MB Wedding Design and Events

Michelle came highly recommended by a very good friend of mine who is also in the wedding/​event planning business and I couldn’t have been happier with the result.
I’m a local girl, born and raised on Maui but I live in the Bay Area, so in reality, our wedding was a destination wedding and there were so many details to consider. While I was able to plan most of it myself, I didn’t have anyone to help me coordinate w/​vendors back home or handle day of preparation and execution. Having someone like Michelle, who knew the island, the way vendors work and who has planned many weddings back on Maui, I knew she’d be the perfect person to help make our wedding day the best day of my life.
Michelle was extremely personable, organized, detailed, timely, and managed our wedding to a T. She just got me and my local ways and asked all of the questions I had not even begun to think of. I trusted her with the details and she brought our day to life. I couldn’t have imagined have a more beautiful wedding day and Michelle and her team helped make that a reality. I highly recommend Michelle for any wedding or event planning needs you may have.
Mahalo Michelle!
Angela & Randy

We began working with Michelle in August of 2010 with a TBD wedding date. We were truly in the beginning stages of the planning process and needed help getting organized and on track. We knew we wanted a destination wedding, but had no idea where to begin, which location to chose and on top of it all, we had a family that wasn’t 100% on board with our plans. Living in San Francisco, with a family from Chicago, we knew we had a long road ahead.
After meeting with Michelle, she helped us narrow down our location options, showed us AMAZING destination wedding photos she had previously coordinated and helped us create a timeline. After much deliberation, we decided on a wedding in Providencials, Turks and Caicos.
Upon deciding the location, my fiancé, Michelle and myself went on a site visit to the island. She had set up numerous site visits and food tastings prior to our arrival. We truly fell in love with the island and fell in love with Villa Bajacu! We knew that it was the venue we wanted to get married in and with Michelle’s help and creativity, we knew the event would be magical.
Upon returning to the states, Michelle quickly put together a budget, timeline and a vision board to meet our needs. She even helped me convince my Mother of our vision via conference call and we began marching towards November 12^th of 2011.
Michelle made herself 100% available to me leading up to the event and upon arriving on the island for the big event; she worked tirelessly helping orchestrating our many events. Aside from the wedding, we had planned a Welcome Cocktail Reception on Thursday night, a Sunset Boat Cruise and Rehearsal Dinner on the Rooftop of the bridal party suit and Sunday Brunch on the Beach.
The day of the wedding was truly magical and Michelle’s creativity, style and vision came to life seamlessly. She worked morning till night ensuring every detail was taken care of and most importantly, every guest was having a great time. She truly put together the wedding day of our dreams!
I cannot even begin to thank Michelle for all her hard work and services in bringing my Caribbean wedding dream to life. I would recommend her to ANYONE looking for a fun, creative and amazing planner for their Big Day. I truly do not know what I would have done without Michelle’s vision and support. I loved working with her and thought of her more of a friend by the end of the process than just our wedding planner.
Thanks so much Michelle for everything!!!
Cheers~
Meg & Brian Richardson

I hired Michelle to help me plan my companies corporate holiday party last year and she was AWESOME! She came in a few months prior to help us select a venue, caterer, band and facilitate communication with them and the other vendors we brought on board. She referred us to some great people who were able to work with our budget and that was key.
Michelle offered us ideas for personalizing our party, from the invitations to the goodie baskets that each employee received at the end of the party. She has a very good eye for décor and she was able to help us create a fun and elegant party that wowed our VP’s. This was the first year we hired an event planner, as our company had grown in the past year and we outgrew our in-​house space which was always used for our holiday parties, so this was the main reason we needed someone to help us secure a large space.
We will definitely be hiring Michelle again, as her expertise and connections made us feel at ease and we were able to put our event in the trusted hands of a true professional!

We hired Michelle in 2010 to be our Wedding Planner for our May 2011 wedding. Before hiring Michelle, we were on the fence on if we were going to budget for a planner at all. But with a long distance relationship, work, families, activities, and numerous other factors, we felt that it would be a good investment in the long run… and it was definitely a good investment.
For all future brides and grooms, I would highly recommend a planner, especially Michelle, if they know that they cannot devote a large amount of time to their wedding planning. Michelle listened to our ideas for the wedding, provided us with the appropriate vendors (within our budget and in accordance with our theme and look), accompanied us to various vendor and site meetings, and provided us with a day of timeline (among other completed tasks). On the day of, the wedding and reception turned out completely beautiful and exactly (if not more) than what we expected.
Thank you MB for making ShirlijahLand a reality.

It’s been a whirlwind year and I finally get the chance to sit down and express why my family and I highly recommend Michelle B. I have no regrets hiring Michelle to design and plan our Nov wedding events. My family and I credit her with how successful it went and to this day, we still receive many compliments about how beautiful and how much fun it was. Michelle had been recommended to me by one of the vendors at the annual Four Seasons wedding fair. I emailed her shortly after to learn more about her services and she responded relatively quickly. We had originally been looking for a destination wedding planner but we were happy to learn she also specialized in weddings throughout the Bay Area as well. Michelle had been our rock throughout the whole wedding planning process and provided great advice on ways to stay within budget without losing the vision we wanted for our wedding day. She let us know when the what we wanted would make us go over budget but provided great alternative solutions. She was also there to just listen as we vented about the numerous wedding issues we experienced with certain family members and friends. She attended almost every vendor meeting with us and even came with me to my makeup trial that was even 2 hours away. In addition, she even attended my last dress fitting with my mom and I after she had learned none of my bridesmaids could make it. During our planning, Michelle went through a really difficult period that possibly could have possibly have sidelined any other person. We are so thankful she was there with us on our wedding there. She even lead the negotiations with our venue to lower their rental fee when their original figure was beyond our budget. What is really great about Michelle is that not only did she put so much of heart into each of her weddings but she is just a great person overall. She makes an effort to get to you as a person but also our families.
Denelle L.
Michelle is a great wedding planner! We hired her for the full service wedding planning. She was very thorough and walked us step by step through the entire process. I couldn’t attend every meeting since I lived in Orange County and my wife lived in San Francisco. MB made sure to include me in the major design and budget meetings, so that my opinion was heard. I was worried the wedding would be too girly. MB always kept our budget in mind when we were making design decisions. She sent us vendors for the price range we asked initially set. She was then kind enough to send other vendors if we didn’t like the initial group. She stayed in constant contact with my wife (I saw the thousand emails sent back and forth). MB, my wife, and I also got along personally, even though she is a Giants fan. MB was also helpful in working with our parents as each had their own ideas on how the wedding should run.
Our actual wedding day was wonderful and MB was helpful in a few issues such as the hotel losing some items. Which we later learn happens very often. At the end of day MB and her husband/​assistant looked exhausted from all the running around that they did, so I have nothing but a big THANK YOU! To both of them.
Aaron L.

My wife and I got married in September of 2009 and I’ve had time to think about before writing this review. We chose MB Wedding design for «Day of Wedding Coordinating» or on MB’s website listed as «Partial Wedding Planning» service. My wife and I met with only two other planners, but we chose MB Wedding Design because the price range was within our budget and we felt we had a great meeting after our introductory meeting with Michelle. Based on our initial conversation, it was evident that Michelle had a wealth of knowledge and experience in the industry.
Although MB wasn’t performing full scale wedding planning services, the objective was to make sure all the right vendors were on board and to ensure the wedding day would flow as according to planned. My wife has worked in the wedding planning industry part time, so she knew what she wanted. She drafted out a detailed timeline of the wedding day. All MB had to do was do its best to follow that timeline and to be on the same page with the vendors.
We met with Michelle at the reception site a few days before the wedding. We hashed out details and explained a few things that were a MUST (i.e. guests taking pictures of themselves and signing the guestbook). Michelle stated that she and two of her assistants would be working the event. She never indicated any of our requests would be a problem.
For those of you that have gotten married, all of you know that last week could be stressful leading up to that special day. The last two days of the wedding were stressful for my wife and I (mainly her). The vendors were contacting my wife (even late on the night before the wedding) trying to get on the same page. Some of them didn’t even have a copy of the wedding-​timeline. These «Loose Ends» were suppose to be tied up by MB. Some of the vendors said they had hardly any contact with them.
After our church ceremony we took photos and then arrived at the reception site. We were greeted by Michelle’s two assistant’s, but didn’t see her. It wasn’t until the a couple of days after that we found out Michelle had gotten sick and she only came to help set-​up. From my standpoint, it was a wonderful night and we knew everyone enjoyed their night. We got a lot of compliments and for the parts I could remember, it was a great night.
The fallout didn’t happen until the next couple days. My wife’s sister explained to us what was going on behind the scenes. Everyone knows that a lot of things happen in order for a party to be successful. My wife’s sister (who also has planned weddings) was telling us about all of the «little things» we wanted not being completed. The guestbook station had a camera and portable printer where we wanted our guests to post pictures. I guess one of her assistant’s couldn’t figure it out so the printer was just put on the floor. My wife’s sister had to ensure parts of the timeline were completed. And probably the biggest mishap of the night was regarding the Beverage station. My wife and I wanted the bar closed at 10pm. We stated this to MB because we didn’t want to get charged the extra hour and we wanted guests to stop drinking by then. Unfortunately, nobody told the beverage station to close and we had to pay the extra hour. And obviously, my wife and I had no sense of what time it was.
We contacted Michelle about this. She informed us that she had gotten really sick, but came to the reception site early in the day to facilitate the vendors coming in and decorations. We explained that we were disappointed that all the vendors were still contacting my wife the night before and that some of the tasks were not completed during the wedding. In addition, we asked for reimbursement for having to pay the extra hour and for partial refund for services not being completed due to Michelle not being able to be at the reception.
The response that we got is what made us upset. She stated that her assistants were trying to get our attention during the reception and that we «had a little too much to drink». She also informed us she would not reimburse us for that extra hour we had to pay out of pocket to the beverage catering company.
Michelle’s position to not take ANY accountability for the shortcomings is ludicrous. It’s unfortunate that she got sick and we understand things like that happen. But, the FACT is that MB wasn’t able to complete the services in the contract and our preferences with TWO people working the reception instead of THREE. That was the main issue. If we had just gotten a sincere apology, that would have made things easier. However, Michelle and her assistants refused to take accountability on the FACT that they were not able to perform up to our standards.
My advice to those that work with MB, make sure ALL details are hashed out. It’s obvious people have had success with MB (maybe if you purchase the FULL PLANNING service). One word to sum them up. DISAPPOINTMENT

When we first sat down to meet with Michelle we knew she was the one we wanted to work with on our wedding! Right off the bat, she started coming up with fun creative ideas that made us even more excited about our wedding than we already were. Michelle really took the time to understand who we are and what we wanted for our wedding day. We were impressed that she had close working relationships with our vendor wish list and in some cases even good friends with many of our vendors. Throughout the whole planning experience, we came to appreciate the relationships that Michelle has developed in the wedding community. The benefits that comes from a planner who is as trusted as Michelle is immeasurable. However, the best thing about Michelle is that you get a planner and designer giving you sound feedback and advice as any good friend would. When the wedding day came, we were stress free because she had everything covered in a very clear and thorough itinerary. All we had to do was be a guest at our wedding and it was truly the BEST day ever! We had so many compliments on the wedding — from the food to the décor to the entertainment, our guests appreciated all the little details. Some guest even told us that it was the best wedding they have ever attended! All of this is a testament to Michelle, because of her keen design eye and her expertise to help pull it all together, we had a beautiful wedding day and made a great friend in the process.

I honestly have to say that I would not recommended MB Weddings. Not because my wedding turned out bad, but because our personalities did not match up. It took me a long time to write a review because I wanted to put it behind me, but sometimes you need closure. I write this with all honesty, because I couldn’t make this up even if I wanted to. Planning my wedding was a nightmare, and working with Michelle was no walk in the park– but I’m happy everyone else had a good time and it all came together.
Michelle has a strong personality that we believed would help us move things along, when it instead caused many bumps in the road for me personally. I believe on such an important day the most important thing is to have a clear understanding on both sides of your budget. MB put together a fabulous plan that was 3x our ideal budget. We tried to keep things reasonable, but she pushed many of her own vendors who did not fit into our budget. We tried cutting down our guest list and eliminating what we could. She puts on very high end like weddings and we liked her style, but you can have nice without breaking your bank and your families bank.
What bothered me the most was her suggestions on how to deal with family that wanted to help or offer their services. She told us to ask for them to write out a check-​if they really wanted to help, so that they could enjoy the event as a guest. In the end, my family helped us with the food, décor, entertainment, programs and favors and I don’t regret any of it!
There was much stress along the way that was more memorable then the joy of this event. To top it off MB was not even available the week before the event. Instead she was kind enough to send me an email saying she was out of phone range in Nevada for her daughter’s softball thing and that I was using up her monthly allotted text messages. It wasn’t that I needed her right then and there, but really I had to order boxes and needed the dimensions. She had them in her office, but she wasn’t available to answer a simple text to tell me what needed to be ordered. In the end, the event came together and everyone had a wonderful time and I think that was what was most important.

Michelle is THE BEST! She helped us plan our wedding in San Francisco while we were living in Southern CA. She took on the challenge of combining aspects of our Nigerian and Filipino cultures and worked magic with our ideas. She took on the pressures and the stress of our wedding plans so that we didn’t have to. There is no price tag for the peace of mind that she gave us before and during our wedding. We enjoyed every moment of our wedding and didn’t stress off of ANYTHING! She turned our descriptions, ideas, and dreams into reality. She introduced us to excellent vendors and expertly handled our contracts. She even scheduled and drove us to our vendor meetings when we were in the Bay Area. She was very responsive and steered us clear of potential problems and pitfalls. During the wedding, she diplomatically smoothed over difficult moments. We had a jam packed program full of cultural traditions and performances — yet, she and our dj still kept us on schedule! To this day, we are still receiving compliments from our friends and family about how unique, fun and seamless our wedding was. We are still in awe of her amazing work… Michelle’s creativity, passion, dedication, organizational skills and professionalism shined from the first day we met her. She is definitely the one you want as your point person if you want to enjoy your big day and the whole process leading up to it.
Michelle truly cared about us and our special day. We highly, highly, highly recommend her.

So I hear that planning a wedding can be incredibly stressful and chaotic, but with Michelle (a.k.a. MB) in our corner, not a drop of sweat graced my forehead. On the days leading up-​to our wedding, the most common comment wasn’t «Congratulations», but rather «You two look sOoo relaxed!»
For a time-​crunched and creatively-​challenged couple, MB proved to be a true live saver. We opted for MB’s full wedding package and over the course of 13 months we met with MB on numerous occasions to plan our Big Day. MB put a ton of energy into understanding the dynamics of the relationship between now-​wife and I, and ultimately crafted an event to match our unique personalities. MB and her team handled everything from scheduling vendor meetings, contract management, design/​theme/​décor, day-​of time line, etc.
It goes without saying that our wedding day went off without a hitch and far surpassed each and every one of our expectations. MB created a truly stylish, modern, and contemporary wedding event that I think about everyday and can’t help but smile.

We had Michelle as our day of coordinator and couldn’t have gone through our wedding day without her! I literally did NOT have a worry in the world because she took care of EVERYTHING! She’s SUPER organized, extremely thorough and delivers exactly what you ask of her. I cannot recommend a more dependable and extremely sweet person to be responsible for such an important day!

So Mark and I just got married in June and it could not have happened without the brilliance that is Michelle at MB Wedding Design.
My recommendation would be to hire her as your «FULL» wedding planner which means she maintains your budget. We didn’t do that and I am wishing now as we are swimming in debt (sort of kidding).
We did the partial planning so Michelle helped us with vendor selection, time line, confirmation and details to all vendors before the wedding and running the show that day… and boy did she ever!
Michelle made planning a wedding fun. There were very few moments in the year we had to plan that I was ever stressed or not having fun. She recommended the best vendors for our photography, videographer, florist & cake. She always had the best suggestions and her creativity was endless. Obviously having never planned a wedding before, Michelle was there to help me with etiquette on what not to do and she just pulled everything together.
Michelle ensured that the day was just flawless. Everything was on time, perfect and no stress! She made sure we were in the right place at the right time and enjoying every moment. I would highly recommend Michelle to alleviate the stress of planning a wedding and just know you can put complete faith in her to make sure your day is just perfect.

Mind you — as a single woman, I have not used Michelle’s services for my own wedding. That confession aside, I can say with certainty that Michelle is a gem. I used to work with her, and was thrilled (and insanely jealous) when she left to follow her dream.
She has turned her business into a booming success, and leaves many happy brides in her wake; most recently this past weekend.
A very dear friend of mine was married in one of the most touching and wonderful celebrations I’ve ever had the honor of attending, and Michelle made it smooth, timely, and easy. The bride admits she couldn’t have possibly done it without Michelle’s expertise and calming reassurances throughout the planning process.
I can attest to the fact that Michelle kept us on track the day of, which couldn’t have been easy when everyone was running in a different direction and taking their own sweet time and being distracted (by cupcakes, martini bars, and favorite songs.…).
I highly recommend her.