See The Wedding Took Place in Heaven aka Bali

Michelle Hoover
September 7, 2016
Categories: Modern, Real Weddings
Tags: Bali Wedding, Destination Weddings, Exotic Location, Exotic Venue, glamorous, Real Wedding, Resort Wedding

Welcome to paradise, a.k.a. this stunning celebration in beautiful Bali. Captured by the massively talented Katie Grant Photography, it’s tropical meets timeless and thankfully we’ve got every single detail to share. Want even more? See it all unfold firsthand in The Vault!

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From The Bride…My husband and I just recently got married at a destination wedding in Bali, Indonesia at the magnificent Khayangan Estate on June 3, 2016.

We met at a restaurant in Los Angeles called Fig and Olive when my husband, Max Loong, was in town. He is a TV presenter, actor and host in Southeast Asia and Switzerland as well as a resort owner in Bali called Hidden Hills Villas and has to travel quite a bit for work. I am a Producer holding a Juris Doctorate degree with an emphasis in entertainment. The day after we met he was actually leaving town for work, which allowed us to speak on the phone for 3 weeks getting to know one another.

My initial thought of him was that he was handsome, an exotic mix of Malaysian and Swiss and very confident. I love confidence in a man and that stood out. He also had the most heart melting smile I have ever seen. He says his initial reaction was that he found me very attractive and completely his type, but what made him fall in love with me is my kind heart and how I care and feel for others. That I can’t kill an ant, and literally have to pick it up to put it outside, or when I see an old man sitting by himself I start crying. We also both make each other laugh and can be completely ourselves, goofy and silly around one another, without having to think twice!

Since I was planning the wedding from Los Angeles there were a few challenges. The time difference and different pace at which those in the tropics work being the main issues. I’m a perfectionist and knew that we wanted our wedding to be interactive and have a lot of entertainment elements, so coming up with creative and unique ideas was really important to us. We also knew from the get go that we wanted Travel to be our theme since it was not only a destination wedding, but over the past 3 years travel has been a big part of our lives and still very much is. Lighting is also something that we knew, as producers, enhances the environment incredibly, so we wanted to ensure a lot of lights and candles to set the magical ambience for our family and friends. We came across a vendor that provided this really unique service where they make oversized paper flowers that look like they are growing from the ground. We felt that was a really original idea and different, so made sure that was implemented for a backdrop, against lights, for anyone that wanted a photo op. Planning this wedding was so much work for me. It was done over the course of a year. I am a very detail oriented and know what I like, so spent a lot of time researching, coming up with ideas, and figuring out ways to make the wedding more “entertaining” for our guests, as we felt this is what people remember the most. All in all, they say renovating a home and planning a wedding can be two of the most stressful times of your life, but we did it and are very happy with the turn out. In the end, the time and effort is worth it.

On the wedding day I wore two stunning gowns by haute couture designer Inbal Dror. The ceremony dress was a blush corset, fit and flare gown with a long immaculate train that was a classy and sexy look. It had incredible detail on the dress with white lace and light beading. The reception dress was also by Inbal Dror, and it was a long sleeved, white, intricate fully beaded dress with the most incredible design and detail on the back. It had a plunging v neck, with flowy and loose fabric on the front providing an ethereal and elegant look.

Our theme was “travel” and we had some really unique and creative elements that surrounded travel, both Max and I are producers and TV presenter/hosts so wanted to ensure production value on our wedding day. We started off with the invitations to our guests being Passports. On the wedding day we incorporated PAN AM style stewardesses at the “check-in” desk as our guests arrived, where they handed Boarding Passes to each person which designated their Table Seating (named after countries that my husband and I have visited). The Boarding Passes were personalized individually to have the “Departure” country each of our guests were departing from with their “Arrival” all being Bali. Our guest sign in book was two painted floral globes in our color palette with pastel luggage holding vintage postcards that our guests could sign and leave messages for us on. Behind this vignette we had stubs, boarding passes, pamphlets, etc. from all of our travels over the past 3 years hanging from the ceiling. During the cocktail hour we had a very large “Arrival” sign, with various countries on it, designed and decorated to go along with all of our stationery where people were able to rip off the right side of their boarding pass, fill in their information, and drop it into a slit on the large board for a lottery.

We also had fireworks that went off in the middle of our first dance that were stunning to watch as well as a local Kecak dance of 30 performers that suddenly came out on stage once the lights faded to black. The performers were a highlight. Absolutely entertaining and one of the more traditional cultural dances that guests want to see when they are in Bali.

Our color palette was blush, creams, light yellows, white, greenery with a pop of gold. We wanted an elegant wedding with a lot of lights and candles, and most importantly great performances. After all the speeches, cake cutting and dinner, Max and I went on the stage to introduce the transition into party mode and told our guests we had a surprise for them. They were all going to get “shots”. That was the DJ’s cue to play the “Shots” song by LMFAO, where bartenders suddenly walked out and handed glowing shots to everyone as pyrotechnics went off around the stage to signify PARTY MODE!

We had several videos that played throughout the night. One which was our Same Day Edit, that was a stunner (link at the bottom of this email) that everyone absolutely loved and still can’t stop talking about to date. It’s impressive when a company can turn around a beautifully edited piece on the day in just 45 minutes. We had Max’s family provide us a surprise video from all the cousins on their side, and one of the more important videos which is very dear to our hearts is the remembrance video of Max’s father that passed away and wasn’t able to be with us on the day. This was an incredibly emotional moment, as you can imagine, but extremely beautiful to honor him in this way.

The wedding day was spectacular. It was incredible, emotional, beautiful, fun and entertaining all in one. One of the stand out special moments was my brother’s speech. It was the most hilarious speech I have heard in my life. He actually somehow found my diary from when I was a kid and decided to read it openly to our guests, creatively integrating it with our life now. The things that I wrote when I was 7 or 8 years old were hilarious. Of course, mainly about boys! …which led to me finally meeting my incredible handsome husband (still feels so weird to say “husband”)!

We had received SO many compliments on the wedding and that it had all of the elements necessary, which was incredibly flattering to hear. Those words really made us feel great when it came to the end, as it justified all the time and hard work spent leading up to the big day. We actually had 4 events surrounding our wedding, from our Welcome Party/BBQ at Hidden Hills Villas, Chinese Tea Ceremony, the wedding and an all white beach party at Karma Beach the following night.