Grand Sirenis Riviera Maya Brides??

[FtMacBride]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oilersbride 

Hey everyone ... I am still actually at the resort - our wedding was a couple days ago,
There were no major snafus... Cake was wrong flavor and an iguana helped itself to a tray of appetizers during cocktails.... Those were the biggest boo boo of the day. Dj played songs fine for the ones we specified but definitely wished we pre loaded a iPod with songs for reception - luckily a couple guests provided their phones and the dj played the music from that which was more crowd appropriate. Resort photographers did not show up day of wedding - we brought our own and they offered to do a family session with us for our ten free pics - if the rain ever stops I hope we can do that in next couple days! I used the spa for my hair and make up as well as pre wedding manis and pedis - it all worked out well. Hair and make up took 2 hours and I just needed to remove the thick dark eye brows they filled in - but I was happy over all with how it turned out in general. We also did a ttd session the morning after - pool lazy river and down at the beach .... We had zero issues with bringing our friend in who was staying the whole week with us. More detailed review and pics to come!

Oilersbride,

 

Congrats on your big day.  Cant wait to see pictures and hear all about it when you return home

[FtMacBride]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shera Richer 
 

Hello Grand GSRM Brides!

I'm getting married on April 24th, 2014.  I was wondring if anyone decided to go with an outside photographer from Mexico for their wedding.  I was looking a the packages available through Adventure Photos, did anyone use their services.

thanks!

any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

 

Shera

Hi Shera,

 

I'm getting married on April 16, 2014!  We are there until the 20.  When do you arrive?  I am also looking into using an outside photographer and I just cant seem to choice one!!!

 

June

[FtMacBride]

Hi ladies,

 

I am just going through all my attachments that were sent to me with all the details about the presidential package.  I am a little unsure on the ~Champagne toast and appetizers~  Is this a cocktail hour??? How long does it happen? Is it long enough to keep guests entertained while wedding party gets photos, or did you guys opt for a private cocktail hour?  I am not to sure what time the open bar starts...whether it starts when the ceremony ends or whether it begins when the reception starts.  I am thinking about a 4pm start with cocktail hour from 4:30-5:30 and reception to begin at 6??? Does this make sense or should I change my times.  I know if I start reception at 6 I am will to pay the dj and extra hour to keep him till disco opens. How someone has some feedback for me

 

June

[MrsHK]

Hello Grand Sirenis Riviera Maya brides! Congrats on your upcoming weddings! This post is for any brides interested in affordable decor for your big day.

 

I'm a newlywed from Vancouver, Canada that lives down here in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. I have quite a few decor items leftover from our wedding in May, mostly in a rustic vintage style. I've decided to rent things out to brides that don't want to lug things like vases & mason jars down here to Mexico, and have priced things quite fairly compared to the resorts' prices. 

 

I have a lots of different types of bottles, mason jars, vases and lanterns, as well as a variety of other items like wooden signs & frames, table runners, rustic birdcages, string lighting and even a portable sound system.

If you want a Style Me Pretty or Ruffled type of wedding in Mexico without a huge price tag, I'm your gal! So far no one has had to pay an outside vendor fee at all, as they tell their WC that they have brought the decor themselves. I'm also always interested in buying items that brides bring down and would like to sell after their weddings, please send me photos of anything you'd like to sell!

If you'd like to see some photos and a price list, please send me a PM with your email address and I'll send you all the info. Also if anyone has any questions about the area, ask away! I've lived in Playa Del Carmen for two years and know the whole coast quite well. Happy planning ladies!

 

Here's a couple of photos of some items we used in our wedding and that are for rent, but I have lots more:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[AmandaRyan2014]

Hi Everyone,

 

It's been awhile since I have been on here but the big day is getting closer and closer so we are finalizing some details!!  Love this forum you other brides are so helpful!!

 

I was just wondering if anyone has used the resort photographer?  We have a name Jorge Contreras but I can't find anything online about him or any photographs showing his work.  Yikes!!  Are most of you other brides hiring someone off the resort?  Have you mananged to get a decent rate? 

 

Any help would be great! Talk soon!

Amanda

[AmandaRyan2014]

Does anyone know if the $300 US Resort fee for hiring an outside photographer is per person or just a single charge?  Example if you have two photographers is it $300 each?

[Marls]

Hi ladies,

I had my wedding at GS in May 2013, a bit of feedback about questions being asked:

We used Photos in Cancun as our photographer, and they were great! We got 2300 photos from them, but are waiting on the edited versions (250 total), mostly because we had a crazy summer and didn't pick which ones we wanted until recently. The resort photographer showed up (I knew from this forum to tell them not to show, but forgot), and it was TERRIBLE. The girl was dressed in jeans and a short sleeve shirt, looked very unprofessional, and got in the way of our photographer. She is in a bunch of our vow pictures which sucks. Also, they gave us 10 free photos I think, and they were all terrible. We actually meant to make a complaint to the resort about how unprofessional the company was (again, it's the same company who brings the monkey around and takes pictures of you with it). I would highly NOT recommended them.

 

As for the cocktail hour, we did end up having to get an extra hour of open bar in between the cocktail hour and palapa opening up to give us time to do pictures. If not, the guests would have only had one glass of champagne for the whole time we were doing our pictures, and it's pretty far to go to the bar to get a drink (and we had 75 guests, so using the trolley cart wasn't really an option). It ended up costing a bit more, but was definitely worth it.

[Oilersbride]

Hi Everyone, It's been awhile since I have been on here but the big day is getting closer and closer so we are finalizing some details!!  Love this forum you other brides are so helpful!! I was just wondering if anyone has used the resort photographer?  We have a name Jorge Contreras but I can't find anything online about him or any photographs showing his work.  Yikes!!  Are most of you other brides hiring someone off the resort?  Have you mananged to get a decent rate?  Any help would be great! Talk soon! Amanda

Hi Amanda The resort photographer is the one that takes photos around the resort with the animals and stuff. We brought our own from home - a friend that does it kind of as a side job and we didn't have to pay the 300 USD fee for outside photographer since she was staying at resort as a guest for the week. We did however get the resort photographer to take pics of us for about a half an hour our second last day to get our 10 free photos. It was a female so I don't know that the name you have is who actually is guaranteed to take the photos. They didn't do the greatest job and in all honesty we had prob 20 pics to pick from in our quick shoot and there was only 7 or so that I truly liked. I don't know about outside photographers or if the site photographer would do a better job for the wedding day itself but in my opinion it isn't worth it to risk the photos not being good and I would look into the ones offered from playa or cancun. Shelley

[Oilersbride]

Hi ladies, I am just going through all my attachments that were sent to me with all the details about the presidential package.  I am a little unsure on the ~Champagne toast and appetizers~  Is this a cocktail hour??? How long does it happen? Is it long enough to keep guests entertained while wedding party gets photos, or did you guys opt for a private cocktail hour?  I am not to sure what time the open bar starts...whether it starts when the ceremony ends or whether it begins when the reception starts.  I am thinking about a 4pm start with cocktail hour from 4:30-5:30 and reception to begin at 6??? Does this make sense or should I change my times.  I know if I start reception at 6 I am will to pay the dj and extra hour to keep him till disco opens. How someone has some feedback for me June

Hi June The booze won't start flowing until after ceremony. We opted for open national bar starting at 230 for our cocktail hour(s). We had people take pics with us from 230-300ish and then a Mexican trio came and played to keep guests entertained. We had the DJ play music after this. We had reception start at 6. We had the wedding coordinator arrange to have extra Tiffany chairs at no cost so people could sit. I think having that much time between ceremony and reception probably sucked for the guests since we didn't want to shuttle them back and forth before the reception. We got extra appetizers for the cocktail hour and I think open bar is better then paying for extra wine / champagne since not everyone drinks that. Also you get the golf cart for 8 hours / if you don't pay for the extra one that they offer for 1000 pesos for 5 hours. Ours was available from 1-9 leaving people stranded (only because it was raining buckets that night) at the palapa till the disco shuttle ran. Because you will have a shorter time between ceremony and reception I don't think you need to worry about open bar until start of reception itself. Do you know when sunset is while you are there? We spent from 315ish till prob 530 when we lost the light. Depends what kind of pics and how far you want to go away from ceremony site. Oh and I highly recommend people go check out the ceremony site. The wedding coordinator does not take you there (at least ours didn't) and we walked there fairly easily during the day... It's right behind the disco and there is a path from building 24 (I think it was 24) that you can follow. This is where the private beach ceremony is and not the public one. And you might get talked about how awesome the ruins are to take pics on but I didn't find it very easy to get up to it just walking around let alone in a dress! Sorry I rambled!!!!!

[Oilersbride]

Does anyone know if the $300 US Resort fee for hiring an outside photographer is per person or just a single charge?  Example if you have two photographers is it $300 each?

I think the 300 us is just a penalty for not using their photographer. You need To purchase a day pass for your Photographer and that's 650 pesos a person.... And if they stay for your reception you will have to pay their food. You may get told it's a 1000 pesos a person (we were for two guests staying off site) but that's 650 pesos for the resort pass and then 350 pesos for their food as we had the BBQ menu (buffet)