How to Plan a Wedding in Negril
There are 3 basic ways to plan a wedding in Negril. The first would be a package deal at one of the beach or cliff resorts. I saw basic packages for as little as $500 that included a minister, a bouquet, a cake and the paperwork. Obviously something this inexpensive would only suffice for a couple getting married with very few in attendance. I’m sure that bill could escalate quickly as more people are included The second would be to hire a wedding planner in Negril such as Ariana or Faith Frazier. Do not discount a wedding planner if you are having a large wedding, need some handholding or if this will be your first trip to Negril. The third way is to plan it yourself.
Our daughter Kristin decided she wanted a small wedding and having a destination wedding would insure that. Janet and I set a total wedding price of $12,000, figuring that is what an average wedding might cost in the US. For that amount of money, it would include EVERYTHING, from invitations, wedding dress, airfare and hotels for 4 people for 11 days, all food, all daytrips, flowers, cake, photographer, minister, chairs, reception, airport parking, transportation to and from Negril and any other expenses we might incur.
Kristin was a full time nursing student and working part time. She didn’t have the time, interest or know-how to pull this off. Her fiancée, Alex, had never been out of the US. Janet and I took an 8 day trip in November to plan a May wedding. I figured it might take 5 or 6 days to set it all up and we would get a day or two at the end to relax. I had scoured old Nergil.com posts for wedding information and had E-mailed a few people for some additional information. We had already received the okay from Petrona at Blue Cave Castle to have the wedding there. Kristin wanted something more private than a beach wedding, and Blue Cave fit the bill. We reserved 4 rooms at Blue Cave, figuring any additional guests could book their own room there. Unfortunately, 3 other couples booked places on the beach.
Janet and I were off and running in November with my little booklet of contact information.
The first call was to Sun Gold Photography 876-957-0892. They didn’t answer their phone so I went to our next contact. Bill at Negril Portraits www.negrilportraits.com 876-483-2111 said he could meet us at our hotel in a few hours. Then we called Misha Earle 876-861-5631 and set up an appointment for the next day at 2 PM. She never showed. We also saw some photography work at Faith Fraiser’s www.faithfulweddingservices.com 876-618-1223 but were not crazy about the work. One other contact was Antoinette Gomex, but we never got that far. Bill from Negril Portraits showed up on time and had a very nice presentation on his laptop. We were very impressed but told him we needed a day or 2 to think about it. Two days later while eating breakfast at Just Natural, Bill stopped by (he lives in the neighborhood) and we gave him a $100 deposit. He wrote our receipt on a napkin…..only in Jamaica! The napkin now resides in Kristin’s wedding book. Negril Portraits has a number of different packages and you can pick which one you want the day before the wedding. Kristin’s ran about $400 which included around 300 photos on a DVD and also a 35 minute slide show to Jamaican music. The slide show is what everyone wants to see. You must print your own photos when you get back home, so ask for a copyright release. Wal-Mart wouldn’t print ours without one. After the wedding we bought a beautify wedding album on line for less than $50 and the 24 8x10’s were less than $3 each at Wal-Mart.
About the only part of the wedding that Kristin wanted to plan were the flowers. We had been to Floral Fantasies website many times www.floralfantasiesjamaica.com 876-957-4887 and had an idea of what she wanted. We stopped in to their shop near the roundabout and spent 45 minutes getting prices and availability. They said they needed about 4 weeks lead time on the specifics. By the way, we had made up business cards with our name, E-mail address, the date, time and location of the wedding and gave them to each person we were using. This also indicated to the vendors that we were serious and not just tire kickers. We were so impressed with Floral Fantasies that we never went any further with our little black book. We had the following other contacts. Francine at Seastar, Flower Shop across the street from Rondel Village, Boulevard Floral\Sheryl Stewart 876-957-4737 or 876-883-5164, and Jean Gaynair a lady at Beach Comer Condos. Flowers are not cheap in Negril, but Floral Fantasies put out a superb product and were very professional. Total cost about $850.
We were not sure what to do about the cake. Our contacts included Devon House near the roundabout, Norma’s on the beach and Margaret Myrie 876-957-3191. As we sat eating some patties at Hammonds Bakery we asked if they made wedding cakes. Avis Hammond, bakery.hammonds@gmail.com came out from the back and told us all about their cakes. We were so impressed. A 2 layer cake with fondant icing was about $3,500 Jamaican. We wanted flowers on the cake and would order them through Floral Fantasies. I believe there was a $1000 Jamaican delivery charge for the cake.
Next was trying to find a salon to do Kristin’s hair and nails. We went to Queen Bee Salon, but either they had moved or went out of business. So we stopped out at FOY Fountain of Youth Day Spa, just outside of town on the way to Sav passed the Texaco station. They also provide free transportation to and from the spa. It was a brand new place and looked good. They can be reached at www.fountainofyouthdayspajamaica.com 957-9486 or 857-0857. They offered to do a trial run on Kristin’s hair the day before the wedding but we had plans for a day trip, so declined. Unfortunately they had problems getting Kristin’s hair the way she wanted it on the day of the wedding, and this was exacerbated by Kristin not having photo of exactly what she wanted. This was the only thing that didn’t go exactly as planned.
We needed tables and chairs for the wedding and reception. There is a place in Sav that provides this service, but we wanted something local. Faithful Wedding Services www.faithfulweddingservices.com 876-852-4523 was just down the street from Blue Cave. Everything is charged separately: tables, chairs, chair covering, bows for the chairs and delivery. I think it ended up about $150 but they were on time and actually helped move tables and chairs around after the service and for the reception…very professional.
We decided to use Pastor Trevor Hylton 876-955-2753 or 876-359-9730 trevhylton@yahoo.com for the service. He is rather lax about following up E-mails and we had some problems setting up an appointment. Petrona at Blue Cave gave us a hand in contacting him. We met and gave him a $100 deposit for the wedding ($250 total) and gave him an indication of what type of service we wanted. There are other Pastors that can perform the ceremony at similar prices, but you must ask around.
We wanted some type of music at the wedding, but not a DJ. As Janet an I sat on the beach at Coco la Palm, we had some beach musicians play a song or 2 for us for a couple of bucks. The third guy we met was Iratio 276-2709 iratiobal4@gmail.com. His given name is Orville, and he plays a very nice acoustic guitar, sings well and writes some of his own songs. I would say he is in his late 20’s and dresses and presents himself well. We told him we would pay him $100 to play for an hour after the wedding and that we wanted a few specific songs. This was going to be a little “iffy” hiring a beach musician and hoping he would be around 6 months later. We were not able to get in touch with him again until about a week before the wedding. At the last minute we upped the price a bit and asked him to play a couple of songs during the wedding, one a song he had written for Kristin and Alex. He was a little late arriving, but everything worked out fine. He ended up playing almost 2 hours.
We held the reception at Blue Cave. Teddy cooked up a storm. Because there would only be 16 people at the reception, he would price it off the menu. To make it easy on Teddy, we asked everyone in advance to select from one of three entrees, rather than the whole menu. We also asked for bruchetta and a large fruit salad. He did not have a problem with us bringing our own drinks from Darlings Store across the street. We did not have any alcohol served. The price was very reasonable and we left him and the waitress a rather substantial tip.
