Singaporebrides | Fine Dining

March 2015

Coral and Mint Retro Garden Wedding in Alkaff Mansion

Rosemary and Ingo held a charming fifties-themed solemnisation and a year later, celebrated their wedding in a beautiful vintage garden wedding, complete with a fifties diner photobooth!

Rosemary Chua, 35, Human Resources Specialist & Ingo Laubender, 37, Management Consultant
3 August 2014

The Gown: Renee L Collections
The Bride’s Shoes: Ferragamo, Jimmy Choo
The Jewellery: Etsy
The Suit: Men’s Tradition at Peninsula Plaza
The Groom’s Shoes: Ed Et Al Shoemakers
The Rings: Love & Co
The Bridesmaids’ Dresses: Polka dot dresses from Forever 21; Eternity dresses from an online store
The Groomsmen’s Suits: Groomsmen’s own
The Flower Girls’ Dresses: Etsy
The Page Boy’s Suit: Etsy
The Makeup Artist and Hairstylist: Jovie from TheLittleBrush Makeup
The Venue: Alkaff Mansion
The Wedding Cake: Crummb
The Florists: Bridal bouquet and gazebo by Regina Mae Fleurs; table centerpieces by Heaven’s Gift Wedding Concierge
The Wedding Planner: Loretta of Invited
The Photographer: Bryan Jean Photography
The Invitations: Alkaff Mansion
The Programmes: Design from Etsy and printed locally
The Event Stylist: Loretta of Invited
The Videographer: Ryan from Mosaic Studios
The Band: Compass Entertainment
The Bridal Transport: VolksWedding
The Photo Booth and Stage Backdrop Design: xodbox Pte Ltd

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We’ve heard how you met, but tell us, what made the “very good dancer” and the “tough girl with the many ear studs” realise they were meant to be together?

Rosemary: Well, we definitely didn’t get any sudden epiphany that we were meant to be together. Instead, the realisation that we wanted to be together developed gradually over time. We had always felt very comfortable in each other’s presence. We could talk about anything, and could share our thoughts and feelings openly. We made each other laugh. We were always excited to spend time with each other. There isn’t a one thing about each other that we couldn’t live without. Rather, our characters complement each other – I am the composed, calm one and he is the sociable, interactive one. Through our relationship, we helped each other become a better man and a better woman. And we just knew we wanted it to be like this forever.

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We love your meteor shower proposal story and your adorably vintage solemnisation. Your wedding had a vintage theme too, didn’t it?

Rosemary: Ingo and I love 50s vintage so even though we already had a vintage-themed solemnisation, we just had to have a vintage-themed wedding day as well. Of course, it helped that our chosen venue, Alkaff Mansion, oozes nostalgic charm so a vintage theme just became the most natural thing to have.

Ingo and I are both analytical people with great attention to detail. Hence, it was our desire for our wedding to have a personal, intimate touch which would leave our guests feeling that they have shared a very special moment with us, and have even gotten to know us a bit better through the wedding. With this in mind, we worked with our wedding designer, Loretta, and after several iterations, finally came up with the key concepts for our wedding. Coral and mint were the key colours underlying the vintage theme. We had a vintage Volkswagen van for bridal transport, vintage wooden ladders, a tea cart and old cameras to reflect our love for the quaint and classic. Vintage lettering in a German phrase (“And now let’s get married”) welcomed Ingo’s family, and I picked jewelry with a vintage feel, e.g. vintage chandelier earrings, and pearl drop earrings to go with my wedding gown.

Since Ingo and I are Christians, we lined up the aisle with vintage wooden boards, and had phrases written on them from our favourite Bible passage about love. This way, our guests were able to read this passage and understand what we believe about love. Our stage backdrop was done in “chalkboard” and “chalk writing” finish, and written with the same Bible passage we used for the walk-in aisle. Instead of the usual guest sign-in book, we got guests to pen down their personal advice to us based on pre-determined categories from A to Z (for example, ‘Always…’,’Baby Names’, ‘Date Night’ suggestions), all on personalised little cards designed by Loretta. Each table card had a table number with our baby photos on one side, and a table name with a related fun fact about us on the other. 29 fun facts to be exact!

Ingo is a huge Coca Cola fan (or should I say ‘addict’?) so we weaved in 50s Coca Cola elements into the wedding. For example, old wooden Coke crates and real “old” Coke bottles were used for our biscuit bar decor, old Coke bottle caps were used for the boutonnieres, and of course, there’s Coke all over our Diner photo booth! Our biscuit bar was all about vintage Coke, and doubled up for weddings favours. In addition, the cute red checkered doggy bag, “Ingo & Rose” personalised sticker, old-school childhood biscuits, and the concept of “dabao happiness” gave a fun yet intimate touch to the favours. Our wedding cake was a lovely gift from my sister, complete with delicate sugar flowers on a mint fondant. It was very yummy too!

We had a unity sand ceremony as we thought it would be a meaningful and appropriate alternative for the usual unity candle ceremony that takes place during a holy matrimony. So we bought one from eBay, got the coloured sand, and did some practice runs to get ready for it.

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You must have spent a lot of time working all those fun details out!

Rosemary: Being extremely detailed people, we were very hands-on in every step of the planning. I am a bit of a ‘spreadsheet’ freak, and our wedding ‘toolkit’ for our bridal party was an excel file with ten tabs that had pictures, diagrams, floor plans, tables, schedules etc etc. But while we had put together the massive plan and spreadsheet, it was all kudos to the bridal party who executed the entire plan to a T, even through some last minute unforeseen emergencies. We would not have got through the day without our awesome bridal party!

We definitely spent time to vet through every design and template for our décor and set up. However, Loretta was the one who put together most of the décor, with my brother-in-law helping on the photo booth and stage backdrop designs. We also had help from our bridal party in making some of the items like the flower girls’ flower pails and diner photo props.

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Tell us more about Ingo and Rosie’s Diner.

Rosemary: This was Ingo’s ‘must-have’ of the entire wedding. He loves 50s diners – the look, the colours, and the atmosphere of fun and happiness that a diner brings. So it was his dream to have a diner as the photo booth backdrop. And of course, Coca Cola was ever so easily woven into this diner theme, much to his delight. To match with the diner backdrop, I sourced online for 50s-themed photo props including diner food, 50s’ hairstyles, glasses etc. We got them printed locally, stuck them on sticks and they were ready to go. I think my guests had fun with them.

What was the most memorable moment of your wedding?

Rosemary: It has to be our exchange of vows. So the thing is, every time we rehearsed our vows before the wedding, Ingo would tear up and get emotional. On the wedding day however, I was the one who got choked up for a good 30 seconds during our exchange of vows. I had gone through a difficult time medically early in the year, hence, when I was saying my vows, I suddenly got very emotional. Tears were streaming and Ingo had to very sweetly pass me his handkerchief to wipe my tears (and snot) so that I could carry on with my vows.

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Credits: Images by Bryan Jean Photography, feature image cropped from original.

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Coral and Mint Retro Garden Wedding in Alkaff Mansion