My fairy godmother…

The most talented Marie Mallozzi did the hair and makeup for me and my wedding party. She was a saint, stayed totally calm amongst the chaos of 5 women all trying to get ready for the big event and worked her magic wand on everyone.

She even came down in the lift with me to the entrance of the wedding ceremony and helped me with last minute touch ups, held my hand as I had to balance along a wall to get in to the entrance of the aisle and smoothed out the back of my dress…


LES CISEAUX DE MARIE
Tel: 06 16 14 48 96
Email: lesciseauxdemarie@gmail.com
http://lesciseauxdemarie.com/book.php

Just an added comment regarding the flowers…..

As our wedding was outside on grass, we wanted to do something to make the affect of an aisle. I did lots of research and after reading tips from other brides not to put a canvas runner down (apparently ladies high heels get stuck and people fall over) that we would use fresh rose petals. We also wanted to have fresh rose petals to throw at the end of the ceremony as confetti. It was not a problem for our lovely florists to provide the white rose petals, however the price of fresh petals was horrendous to say the least.

However all was not lost, I found an alternative “Preserved Rose Petals” they look and feel like the fresh petals but even better they won’t wilt or die in the sunshine and they are available in a wide range of colours and at a fraction of the price.

There are many providers out there depending on what country you live in, I ordered mine from Perditas Petals and had them delivered to my office in London and then I took them out to France with me.

Artistic Creations

3 A Roni Fleur is a family business that has been
creating floral arrangements since 1887 and is now run by the fourth generation of Roni’s, four brothers and one sister.

We had a lovely meeting with the sister who showed us through examples of their work and then came up with great ideas after we explained our look and feel we were striving to achieve, it truly was a made to measure service – and unlike some other companies we met, no French artist temperaments to deal with!

Our colour theme was white and arzu blue for the whole wedding, so all our flower arrangements were made up of white and what they call King Blue.

(sorry these are not our professional photos, just photo's that guests took.)

3A RONI
6 rue Sainte Marguerite
06 160 Juan les Pins
France
Phone : +33 4 93 61 93 31
Fax : +33 4 93 61 83 14
Email : roni3a@club-internet.fr
Web: http://www.roni-fleurs.com/

And for dessert….. the wedding cake

We decided not to go down the road of a traditional English/American style wedding cake. We figured whilst in France do as the French do, so we went with a Croquembouche.

The name comes from the French words 'Croque en bouche' meaning 'crunch in the mouth', because of the sensation one has while eating one of the puffs. The croquembouche has been used as a celebration cake for weddings by the French nobility since the early 18th century. Each wedding guest would bring a “sweet bread” or two with them to help create a tower of cream puffs. The couple of honour would attempt to kiss over the tower. As tradition has it, the hope was that this ceremony would grant them a prosperous life together.

The cake is made from choux buns filled with vanilla crème (profitteroles) held together with caramel in an impressive pyramid, and often decorated with threads of caramel, sugared almonds, chocolate, flowers, or ribbons.

Our cake was arranged through the venue with La Boutique at Oasis Raimbault. Contact there is Valérie Raimbault boutique@oasis-raimbault.comRue Jean Honoré Carle - 06210 La Napoule - FranceTel direct 33 (0)4 92 97 31 82Tel 33 (0)4 93 49 95 52 - Fax 33 (0)4 93 49 64 13http://www.oasis-raimbault.com

For those keen cooks, or brides on a budget here is a recipe which serves 20 people http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1801/croquembouche

The Yummy Stuff

Club Port la Galére offers various options with regards to catering your wedding. You can choose from either one of two all-inclusive packages which they call Les Formules or go a-la-carte. The two packages are:

The Preimiere Formule
Cocktail Open-bar without champagne
Menu options 3 to choose from
Wines of the slopes
Mineral water
The hire of the club incl. all equipment, chairs, tables, linens etc
Personnel until midnight

The Deuxieme Formule
Open cocktail bar with the champagne
Menus options 5 to choose from
Higher wine selection
Mineral Water
A goblet of champagne with dessert
The hire of the club incl. all equipment, chairs, tables, linens etc
Personnel until 2:00 am
Incandescent Decoration

Les Formules work out to be great value, and you can add things on and pay a supplement. We went for the Deuxieme Formule and it was great, as previously mentioned nothing was too much trouble. I won’t list all the menus or prices as I am sure they change from year to year.

However to give you an idea our menu was 5 courses followed by wedding cake, we did warn our guests not to eat a big lunch that day!

Want to stay in touch…

So as we all know it’s very easy to travel around the world, but to stay in touch with loved ones, can get expensive using your mobile overseas. For you to stay in touch with all your guests you could hire a mobile phone or sim card from The Cell Phone CIE whilst your in France and give out the contact number to all for the duration of your wedding festivities.

You can order and pick up your cell phone at Nice Airport, The rental of the handset is charged either by per day, per week or per month. All incoming calls are free, from anywhere in the world.

How to keep the gang entertained

If like us your wedding is a long weekend event, you might want to give your wedding guests some fun things to do…

Want to organise a traditional coach tour for your guests, with either a full or half daytour, check out Sunny Days Tours

Or if you want something a bit different what about…

A half day boat trip to see whales and dolphins. Check out Acti'Loisirs

Or don’t want to get stuck in traffic, or tire out everyone’s feet, what about a cycle tour of Nice. Check out Nice Cycle Tours.

Or maybe the boyz want to have a go on the Monaco Grand Prix check out AGS Formula 1

And if that speed is too much how about the Le Petit Train

Some thing old, something new, something borrowed, something blue…

The “old” remembers the bride’s family ties

The “new” should bring success to the newly-wed

While the “borrowed” is supposed to bring them luck

And finally the “blue” symbolises fidelity and the couple’s 'purity'

For the something blue check out these

lovely bespoke bridal lingerie Ell & Cee Lingerie

Capturing the moment

Trying to find a photographer in the South of France to capture our French Riviera Wedding has proved to be trickier than initially thought, not because there aren’t lots of them around the Cote d'Azur, but that the typical
style in the South is very different to say London or Paris…
but I have found a few that I liked:

Studio Cabrelli Photographies - Dominique & Maria Cabrelli – Provence
Wedding package includes:

• A complete day from the preparation until 8pm.


• DVD with about 300 photos mix of colour and black & white in high resolution with no copyrights.
  
  Price: rates start at €1800 http://www.studiocabrelli.net/
  

ALBAN PICHON Photographer – Cannes
Wedding package includes:

• Taking Pictures (unlimited) from the preparation to the dancing


• High Resolution Digital Files and full permission to print and distribute your image as you wish (no additional fees) on 4x personalized DVD


• All images available online (1 year) for family and friend to view or download (High Resolution Free) or print.


• Extensive post-production image editing on all of your wedding images

Price : €1400 http://www.pichon.com/


Peggy Herbeau – Photographer – Saint Ouen (outside Paris)
Wedding package includes:

• Taking pictures in colour and black and white


• DVD with 700 - 800 photos

Price: from €1700 -2100 http://www.lesproductionsdelafabrik.com/