) Then we went to the Gazebo and to the beach front area.  Since I’d be wearing 4” heels and it was really windy and I would be wearing my hair down, we decided to go for the Gazebo.  She said that they will remove the pool chairs by the gazebo and the speaker by the gazebo will be shut off during the ceremony so we will have some privacy.  We discussed the decoration for the gazebo and I just wanted the white curtain with turquoise color bows for the white chairs.

Once we decided for the place of ceremony, I had to edit the wedding schedule for the guests.  So we went to the preferred lounge and used their computer to update our wedding schedule and e-mailed it to Cecilia so she could color print them.  We didn’t want to spend money on papers or printing. Cecilia suggested we could use Secrets letterhead and the envelopes so we did. She color printed them and delivered them to our room right away so I could include in the welcome bags for our guests.  I also brought the blank name tags with the sea shell name holder for the dinner reception.  I asked them to print the names on the name card and they did a great job on that.  

We were supposed to discuss the table setting and seating at the restaurant for the reception, but we completely forgot.  So the next day I called Cecilia to meet us at Oceana at noon so we can discuss the seating.  Since Cecilia was in a meeting with other wedding party, Lety and the other guy came to Oceana. My cousin and I discussed the seating with them because during the meeting, Cecilia mentioned we have to have two tables at the restaurant for our dinner, but we really wanted one big table to avoid separation among the wedding party.  They fought against that quite a bit saying they don’t have a permission to do that and it depends on the restaurant manager’s decision.  But we did insist that it needs to be one big table. They didn’t give us a clear answer, but in the end they made it happen and we had a center circle area in the Oceana restaurant all to ourselves, which was plenty of room for 10 people. It worked out great. 

Cecilia as well as her team worked so hard to make the wedding go smoothly.  Everything she said she would do was done.  We had a simple wedding with only party of 10, and since I wanted our wedding to be stress-free as much as possible, I did not plan too many details, but these details were taken care of by her and her team.  

Hairstylist at the SPA - Marivelle: A

First of all, the room in the Spa I got my hair done was very grand, very luxurous.  They had a huge mirror hanging from the ceiling and it was completely private and really relaxing.  Marivelle was my stylist and did a great job on curling my hair the way I wanted. I explained to her exactly what I want on my trial run, which was on Thursday 5pm (my wedding was Saturday). I did make two appointments (one trial run and one for the wedding day) with Carla through e-mail about 2 weeks before the departure.  Marivelle does not speak good English but I had a few pictures and I used hand gesture to communicate with her. She used a humidity resistant hair spray and she applied it to my hair every curl she did with curling iron.   I was pleased with the result of the trial run, and she did even better job on my wedding day. She was more used to handling my hair the second time around.  So for that, I strongly recommend doing a trial run. It was raining on my wedding day, but she comforted me by saying “it is good luck to be raining on the wedding day” and she gave me her really pretty pair of earrings.  She was so sweet.  I also asked her to pin the curls so the curls hold up in the humidity.  The curls softened once I went outside to get to the ceremony site, which gave me perfect curls, not too tight but not too soft.  In all honesty, I’ve had a better stylist before, but overall I was very happy with her work. The cost is about $47 with 15% discount, so I paid $94 for two sessions.

Wedding Ceremony: A

I had my hair appointment at 1pm and I was done by 2:30.  They called the golf cart for me to go back to the room since it was raining.  I went back to my room and started on my makeup.  Cecilia came around 3:30 and informed me that the rain stops but then starts back up, so I had to make a decision to move the ceremony from Gazebo to the theater entrance. I was disappointed that we couldn’t have it at Gazebo, but everything worked out.  It did stop raining right before our ceremony. Cecilia coordinated the music during the ceremony very well.  My dad and I walked the aisle with Stevie Wonder’s “Ribbon in the sky”.  It was the right timing and right volume.  We had an English speaking minister.  She read a poem called “Marriage by the Sea” which really spoke to my heart.  Sade’s “by your side” played while she was reading the poem.  The ceremony lasted about 20 minutes and we had a Champaign toast right afterward. The staffs promptly served us a glass of Champaign to all of us right after we exited. I had 6 songs played from the start till we started taking group pictures right outside of the theater, it was a perfect length.

Dinner reception: A

Dinner started a little late as we were taking pictures, so we had our guests wait a little at the Oceana restaurant. We just ordered off of the menu and we ordered two bottles of Sake, my mother in law did the toast in English and my brother did another one in Japanese.  After the dinner, we did the cake cutting.  We didn’t upgrade the cake as it wasn’t really important to us.  We chose the tres de leche cake, which I really liked. 

I was really nervous about how my dad and my brother who do not speak English can interact with my in-laws throughout the wedding trip, but everything worked out and I am so grateful for them coming all the way from Japan for our wedding.

Overall, all of my guests loved Secrets Maroma and I made the right choice choosing this resort. I still day dream about our stay at Secrets:)    This was a very long review, but hope it is helpful to anyone thinking about having their wedding at Secrets Maroma.  Any questions, please feel free to ask!