Devoted To You

Carmen was amazing during our wedding! She seamlessly handled any emergencies that came up so we didn't have to stress out about the little things. She went above and beyond to get the details right and kept us on schedule. Our wedding day wouldn't have been the same without her and we're grateful to have been able to work with her.

We hired Carmen to help organize our backyard wedding during COVID-19. She did a great job and was able to organize the tea ceremony as well. A backyard wedding has an incredible amount of unforeseen logistics and she was able to manage everything. She introduced us to an amazing designer/florist (Nous Design) and cater (Elle Cuisine).

Carmen is a professional and helped us figure out pieces for our wedding. There was one vendor that she recommended, Konrad Czystowski, which we wouldn't have met if it wasn't for Carmen and why we are not giving 5 stars. Although she tried to reach out to him on our behalf, he's continued to be difficult. I'm writing this to share our experience...so Konrad CZYSTOWSKI, I think he goes by Freshsox, but there's no reviews for his business and he's missing on all social media as he works off of referrals. In retrospect, that should raise alarm bells. A good videographer who cares about clients would open themselves up to feedback online, in addition to being referred. He has closed those channels and from our experience, we can see why. He did Carmen's wedding for a discount and offered us a rate of $5k for an 8 min highlight reel and 1 min trailer, which apparently is a discount, but who knows as rates are never posted in the wedding industry. However, after Covid cancelled our wedding and we were looking at new options, he took advantage of the situation. First he told us, he will raise our rates if we postpone, but he doesn't know by how much. In my opinion, this is a sign that he does NOT have his business together or care about his clients to do this during a PANDEMIC. Finally, he came back and said he wanted to charge us $1000 more...a full 20% surcharge above our $5k cash deal because we were unlucky enough to have our wedding cancelled by covid. He also said most of the vendors he talks to also is doing this, even though the vendors that I hand selected did not and were wonderful during this time. However, he was a referral from Carmen. He was dismissive when we tried to meet him halfway. After 2 months of stress and waiting for him to respond to our emails or of him avoiding our calls, he decides we don't deserve our money back and is trying to keep our $2500 deposit. Clearly after what he has done, he created a situation in which it was impossible to trust him or want to have him on an important day like our wedding. It's a difficult situation for all of us, but he chose to make it even more difficult. I wont go into the specifics, but he's not returning our $2500. Based on this circumstance we are all in, his contract requires that he returns our deposit if he can't perform due to an unforeseeable situation like a pandemic, but based on what we've seen, his biggest focus is money not how clients feel about what he's doing. Our learnings are, even if you are referred by someone, or they are touted as a 'pro' in the industry, it's hard to trust someone if they don't have real reviews. Honestly...we wish we were given better choices of videographers during the selection process. He said he shot for a Raptor in Miami and insinuated it was Chris Bosh to help win our business, but we never validated this. It's easy for people to say whatever when they don't have reviews or the work posted publicly. For your wedding, don't just look at the video portfolio, but keep in mind who you're hiring. It's that whole genius, but a jerk notion. You want to work with someone who is a genius, but also trustworthy and wont take advantage or is tough to work with during the worst of times. Because who knows what can happen these days.

We initially found Devoted to You (DTY) through Instagram but quickly learned about Carmen through our friends who raved about her services, so we hired her as our month-of coordinator and for a few design consulting hours! Drawing from her personal and professional experiences, Carmen was instrumental in helping us make key decisions for our 200-guest, Chinese wedding, and was a great joy to work with. She was very professional, detail-oriented, and flexible in her communication style, which we very much appreciated as I was travelling for work and had to manage different time zones. Her bilingualism was also a huge asset, not to mention her sewing skills (which came in handy when a button popped off my dress on the day-of)! Carmen can really do it all. Since the wedding, we have become friends and have also recommended her to a handful of our own friends with great confidence that she will be able to deliver on her promises. Many thanks to Carmen and her DTY team – we love you!!

Carmen was the BEST!!! My twin sister and I had a double reception with one wedding on the Friday and a second wedding on Saturday, which made for a very, very busy wedding weekend! Carmen was so incredibly amazing to work with. Her knowledge of the business was phenomenal. She was so bubbly and sweet no matter how hectic things got. She was so detailed oriented and thought of all the little things that wouldn't have even crossed our minds. She was great at keeping us all on track and has a way of getting things done without ever feeling pushy, rushed or frustrated, even when we were lazy! She understood our vision from the get go, especially the importance of blending the three families and working with all the different wants/needs. She was extremely responsive, at all hours of the night... its hard to believe she ever sleeps. We can confidently say without Carmen this wedding would have never come together. I will be recommending her to anyone I know getting married now or 20 yrs from now! We are beyond grateful for the time we spent working with her, the beautiful wedding that came of it but more than anything we are thankful for the friendship we ultimately developed with her. Don't think twice about who you want your wedding planner to be! There is no one better! Nikita & Angel