My first wedding vendor review has to be about Johnna Metcalf. Where do I even begin? Johnna is one of the most brilliant, kind, organized, warm, friendly and calm people I have ever met. She’s one of those people where you immediately feel at ease when you’re around her. Hiring her was by far our greatest wedding investment and I would hire her over and over again if I could.

She made our day absolutely flawless - if ANYTHING was sliiightly off or wrong, she caught it immediately, calmly, and handled it with poise - always reassuring us she’s got it covered. I felt 100% at ease, all day, because of her. The DETAILS of what she does for you is unmatched. She cared about our family and we all felt it.

We are obviously still on cloud 9 from the wedding, and haven’t stopped talking about it - but our most frequent compliment by far (from our bridal party and family) is how wonderful Johnna was. Thank you Johnna for the greatest weekend of our lives ❤️

Chrissy Magliano is just about my favorite human being on this earth! I could write an entire dissertation about how wonderful Chrissy, Christine Cronin, and everyone at Big City Bride are, and it still wouldn’t do any of them justice. We started working with Chrissy in 2018, with an intended wedding date of Fall 2020. As you can imagine, things didn’t quite go as originally planned. Chrissy guided us through the entire wedding planning process – and then re-planning process as we had to shift the wedding weekend to a year later in 2021 – with more grace, patience, and kindness than we could have ever imagined or asked for. Chrissy held our hands through every tough decision along the way, set us up with vendors that exceeded our wildest expectations, and helped us navigate all the added complications caused by the pandemic. Our entire wedding weekend went like clockwork, with every last detail perfectly handled and directed by Chrissy and company. If a single thing went wrong, we had no idea! We truly could not be more grateful to her and everyone else at Big City Bride. It felt like we got to work with a dear friend for our wedding planning, and we already miss having our regular calls with Chrissy! If you’re looking for a wedding planner, do not hesitate to work with Big City Bride. They are truly too amazing for words!

Before COVID we had a "BIG CITY " Wedding planned and having received rave reviews about Arin at Big City Brides. We knew she was the one we wanted on our team. During COVID we had to pivot to an outdoor Suburban wedding and ARIN more than "Delivered". She just kept impressing us with her creativity, organization, and contacts. Day of, Everything went seamlessly and she was there the next day even helping to make the Brunch a success. She was incredible !!! Thank you Big City Brides for being "The BEST" Bridal consultants in and outside The CITY.

Big City Bride made our wedding day as smooth as can be. We worked with Kayla and could not have had a better experience. From coordinating our day of timeline to confirming everything with our vendors, her hard work took so much stress out of our hands. We trusted Kayla to handle anything that popped up and are so happy that we did. We had the best wedding day we could have asked for all thanks to Kayla! 

Big City Bride is the premier wedding planner in the Chicago area. Their attention to detail is amazing! Their creativity is incredible! Highly recommend!!

Hiring Big City Bride as my partner in wedding planning was one of the best decisions I’ve made in my life! I’m the definition of a bride who struggles to give up control… so when I realized I needed help, I went to the best. I had interviewed a handful of companies, but always felt something was missing. From Day 1 of meeting with Kayla at BCB, I instantly felt at ease and clicked with her. Through every stage of a year of planning, Kayla was always there, took initiative, was my cheerleader, my sounding board, a shoulder to cry on when I needed to vent, and the best partner I could’ve ever asked for. She went above and beyond every step of the way. Everything was flawless from start to finish and my guests still can’t stop talking about how it was the best wedding they’ve ever been to. Now that our wedding is over, I can’t put into words how much I miss our weekly meetings and chats. BCB goes out of their way to ensure their brides not just feel like an important client, but also like part of their family. I’m beyond honored to have worked with such an amazing person and company, but even more honored to now call Kayla a lifelong friend.

Claire Weller from Big City Bride was amazing and went well above and beyond as our wedding planner. It’s so hard to list everything or even know where to start, but we’re definitely going to try! Overall, she was on top of everything, and always 5 steps ahead. She brought things to our attention and thought of scenarios that we didn’t even think about, and she had a lot of great ideas and helpful tips. Professional, extremely organized, and prompt, she got back to us very quickly and made sure we stayed calm, cool, and collected throughout the entire process, especially the day of the wedding. Friendly, creative, energetic, enthusiastic, charismatic, and very reliable all describe her perfectly. Claire and Big City Bride was very flexible when it came to pricing and budget, and Claire still helped as much as she could, even if it wasn’t included in the services we got. For example, she came and helped during the rehearsal, even though we hired her for the day-of wedding (above and beyond). She was a point person with all our vendors and kept everyone (us included) on time in a very professional and respectful manner. We even heard back from vendors how polite yet prompt she was throughout the night. She was very familiar with our venue and took care of everything throughout the night while remaining very responsive.

In the end, we felt it was definitely worth having a wedding planner, otherwise, things would have easily fallen apart, forgotten, and the stress would have been overwhelming. We got to focus 100% on each other, our wedding, and the fun wedding reception with absolutely no worry. We’re so happy to have had Claire with us throughout the process.

Big City Bride. How will I ever express enough gratitude for what you did for me, my husband, and our guests. More specifically, this love-post goest out to Arin Calamari. The coordinator of all coordinators, the planner of all planners. She exceeded our expectations and was an absolute dream to work with. If you are lucky (blessed) enough to work with this angel, then you will join an elite group I have affectionately named, "Arin's fan club". From start to finish, she was the absolute greatest to work with. She lifted me up through some tough times through out this process and brought out the best in me and made our wedding day more than I could have ever imagined it could be. You could absolutely feel the love she has for her job and I was comforted knowing that this was and is her passion. She treats her brides like royalty and I knew that I was always a priority. Arin, my heart is full thanks to you. OH GOODNESS, I'M CRYING AGAIN!!!! Cue the ugly cry. Thank you so much for everything. You are a forever friend. Thank you for knowing all that you know and for navigating me through this crazy process called wedding planning. I can't wait to send over pictures and videos because you know, you'll be one of the first to get them! Big City Bride- you guys are so great!! THANK YOU!

Big City Bride really helped in creating the wedding that we were exactly looking for. While the wedding theme that we chose was not your average theme, Kayla helped us to create a vision that was exactly what we wanted (from our brain to hers)! We loved everything about BCB and we were so happy to have them execute our wedding day timeline.

We were apprehensive to pay for a planner, but looking back, I do not think we could have ever had the day we day without them. We absolutely made the right decision!

I cannot thank Kayla enough for everything she did for us to achieve the perfect wedding weekend! We were honestly blown away at her attention to detail in every aspect, her enthusiastic and professional attitude, and all of the extra effort she went through to make every moment flawless in execution. Not to mention, she was tons of fun! Every person has come up to me asking who she was and what company she worked for to help coordinate our day. I cannot imagine our weekend without Kayla. She started working with us about 3-4 weeks away from our wedding. At that point, stress and excitement is high and to have someone completely take care of last minute finalizations and details was a godsend. I did not worry about a single thing. Absolute best money we spent! I recommend Kayla and Big City Bride to every Bride and Groom!
Shelby and Alex Krause