Iona Napier
WHAT Laura Charles doesn’t know about organising weddings in Spain is simply not worth knowing.
The former interior designer and stylist, from Surrey, has had an exciting decade-long journey to become one of Spain’s top leading wedding planners.
Via her company Reviva Weddings, Laura and her team can organise everything from the ceremony to the sparkly cocktail sticks and from the catering to the flowers.
“The wedding market here in Spain has grown massively over the last three years and is practically unrecognisable from a decade ago when I started,” she says.
“Nowadays, 99% of the clients I work for are Destination Weddings, and we have planned and executed hundreds of weddings for clients from all over the world.
“Spain is a great central point for guests flying in to join them in their celebrations, and our clients love the culture, vibrancy of our country, tapas and of course good weather,” adds Laura, whose team works all over Spain from Malaga and Marbella to Barcelona and Seville.
When Laura started organising weddings a decade ago from her office in Marbella things were very behind, terribly dated and you could not even hire a chair!
Nowadays, there are hundreds of venues and a brilliant selection of caterers and photographers to choose from and the devil is in the detail for Laura who is also known as the Martha Stewart of Spain.
She estimates the average budget currently stands at around €30,000 for a wedding here, but it can vary wildly from an intimate rustic villa setting to something much more extravagant.
Whether you’ve organised your own wedding but need to hire some final details or whether you need her to take on the entire project she can help.
Laura has a wealth of experience and, best of all, has a fabulous array of decorations, props, table linens and wedding accessories, all available to be hired and her creative team can create fabulous stationery, signs and other bespoke orders for her clients requests.
“Aside from organising the entire event which I love, a lot of brides come to me when they hit the ‘wedding wall’,” she explains.
“Maybe they have organised the key elements of their day but need extra help with certain things, and are not sure how to progress to organising the actual day, they want to hand it all over to an expert and turn off their mobiles, thanks to my contacts, fabulous suppliers and our planning experience, I am in a great position to help and take over the wedding logistics.”
Reviva has steadily grown and are renown for their elegant style, keeping up with the latest trends and attention to detail to their weddings and it has been a roaring success,” explains the 51-year-old Marbella mother-of-three – and recent grandmother – who cut her teeth in the display industry in London before moving into organising and styling large, corporate events back in the UK and then dragging Spain into the stylish wedding world!
For more information visit www.revivaweddings.com or her hugely popular blog theweddingdecorator.blogspot.com.es
