The new Dreams Tulum thread! (Post all DT Qs&As here)

[amanda2]

Also going to book hair and makeup appointments soon.  Does the resort salon do good work, and are they easy to work with/communicate with?  I think I am planning to do a few hair and makeup trials at home first and then take a bunch of pictures down to make it easier- anyone else doing something similar?  

 

Would you recommend bringing your own makeup down for them to use?  Or do they have a good selection?

[rootkl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by amanda2 
 

Has anyone hired a DJ through the resort?  Or is it better to hire an off-resort DJ and pay the $120 vendor fee?  

I hired DJ Doremixx. He has amazing reviews and has been very responsive so far and easy to work with. My wedding is in January though so I won't know the final outcome until then

[rootkl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coolcalcium 
 

I'm very confused how much to bring...when I think about it I get completely overwhelmed. I think definitely organza chair ties for the ceremony, and then table decos as I'm not sure how much more I can possibly cram into other people's bags?

My goal is to stuff as much as I can onto the plane also. I wanted to do the chair ties, centerpieces, and in memory table stuff for sure. We might end up just checking another bag if we have to

[Sehausle]

Quote:

Originally Posted by amanda2 
 

Also going to book hair and makeup appointments soon.  Does the resort salon do good work, and are they easy to work with/communicate with?  I think I am planning to do a few hair and makeup trials at home first and then take a bunch of pictures down to make it easier- anyone else doing something similar?

 

Would you recommend bringing your own makeup down for them to use?  Or do they have a good selection?

I've read all of the reviews for DT weddings and most said they were happy with their makeup though it does tend to be on the heavier side so be sure to bring photos of the look you're going for (also know that a tad heavier will look better in photos- but as we all know there is such thing as overkill). I went to my local MAC counter and did a trial with the colors I wanted to use. The makeup artist gave me a  picture of a face palette and literally wrote directions on what he used and where everything was supposed to go (kind of like a map for the makeup artist in Mexico to use). The makeup was very expensive  over $160 for some eye shadows, a liner, concealer, and a gloss  but I chose colors I could use every day so really it was a good excuse for a makeup revamp!

[Sehausle]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coolcalcium 
 

I'm very confused how much to bring...when I think about it I get completely overwhelmed. I think definitely organza chair ties for the ceremony, and then table decos as I'm not sure how much more I can possibly cram into other people's bags?

We are planning on checking one extra bag- I didn't want anyone else to have the responsibility of bringing anyting or dealing with paying customs fees (which people have had to do). I did have to limit my choices as to what I could bring as I belive 50lbs is the weight-limit for most airlines. I originally wanted to bring photos of my familiy members wedding photos with frames and all but it just seems like too much and I don't want to risk anything being lost at the reception. In the end I decided I could only bring things I wouldn't be heart broken if they weren't returned.

 

We are packing - 24 "Welcome" Kits, Menues, place cards, starfish wine stopper favors, 3 candles & holder for unity ceremony,to-go flat cake boxes, 12 tea lights & glass holders, and that's it. We have left most everything in it's original packaging for the trip but I will affix our labels to the cake boxes and our personalized  tags for the wine stoppers when we arrive. Make sure you bring extras just in case anything breaks. I am packing everything in shoe boxes as they take up little space and I feel like they will survive the trip better.

 

We decided to just use the resort white linens & flowers (bought extra centerpieces) ...that will save some room in my suitcase & fuss...

[hezmshaw]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coolcalcium 
 

I'm very confused how much to bring...when I think about it I get completely overwhelmed. I think definitely organza chair ties for the ceremony, and then table decos as I'm not sure how much more I can possibly cram into other people's bags?

I'm bringing chair ties too.. the resort charges $6 per tie.. I was able to rent them for $2.80 per tie in town and they're only charging me for one day even though I have them for over a week.  Worth it.  I think even if you pay for an extra suitcase you can end up saving money by having what you want and not doing it through the hotel.  I'm bringing my own centrepieces too.. but in pieces and we'll assemble there.

[BeaBride]

Things I brought:

 

-battery operated votives with mercury glass votive holders for the reception tables (5 per table).I had 6 guest tables, 1 head table, and a welcome/gift table.  The DJ also had a table and set up his own lights around it.  We used the centrepieces included in our ultimate package for the welcome table and head table....plus we had our 3 bouquets scattered at the head table (MOH, bridesmaid and bride).  Only the bride's bouquet was included in the package.

-lantern centrepieces with a battery operated pillar candles inside (lantern is made of black metal and plastic windows instead of glass).  We tied ribbon around them and they looked great.

-fake flower petals in ivory and dark pink for the reception tables

-table number holders with table number cards

-menus for each plate

-wedding favours which were airplane shaped luggage tags in a box wrapped with ribbon. Each had a guest's name on it as their place holder

- card box

- self-standing seating cards for guests to know what table to sit at 

- star decoration, spray painted paper lanterns, and tissue paper pomanders for the ceiling at the Seaside Grill

- "Just Married" banner for the reception

- ribbon for the chapel pews and reserved signs for the front pews in the chapel

- fake flower petals in pink and ivory for the aisle

- programs at the chapel

- 2 little white electric string lighting for around a central pillar at the Seaside Grill

 

I paid to have the wedding staff set everything up.   I didn't have time to set anything up, and I didn't want to add stress to anyone in the wedding to run around and set stuff up because the window of opportunity to do so was pretty tight.   Plus I wanted people to be around for pictures after the ceremony.  I gave Natalia printed instructions on how to set up the chapel and the reception area with a picture of how I wanted the reception tables to look. My sister-in-law to be  and friend made sure that the chapel and reception areas were set up properly once the wedding staff did it.  I took all of it with me as I was told by various Dreams staff that shipping could be problematic.  I didn't have to pay for any additional bags as my family was nice enough to take stuff along for us.  We all used little carry-on suitcases; I think we had 5 little carry-on suitcases with wedding stuff and the rest we just spread amongst our regular luggage. 

 

 As for candles, I had my reception at the Seaside Grill and I would have loved to bring real candles but was told by the wedding coordinator to bring battery operated ones because of the wind near the ocean.  I followed her suggestion but I think I may have been able to get away with real ones.  Anyway, my point is that I would definitely recommend the battery operated ones for a beach-side or even poolside reception because those locations are less sheltered. 

 

Initially I was just going to put 1 large double-sided menu card in the middle of my 6 guest tables just so the guests had an idea of what kind of food to expect. My husband (also) actually wanted inidividual ones to bring the accent colour out more on the tables since we had all white linens and plates.  I didn't have napkin holders or anything with a punch of colour so that's what we did.  Plus we had the luggage tag favours at each setting with each guest's name on it.   

 

We did have a lot of stuff for the resort staff to set up,  Here was our price break-down:

- Set up over 20 guests for ceremony and reception = $207.90 ($165.00 plus tax and service)

- Set up of decorations by wedding staff = $211.68 ($3.00 plus tax and service x 52 adults..at least they didn't include the 3 kids, I guess).  We had individual menus and favours per person. At each reception table, I had a lantern centrepiece, table number holders, fake rose petals, and 5 candle holders with battery-operated votives.   Each of the 3 kids had a little monkey holder with their picture attached and a kids menu.  Also, I had the gift/welcome table with card box, 5 candle holders with candles, rose petals, guest book, and floral centrepiece.  The head table also had a floral centrepiece and bride/groom signs on the chairs.

- Set up of pomanders and lantern centrepieces = 100.80 ($80.00 plus tax and service).  They actually had to fluff up and hang up the 6 pomanders as I just brought the packages that I bought them in at the party store. On the ceiling, I had 6 pomanders, 5 lanterns, 1 hanging star decoration, and they hung a "just married" sign between the pillars. I also had 2 sets of white string lights.

For the ceremony, they set up our pew ribbons with fresh flowers, set up extra chairs with covers so all 55 of us would fit in the chapel (6 of us stood at the alter), had the programs ready, 4 reserved signs, a centrepiece, flower petals scattered in the aisle, and lit the candles at the front of the chapel.

** Keep in mind, though, to save on cost, we did not have any chair sashes, we used the standard chairs (not any of the special ones), and we used the standard white linens (no overlays, colored napkins, etc.  The Seaside Grill was beautifully set up so in hindsight,I'm glad we didn't spend extra money on sashes, overlays, and linens for 4 hours of reception.  Instead of overlays, we sprinkled rose petals. 

 

​

 

[BeaBride]

I tried to post a picture of one of my reception tables, but the JPEG size is too large to upload as a picture on this site.  Sorry Ladies!

 

Quote:

Originally Posted by amanda2 
 

Has anyone hired a DJ through the resort?  Or is it better to hire an off-resort DJ and pay the $120 vendor fee?  

 

We hired a DJ - DJ Bijan from Mayanvibes for our 55 person wedding reception for 4 hours.  We had him do our ceremony music in the chapel for 30 minutes as well.  For $750.00, it was totally worth it for us as we had a great time dancing at our reception at the Seaside Grill.  We had a huge list of songs ranging from the 1950s to now in order to give him a taste of the fun songs we were looking for...plus the more subtle dinner music, first dance, etc.  If we changed our minds on timing or something we wanted to play at the moment, he was able to do it no problem.  I actually didn't include a father/daughter dance so when it was time, I went over to him and asked if he could play a country song that would reflect the occasion and he nailed it.  I loved that I didn't have to micromanage him.  He knew what to do and how to keep the reception moving.  DJ Bijan was extremely easy and prompt to deal with via email.  We email money transferred him our $200.00 deposit in CAD to hold him for our wedding.  He was nice enough to let us pay him in CAD since he's a Canadian living in Mexico.  The final amount was paid with Paypal in USD the day of the ceremony.  He also gave us the option to pay in cash.

 

The ceremony sound was not as good as good unfortunately.  I'm not sure why that was.  The music itself was fine but the microphone kept cutting out and it wasn't loud enough when people were speaking into it.  Like I said, I'm not sure if that was the resort's mic system or his or whether Kiko, the minister wasn't holding it properly.

 

The DJ was an outside vendor so we had to pay the $120.00 vendor fee to the resort to bring him in. He came alone with his equipment and he brought his own lighting which he placed around his DJ table.  The table was supplied by the resort.  Anyway, that's what I can tell you about having a DJ.  It all depends on what you want to spend but we found DJ Bijan to be affordable for 4.5 hours of play when comparing prices at the time.  I think you can definitely get away with having an ipod but you need someone to man it if you're planning on having speeches, special dances, games, etc....which is what we did.  I think some brides have brought ipods and had a resort sound guy manage it as well.  When I was planning my wedding, it would have cost me $410.00 to rent a sound system for a 3 hour reception....HOWEVER my reception was 4 hours long so it would have cost more than $410.00.  I just didn't look into it because I knew we wanted a DJ. 

 

The resort does have DJs.  I have read from other brides that they are good.  When I was planning my wedding the cost for a resort DJ was $250.00 per hour of play.  At the time, it would have cost me $166.00 to rent the resort sound system for the ceremony.  So, it would have cost me $1166.00 to get have the same services from the resort as what I paid for an outside DJ which cost me only $870.00 (vendor fee included).  From a cost perspective, it made more sense to have an outside DJ (especially since we knew we wanted a DJ and not just a sound system rental).  I'm not sure if any of the resort prices have changed this year, so I would check into that. 

[BeaBride]

Quote:

Originally Posted by amanda2 
 

Also going to book hair and makeup appointments soon.  Does the resort salon do good work, and are they easy to work with/communicate with?  I think I am planning to do a few hair and makeup trials at home first and then take a bunch of pictures down to make it easier- anyone else doing something similar?  

 

Would you recommend bringing your own makeup down for them to use?  Or do they have a good selection?

All in all, the spa does really nice work from what I've seen at my wedding and pictures from other brides. It can just take more time than expected. I just cut and pasted this from some of my previous posts. 

 

SPA: I knew from a previous bride that I needed to give myself plenty of time to get ready so I booked my hair for 12:00 and makeup for 1:00pm.  My ceremony was at 4:00pm.  When I booked the appointments for hair and makeup months before, the spa concierge Adriana assured me by email that everyone would be finished by 2:00pm.  I got to the spa at 11:45, and they didn't start my hair until about 12:30.  The lady that did my hair, Rosely, was very good at her job but took FOREVER.  She started my makeup around 2:30 (half an hour after I was supposed to have been finished completely) and it was also nice but not exactly what I wanted.  I would have been able to fix it if I had enough time to get ready in my room, but I did not get back to my room to get dressed until 3:10pm!!  That left me 50 minutes to get dressed, eat, take pictures and be at the chapel.  I lost my cool and cried.  That last thing you want is to be rushing to your room from the spa and getting ready in a frenzy!  This was hands down the most disappointing thing of the entire day for me. The spa opens at 9:00am, so I actually called them at 9:15 on my wedding day to ask if I could come in any earlier.  It wasn't possible.  I guess I had a gut feeling that I might not have enough time. Plus I wanted to make sure I had plenty of time for pictures pre-ceremony.  

 

FYI: Bring pictures of exactly what you want done with your hair and makeup.   The ladies at the spa speak little to no English.  I brought a picture of my hair that I took after my hair trial at home in Canada, and she copied it and made it look even nicer! However, I wanted a different bang than in the picture, so I showed her a picture of the bang that I wanted but it didn't end up looking like the photo that I brought.  I forgot to take a picture of the makeup that I wanted but either way, it was pretty darn close.  The only thing I would have changed is black eyeliner instead of brown (the lady suggested the brown so I went with it because I just wanted tot get back to the room) and maybe a bit more blush.

 

***Also, I would suggest taking your own makeup.  I took all of my own makeup so I wouldn't be stressed about choosing colours, and thank God I did because who knows when I would have returned to my room if I would've had to choose the makeup too!  Also, I need to add that all the makeup was MAC makeup.  I went for a makeup trial at the MAC counter and the makeup artist there gave me a picture with all the makeup on it and where it was applied so the spa makeup artist knew what to do based on the picture (same as another past bride "Sehausle").

 

My hair and makeup held up really well.  Post sleeping (albeit only about 3 hours) and some wedding night hanky panky, I got up touched up the makeup a little and added a couple of bobby pins before doing our TTD shots at 5:45AM the next morning.  I  washed my face off after breakfast but didn't wash out my hair until 9:00PM the day after the wedding and the "do" was still in pretty good shape.  My hair was mostly up with a bit down and curly to the side.  I think if you have a down-do or a partial up/down do, you need to be a bit more concerned about whether it will last, especially if it's curled because of the humidity and dancing. My bridesmaid did a part up/part down hair do.  She had the hair that was left down curled as well and it was falling out after about an hour of dancing. If I wasn't so darn tired and hung over, I would have done my makeup a bit better for the TTD shots (foundation, blush, and lips).

 

Spa Appointments:

I had two bridesmaids and myself booked for hair at 12:00 and my brother's girlfriend had her hair booking at 1:00.  Myself and my 2 bridesmaids then had our makeup bookings at 1:00 for two of us and 1:30 for one person.

 

I had 4 nail appointments all for the same time.  My sister-in-law completely forgot to do her nails at home so I booked her mani/pedi appointment the day before at the resort and was lucky enough that the spa could accommodate. I pre-booked my 3 other nail appointments by email from Canada and made all the appointments for the evening before my wedding at 5:30pm.  I'm so glad I did because it was one less thing to worry about on the day of the wedding. My sister-in-law had a French manicure and pedicure, I had a French manicure, and my mom & family friend both had a basic manicure.  The nails turned out really nice and no one had any complaints.  They are really sweet and good at what they do AND they took a reasonable amount of time to do it.  

 

FYI: My MOH decided to have acrylics done because she chews her fingernails so she did them before heading to Mexico since they don't do them at the resort.  In hindsight, she would have done a gel manicure instead because the acrylics really ruined her nails.  My bridesmaid decided to have both her manicure and pedicure done at home to simplify things for her.  Myself, my MOH, my mom, a family friend, and my brother's girlfriend all decided to do our pedicures before leaving Canada since they last long enough to still be nice for the wedding.  Myself and my MOH did gel pedicures at home while the rest just had regular polish.  

I really wanted a gel pedicure and they don't do them at the resort.  I did a gel French manicure test run at home to see if the polish would last long enough (4-5 days) to be nice for the wedding and they probably would have been fine if I we weren't doing hand/ring shots, but I didn't want to take the chance since the French tips weren't as nice a few days later.  That's why I decided to do our manicures at the resort.  

 

I did not want acrylics, but if you want to do all your nails at home and don't mind acrylics, that is the way to go for a lasting manicure. As for pedicures, it seems that no matter what kind of pedicure you get (basic polish, gel, acrylic), it will still look beautiful 4-5 days later.  We all had our pedicures done on Saturday in Canada, left on Sunday, and the wedding was on Wednesday. 

[BeaBride]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sehausle 
 

I've read all of the reviews for DT weddings and most said they were happy with their makeup though it does tend to be on the heavier side so be sure to bring photos of the look you're going for (also know that a tad heavier will look better in photos- but as we all know there is such thing as overkill). I went to my local MAC counter and did a trial with the colors I wanted to use. The makeup artist gave me a  picture of a face palette and literally wrote directions on what he used and where everything was supposed to go (kind of like a map for the makeup artist in Mexico to use). The makeup was very expensive  over $160 for some eye shadows, a liner, concealer, and a gloss  but I chose colors I could use every day so really it was a good excuse for a makeup revamp!

 

 

I totally agree!  In my experience, if you bring a picture of yourself and/or your face palette picture thingy, then they are good at copying stuff.  If you have no idea and just let them choose, it tends to be heavier makeup.  This is why I think my bridesmaid's makeup was heavier and not as nice....but it looked good in pictures....just a bit much in person.