sheri215's reviews

I've been to other Hawaiian islands plenty of times and have been to numerous luaus, but for our DW to Maui we booked the Old Lahaina Luau for the day before our wedding for guests to mingle and get to know each other. It is a bit pricey - they do 10% discounts if you are booking a party of 15 or more and have children rates. The dinner was by far the best luau dinner I've had ... they have tuna poke, taco poke, lomi lomi that actually has salmon in it! And even an open bar!! I had a party of 45, the staff was great and friendly, they accomodated our big party perfectly. They even printed special tickets with our names on it.

The only reason why I didn't give it a full 5 stars is because I was expecting the traditional luau ... so be aware that this pays tribute to the "old" lahaina, so the dances are slower, more traditional. I like the fun, fast dances and there weren't many. No fire dance, no tonga men with the crazy painted faces that stick out their tounge and no crowd participation for the hukilau hula or crazy people on stage to see who can shake their butts faster. It's still a great show, but wish they would throw in a bit more fun and fast hulas to keep the momentum going.

Since I'm a DW bride doign a lot of DIY, I had googled florists in Maui and found Paradise Flowers. They also ship anywhere, but I opted to pick it up while I was on the island. My centerpieces (photos in bio) were all diy and instead of doing a lot of florals, I did loose orchid heads which they have for $.12 a piece. I had 5 tables, a guest book table, bar and buffet tables and ordered 400 orchids and had plenty to spare. Great quality, awesome price. I picked them up on Saturday and the wedding was on Monday - kept them in the fridge and they still looked fresh and smelled great. The left over flowers were in a bag in our car overnight and I used some the next day for our TTD photo session and they were still perky and pretty!! They also do custom orders for lei's if you're interested - we didn't since we were on a budget but when I went to pick it up, I saw them making an order for someone else - all hand done and looked great. Friendly staff and great service.

I booked Teresa through Jackie at White Orchid Weddings. I believe she is their house florist, since it was a DW I didn't get to meet her in person. I was on a huge budget being that I got laid off after we paid deposits with White Orchid and the venue ... so we opted to do a lot of DIY. I only used her for the bouquets and bouts which turned out awesome (photos in my bio).

I worked with her through email via my coordinator. She seems very flexible and easy to work with. I sent her my colors, pictures of my dress and inspiration photos and she told me what she thought would look best within my budget. I did my own centerpieces, but she seems flexible for that as well - I told her my budget and an overall feel of what I wanted and she told me what she could do ... I had gotten killer deals on a lot of vases so I opted to do the centerpieces myself to save $ but if it would have been anything like my bouquets, I'm sure it would have been awesome!

We booked Tino through Jackie at White Orchid Weddings, he was great!! His words are very touching and although it's a routine for him, you'd never guess it. Jackie let us read his speech prior to booking him - we chose the non denomination ceremony with Hawaiian prayer at the end. Although, the day of, I think he forgot to do the Hawaiian prayer - but it's ok, I completely forgot until I started writing this review!! We had so many people compliment the ceremony and many guests said they never felt so connected to a wedding ceremony. We didn't hire a videographer and had a friend tape it instead (a guy) and you could hear him sniffling during the ceremony - he's been to a lot of weddings and he said this was the most touching one out of all!!

I would defintely recommend him. As Cascara (below) mentions, he has a very calming and soothing voice. I would totally recommend him, he was awesome!

We had a DW and didn't get to have a tasting but I'm very pleased to say that the food was delish!! We booked them through Jackie at White Orchid Weddings, she gave us a list of recommended caterers and I did some research and Cafe O Lei has a restaurant that had great reviews, so I went with them. We did a buffet (few pictures in my bio) which included pasta salad, baby green salad, sauteed vegies, fish, chicken, steak, shrimp, garlic bread (and added 2 vegetarian plated dinners).

Pasta salad - great flavor (bowtie pasta, feta cheese, tomato based sauce). Baby green salad - tossed with the perfect amount of dressing (spring salad, walnuts, pears, slightly sweetened). Sauteed veggies - soooo yummy (mushrooms, maui onions, eggplant, potatoes, zuccini)! Mahi Mahi filets were moist and covered with mac nuts, chicken breast was very moist and flavorful, steak was a little over cooked for my taste but it's a buffet and they play to the majority, shrimp was awesome and the highlight of the meal for everyone!

Everything was very good and we even had a few guests tell us it was the best wedding food they've ever had!!! That was a huge compliment and big relief!!

They were recommended by my wedding coordinator Jackie at White Orchid Weddings. I'm only giving them 3 stars ... The cake was pretty, however not what I had ordered (picture of actual and inspiration in my bio). Not sure if this was the bakery or my coordinators fault since it was a DW and we didn't do a tasting or anything. I ordered butter cream and got fondant. The inspiration picture (which was a white orchid wedding cake - so I assumed they booked my cake with the same baker) had white chocolate shavings, mine did not since it was fondant. I personally don't like fondant, they don't taste as moist to me - and from the bite my DH and I had, we didn't like it and thought it was dry. However, we only ate the 1 bite we fed to each other and didn't truely taste it. Two guests did say they thought the cake tasted good ... but we also had liliha cocoa puffs at our dessert table and those outshined the cake, tons of people complimented the cocoa puffs.

I just had my wedding at Haiku Mills and it is to die for! I knew right when I saw the venue online that this was THE place. It is just as charming in person as all the photos. All my guests kept talking about how beauitful it is! It's a photographers dream to shoot here. There is the cutest brides room to get ready in but it doesn't have a/c but a good breeze comes through. Everything has a vintage charm to it, very chabby chic. Lots of hidden areas for amazing photos. Only downfall - there are mosquitos gallore so bring bug spray for your guests!!

Rachel is a doll! I love her! She's fun to work with, easy to get along with and best of all - she's patient!! I have a stubborn "husband" (hehe i can actually call him that now!) who hates to take pictures, she was a good sport and did her best to try and losen him up and work around it! We did a TTD session the day after and she had awesome ideas! Our shoot was on Maui - she's based in Oahu ... she travels and will go the extra mile to scout out locations for you. She's awesome!! Can't wait to see the pictures!!

I worked with Jackie - she is so friendly and awesome! We hired her for our DW in Maui at the Haiku Mills. I was probably a little challenging for her since I had lost my job right after we paid our deposits and wanted to DIY a lot and was looking to save money in any way possible. You defintely get what you pay for and WOW only works with the best vendors! We had to revise a little and cut back on things to make sure we stayed on budget. She is so sweet and easy to get along with. Even though we diy'd our own centerpieces and decor, her staff helped us break things down after the wedding was over. If you live on the mainland, keep in mind the way of the island - I live in Los Angeles and am always go go go, so with any Hawaiian based vendor, be patient ... it can be difficult to plan a DW but Jackie would schedule conference calls to discuss things and make sure we were on track. Jackie is great and our wedding turned out beautiful! Even when we kept changing our guest count up to the weekend before, she was always on it!