Choosing Our Wedding Coordinator, Day One Project

One of the things that I keep hearing from others when you’re planning a wedding is having a great on-the-day coordinator. On-the-day (OTD) coordinators are the backbone of the whole event as they’re in charge of making sure that everything in the wedding goes as the couple envisioned, including staying on time, ensuring contracts with the rest of the suppliers are met, addressing problems that may arise, and making the couple stress-free on the day of their wedding.

There are many events or wedding coordinators available, possibly because it has a low barrier of entry compared to other suppliers (ie. photographers who need equipment or caterers who can serve good food in huge capacity). This means that there’s also a higher chance of choosing the wrong one.

During our search, I relied heavily on recommendations on the Facebook Group Best of the Best Manila. It’s a group where people from different fields and walks of life gather to consult or share with others on what is the “best of the best” for certain products, situations, services, or experiences. And because it’s not a wedding group, you get a more curated, thought-out recommendations compared to the many self-promoting posts in wedding communities.

During our search in this group, two coordinators were always recommended by many. All at different times and from different people. One of which was Day One Project (D1P) by Angela Ibarle Silan. (Side note: the other coordinator that was always recommended didn’t even reply to my inquiry)

Initially, I was having second doubts about getting Day One Project since they were definitely pricier than some of the lesser known and newer coordinators I’ve canvassed from. But after seeing so many recommendations and reviews over a long period of time, I became easily convinced that our on-the-day wedding coordinator was one of the things we couldn’t just skimp on. I knew Dane was also in doubt, so before we made the final decision on booking Day One Project, we decided to get in touch and hear from Angela herself about the services they offer to fully understand what we were getting.

Immediately, it was a very comfortable call to be in. Angela is super easy to talk to and her energy is enough to fill a room. The call went smoothly and by the end of it, Dane was as onboarded as I am with hiring Day One Project as our wedding coordinator. They were in fact, the very first supplier we were sure of booking.

Once we secured our venue (primarily because there are a lot of dependencies based on the location), we booked Day One Project straight away. We ended up getting their midway coordination since it was only a few bucks from the on-the-day coordination but with a bigger scope that can help us make sure we’ve covered our bases.

Since our wedding was 8 months from the time we booked them, Day One Project only came into the picture about 3 months before as part of our midway package. It started with a scheduled Zoom call where Angela asked us to go over where we currently are so she can gauge if we’re on track and if there’s anything we missed in the process that we need to tackle.

Prior to onboarding them, Angela was accommodating and very responsive to all both our valid and stupid questions. Three of our suppliers (that we very much love) also came from Angela’s recommendations. Angela was the only person we’re talking to throughout our planning, and she made sure to cascade information as needed to her team without burdening her couples with briefing a lot of other people.

Having Day One Project was one of the best decisions in our wedding. Sure, they cost some extra bucks compared to many others, but those extra bucks paid for a stress-free wedding where I didn’t have to think about anything aside from being awkward in the camera and enjoying the celebration (and crying a lot!!).

There were only four of them during our wedding, but it didn’t feel like they were undermanned. In fact, I only found out there were only four of them when we looked for them to get the below picture taken!