Our Thailand wedding at the Rosewood Phuket is finally here!
It was always going to be a destination wedding for us – specifically, a Thailand wedding. The world was our oyster and we wanted a place that meant something. We quickly chose Bali for the honeymoon and swiftly decided Thailand as the designated country to host our nuptials. From there, the fun really began.
To read more about our love story and proposal – read this BLOG!
Our Wedding Vendors | Rosewood Phuket
Photography @kristakphotos
Videography @goodcostudios
Venue & Catering @rosewoodphuket
Planner, Stationary & Rentals @theweddingblissthailand
Florist @iamflower.co
HMUA @mewmakeupartist
Invitation Suite @courtingdesign
Our Wedding Venue | The Rosewood Phuket
I scoured the internet for weeks looking up venues all around Thailand, specifically the Phuket, Krabi and Chiang Mai areas. I finally found a featured wedding blog from Martha Stewarts HERE where the bride was a fellow wedding photographer. I quickly trusted that photographer’s eye to give us what we wanted. The Rosewood Phuket’s wedding venue includes a variety of backdrops right on the beach, a gorgeous floor to ceiling glass rooms to get ready in, ivy covered concrete walls with large stairs as passageways, all mazed around Lilly pad ponds and ginormous jungle plants. And that was just the resort itself. The actual venue is a simple grassy yard with a view of the bay through tall palm trees and an indoor space with wood and concrete Thai architecture. We loved it.
We also loved that they bundled our 8-night accommodation (required as part of your wedding booking) catering and venue fee together. But upon arrival, we were gifted with so much more. A 24/7 butler service (shoutout to Fang!) and the most friendly staff at breakfast every morning, greeting us with that morning’s artisan platters of local and imported meats and cheeses, soft lounge couches all around and a “pick anything you want” menu. James and I relished in a different detox juice, savory crepe and Thai breakfast for the 5 days leading up to the wedding. This was the start of our experience and we truly felt like royalty. We were so glad we splurged on the experience as much as our wedding day and the Rosewood was an excellent choice.
The Welcome Party | Coco Copper
We hosted an all white welcome party at a place we picked out literally just the day before. Coco Copper is an expansive indoor and outdoor beach club style restaurant with live music. We told them our party size and they quickly rearranged the furniture on the lawn to accommodate us. We were surprised with a bartender fire show, fireworks and our wedding song from the band. It was an amazing night filled with great food and 2 for 1 cocktails.
Welcome Party Dress | Revolve
James Floral Linen Button Up | Abercrombie
The Wedding Morning
Our Rosewood Phuket wedding has finally come. November 15th, 2023, a date that will live on forever!
After a fun night with the girls, they all went back to their airbnb and my sister stayed the night with me at the Rosewood. I woke up a whole 45 minutes before my alarm in just plain awe. It was nerves. It was excitement. It was everything. When the alarm finally blared, my sister sat straight up and asked how I was feeling. I told her I was nervous but also so so so excited that the day was finally here. We enjoyed a long breakfast and got a text from our butler that the HMUA team had arrived early. We rushed back to our villa and started doing skin prep while my mom started steaming my vintage slip I found just 2 days before leaving for Asia.
But first, the details at the Rosewood Phuket Wedding Venue
Once I sat in the chair, it was happening. I had my orange elephant fan in my lap for two hours, fanning away my nerves as I blasted my “Morning-Of” playlist on Spotify. One by one, the girls started getting ready with me and our photo video team arrived around noon. It was an upbeat morning of singing and people filtering in and out of our villa. It was a perfect morning despite realizing I forgot my wedding earrings at home. Thankfully, Michelle came in clutch with a pearl drop pair she brought.
Important notes I told our photo video team for the morning:
- I don’t care about the hair and makeup shots of me in the chair
- I would rather get all of the girls lounging around the pool before we get into our dresses
- I knew I was going to be nervous so I requested ONE Mama Mia song before the dress.
The song we danced to was none other than “Dancing Queen” by Abba. It got so good, I ended up jumping on the table to dance while the girls stayed on the floor and sang up towards me. We even did a group hug right after that got me emotional. Right after the dance, I turned the corner and saw my mom in her dress and I screamed with excitement. It was hitting me!
And then the dress came on
Bridesmaid Photos
I love love love the candid, giggling, having a blast type of photos. We definitely did just that. And in the cutest spot in front of our Villa at the Rosewood Phuket wedding venue with the beautiful iron gate as our backdrop. I absolutely loved how creative and fun the bridesmaid floral fans turned out. This is where we also snuck in my solo bridal portraits!
James on the other hand spent the night at the airbnb with our wedding party and woke up the next morning to go to the coffee shop with his friends and our officiant/pastor from home. They talked about marriage and what it is to be a husband. Knowing that made me just so happy and proud to marry a man of God that is going to value our union as much as me. Once they were changed and ready, they headed to the Rosewood and hung out in an air conditioned suite until it was their turn for photos. The boys took photos in the Courtyard of the Rosewood venue. We loved how it was highlighting the architecture of our venue!
After photo + video left us girls at the villa to go capture the boys and the empty ceremony shots, we had an hour to kill. In that hour, I started getting nervous again and I ordered everybody an espresso martini. These ended up being the VIBE and thankfully, Michelle was there to capture some cute film photos!
The Wedding Ceremony
Oh how blessed we were with the weather!!! Fun fact, it rained every single day leading up to our wedding (each day a tropical downpour that flooded the resort), but on Wednesday the 15th of November, 2023 — we were blessed with nothing but sunshine and clouds for shade.
The girls were picked up in a golf cart and escorted to the venue. On our way we sang “Going to the Chapel” — a memory I’ll never forget. They finally dropped me off at the concrete wall behind my aisle that would serve as my hiding place until we began. Here, I had my first look with my dad and we both cried and stood together.
Wedding Processional
James and our pastor walked down together. Followed by our wedding party. Everybody walked down to “Turning Page by Sleeping at Last” for this moment. As I walked down the stairs and readied myself to walk across the long grass and see our ceremony for the first time in person, my song “Until I Found You by Stephen Sanchez – the piano version” started playing. Heart racing and holding on to my dad for dear life, we started walking.
Nothing, and I mean NOTHING — beats that moment of seeing your loved ones and your husband all smiling and crying as you walk up the aisle. That POV is forever etched in my brain. The crying started early for me and it wasn’t until I got a clear view of James that I needed my handkerchief.
As soon as my dad hugged James, we immediately went in for a hug and I felt so relieved to finally be with him. Our ceremony didn’t start until 5:00pm so it felt like forever without him.
We got settled under two beautiful 12 foot pillars of hydrangeas, orchids, amaranthus, daisys and roses.
The 5 minutes of Jared speaking was spent looking into James’s eyes for most of it and laughing and crying alongside everyone else. When it was our time to say the vows, I am so glad to say that the practice I did of reading them for months leading up to the wedding was incredibly helpful. We both did a great job and shed many tears along the way.
Finally, Jared declared us husband and wife under God and we shared a tear-filled snotty kiss and walked back down to Electric Love by Borns as everyone tossed white petals above us giving us the perfect aisle kiss!
Post-Ceremony | Family Photos
I usually don’t blog family photos, but since this is our wedding, I thought I’d throw a couple of our favorites in here!
Our Wedding Portraits
One thing about the Rosewood is that it doesn’t have a solid sunset spot for photos. Instead, you can choose the beach (mainly in even light since the sun will more than likely be behind it at 5:30), or spots around the resort. After taking family photos in front of the arch, we golf carted to the lobby and spa area of the Rosewood and took gorgeous concrete jungle portraits. Our favorite film photos of us is from this moment of the day!! Just us, newlyweds and our talented photo video team.
Cocktail Hour
Because the ceremony started later than planned, we unfortunately didn’t get to enjoy our cocktail hour for longer than 10 minutes. But when we walked out to see our venue be completely flipped to an incredible table scape filled with life-size paper flowers, our white dance floor and bouncing lights in the trees, we were ecstatic. It was better than I could’ve ever imagined. It was colorful, fun and completely unique to us. Our favorite was the napkins of our new kitten “Gouda” and our his and hers cocktails —
Hers | Spicy Mango Ginger Margarita
His | Old Fashioned with Bulleit Bourbon
First Dances
Our dance floor was my favorite design from the Wedding Bliss Thailand! Our first dance was on a beautiful white round platform surrounded by our colorful aisle florals and life-size paper flowers to create a whimsical garden wonderland. To top it off, we added a fog machine and it felt like dancing in heaven.
James and I danced to Cinema by Gary Go – the acoustic version. We swayed for the first two minutes and choreographed a dance for the final chorus. It was perfect.
Then, my dad and I danced to You’ll be in my heart by Phil Collins. From here, I arranged a surprise cutoff to be handed a microphone and announce to everyone that I was giving the rest of my dance to my sister. That video completely went viral and you can watch it here!
Dinner & Speeches
The Rosewood had the most amazing Thai food I have ever eating in my entire life. We had I think dozen staff passing around trays of food and giving us the family style luxury dining we wanted. Our menu selections were the following:
Cocktail Hour Appetizers/Canapés:
- Wagyu Beef Slider
- Mar Hor; Fresh Pineapple, Spicy Shrimp & Pork Relish
- Curry Lamb Puffs
Dinner Appetizers:
- Tom Khai: Coconut Curry Soup
- Yam Som-O: Shrimp & pomelo salad, crispy shallots, roasted coconut, chili
- Gien Tod: Deep fried Phuket roll, minced pork, shrimp, crab meat, taro, yam bean
Main Courses:
- Moo Hong: Phuket style dark soy braised pork knuckle with spices
- Gai Pad Med Ma Muang: Stir fried chicken with cashew nuts, bell pepper, onion, mushroom, dried chili
- Ped Yang Nam Jim Jaew: Smoke roasted duck with raw vegetables and spicy dipping sauce
- Goong Pad Makam: Fried tiger prawns with tamarind pulp & roasted chili
Desserts:
- Khao Neow Ma Muang: Mango with black sticky rice and coconut cream
- Khanom Ba Bin: Pan fried glutinous coconut cakes
White Wines:
- Sauvignon Blanc
- Pinot Grigio
Red Wines:
- Cabernet Sauvignon
- Merlot
The Toasts
This is something that our videographer will do more justice because everybody had fantastic speeches. We’re most looking forward to the surprise toast my sister-in-law gave us that came from the viral Tiktok of Pitbull. I think our reactions says everything!
The Champagne Tower + Flash Portraits
I bought my 2nd dress for my reception from Akie Bridal on Etsy. He made it custom for me and it ended up being the perfect dress to dance all night in. Especially paired with my new white Pradas!
The Dance Floor
We ended the night with the craziest, sweaty dance floor moves. It’s more common to have your dance floor inside where the AC is at the Rosewood, but we really wanted the jungle vibes seeing that we flew to Thailand and all. The lights, the flowers, the fog, it was truly unique and so stunning. But because the drinks were bottomless, I barely remember it hahaha. Thankfully the photo video team captured us in our element from Michelle’s back hand springs and me kicking off my shoes.
