Ocular: Sts. Peter and Paul and the Great Eastern Hotel

With just a little less than 365 days up in our calendar, Francis and I do consider that we are way beyond our wedding preps. Nonetheless, we wouldn't want to leave everything else to chance, would we?


For the last three weeks, we have accomplished a couple of things through our meet-ups and caucuses. It's actually kind of weird to be talking about serious matters like the budget for the wedding and all with him.


Yes, we have faired well with pulling off our resources and equally distributing the necessary pie of our budget to his and my households. See, like me, he is also a breadwinner in their family. But, planning our wedding party is different, I must say. It's more pressing and way stressful. We're talking about a 100k wedding challenge here, people. A hundred pesos!


After much deliberation, we've drafted our official guest list and arrived at 100 most important people in our lives. We cannot just invite our relatives from the province and those in Manila as them alone would amount to  a little over than 200 people. It was a very thought-provoking and time-consuming challenge, but we felt great after drafting the final list.


At the moment, we are considering Great Eastern Hotel (for the reception) and Sts. Peter and Paul Parish (for the ceremony). Both are located within the Makati Avenue realm, which will not be a hassle for our guests.


The Great Eastern Hotel
Through GT Sis Kat's persistent raving about this hotel, Francis and I sought to check it out. It turned out that it is indeed promising.


The reception hall is actually warm and cozy. Yes, it's perfect for our simple little event. We are yet to try their food. Mind you, the food tasting is not free. Right now, we're quite hesitant to put out some gran for this. We are to spend a lot in the coming days visiting bridal fairs and all. Thus, we've came up with the idea of further searching other options before getting a go on GEH's offer.

Aberdeen Court of the Great Eastern Hotel's Wedding Package Rates

There are four to five packages couples may choose from. By the looks of it, we may opt for the Festival Package, which would cost us a little more than 37,000 PHP for the wedding reception package and free overnight stay in one of their suites.


Pros:
1. Located in Makati and near a church (Sts. Peter and Paul Parish).
2. There are available staff that could assist you quite well with your inquiries.
3. The hall needs not be adorned much especially when we're planning on a vintage, etsy, and rustic party.
4. The reception is set in Lauriat style, which means no falling in line. Guests often get turned off by long lines.


Cons:
1. Corkage fees be damned! I couldn't wrap my finger around the fact that the overhead expenses will balloon up to 50,000 PHP if we are to include necessary decoration and even the Photo/Video coverage. They all have corkage fees!
2. Food served is Chinese cuisine. Not a lot of people are a fan of this, which may be a couple's dilemma.




Church Ocular: Sts. Peter and Paul
This church is an okay option for us. I must say that there is no WOW factor in the church and the administration officials are quite strict when attending inquiries. If we won't be able to find any other church, we better reserve this one as it's a good deal with its medium length altar.

Photo courtesy of Google as I don't own it and all rights are reserved to the owner.

Pros:

1. Located in Makati and near the Great Eastern Hotel.

2. Very small. Perfect for an intimate wedding like ours.

3. The aisle is actually narrow but long enough for the bridal march.

4. The prize is 13,000 PHP, which is within our budget.

Cons:

1. They have too many do's and dont's. I don't complain on the rules and policies because we really do have to be mindful about them; however, the two-meter restriction for photographers is quite troublesome. Francis and I must resolve this with the photographers.

2. The bearers need to be at least four years old. This, again, posits a dilemma to us since our bearers are three years old and younger.

We'll see other options but these aren't bad deals. More to come!


Posted on 1/22/12 at 10:09 AM

Posted in: 2013 wedding challenge, hotel, Philippine churches, planning, reception, scouting, venues