Huge thank you to Colleen with Five Grain Events for making our wedding day go smoothly—everything was perfect and if it wasn’t, we didn’t know about it. We hired Five Grain for Day-of Coordination, and they were amazing to work with from the first meeting. Colleen handled all the little details so well and picked up the vendor communications about two months out. It was also helpful that I could reach out to them for general advice while I was planning the wedding—and I referenced their preferred vendor list frequently.

We LOVED the detailed timelines Colleen put together for us, vendors, and wedding party. I have never gotten that as a bridesmaid in friends’ weddings, so it was a pleasant surprise that made everyone more organized. She also collected many of our items for the day-of ahead of time, which was very helpful!

On wedding day, Colleen was so helpful and even placed my veil in the morning and bustled my dress before the reception. Because of all the prep work she put in, we had full confidence that the day would be smooth, and she exceeded our expectations. It was truly the best day of our lives and not having to worry about any coordinating was amazing!

We were so glad we hired Five Grain Events to coordinate our September wedding at the Chicago Athletic Club. Planning a wedding felt like the epitome of “you don’t know what you don’t know”, so having our coordinator’s guidance on considerations and decisions we needed to make leading up to our wedding day was incredibly helpful. Jennifer our coordinator was incredibly communicative with us, our vendors, and my mother who was hosting our wedding. When their was an issue getting in touch with our florist the week leading up to our wedding, Jennifer was there to help (and calm me down!). When planning our day of schedule, Jennifer suggested that hors d'oeuvres and champagne could be brought to the room I was having my dress bustled in so that my husband and I could have a moment together between our ceremony and reception. Leading up to the wedding we didn’t think we would need that, but Jennifer suggested we leave it on the schedule as an option that we could decide on the day of. I’m so glad she did because that is one of our favorite moments from our wedding day! We cannot recommend Five Grain Events, and specifically Jennifer, enough!

We had a great experience working with Joan & Jesseca at Five Grain Events! They are very professional and knowledgeable - they thought of everything we didn't! Joan helped us with the initial budgeting planning/process and Jesseca was our coordinator. Our wedding with 175 guests was held at St. Giles Church, with reception at Chicago Athletic Association. Jesseca and the Five Grain team did an amazing job managing multiple vendors and making sure everything was organized, on time and running smoothly. Plus they are awesome people! Highly recommend the Five Grain team.

It was definitely the right decision to use Five Grain to help with our wedding coordination! It was really nice to be able to focus on my husband and the special moments of our day without worrying what was/wasn't getting done. I can't imagine if I had to handle questions, logistics, etc on my wedding day. I would have missed a lot more and probably been way more stressed out! Everything was flawless and honestly better and more beautiful than we could have ever imagined! I couldn't have pulled it off without Jennifer and the Five Grain team! Joan was also fantastic, she provided thoughts early on regarding vendors we were considering before we were assigned a coordinator.

Our coordinator, Jennifer, was on top of her game and it was nice to have someone to bounce ideas off or sometimes frustrations. She was also able to tell me what is "the norm" when working with vendors, etc. Also, my family members were really impressed with the detailed timeline going into the wedding day!

I can't speak highly enough of my experience working with Five Grain Events!

Hiring Joan and her team was easily the best decision we made in the entire wedding planning process! We hired Five Grain for full service planning, just after setting a date and choosing a venue. Joan helped us to create a detailed budget based on our priorities and overall budget, while factoring in the planning fee to make sure we wouldn't go over our all-in budget number.

Joan brought so many fun and interesting ideas to our wedding, helped us achieve our wildest ideas and visions (we entered our reception on a boat!!), and will always let you know when something is or isn't worth the spend or effort. She'll also exchange as many emails or have as many calls as is needed to feel confident and comfortable. Five Grain also sourced and helped us contract the most amazing vendor team to execute our day. As someone who is pretty type A and organized and also works in the event industry myself, I could not have had more trust in Joan and her team throughout the entire process. Five Grain alleviated so much stress and really made planning a wedding to be an enjoyable activity.

I had a friend once ask if there was anything I regretted spending money on or wasn't worth the investment for our wedding, and I said that having Five Grain made that impossible because Joan helped us to be so intentional, logical, and efficient with our entire day. I always felt confident that nothing was going to be missed, forgotten, or overspent. My number one piece of wedding planning advice is to hire a planner, and make it Five Grain!

I can barely put into words how incredibly grateful we are to Five Grains! We had to reschedule our wedding twice due to covid and they made the process as stress-free as possible. The second time, they even spoke to our vendors and presented us with options and availability! And, if that wasn't enough, they walked us through all of the final decisions leading up to the day with such care that it made us feel completely at ease. On the day of the wedding I was genuinely excited to see our coordinator as she had played such a big role leading up to the day. I trusted her completely and so did my entire wedding party and family. She handled every day-of issue with grace and never let us know anything was a miss (including wedding crashers!). My family still talks about how seamlessly every detail was tended to, even my MOH magically had a glass of champagne handed to her right as she took the mic for her toast. Truly the best team and we are so grateful to have worked with them.

Five Grain Events absolutely was the best choice we made in all of our wedding planning! Joan was incredible! She was on top of every detail and went above and beyond to make sure our wedding was flawless. We had to reschedule 3 times due to COVID and she was monumental in reaching out to our vendors and getting all of our ducks in a row. I recommend her to all of my newly engaged friends and could not think of a nicer more organized person! Thank you again!

Colleen Fahy was our coordinator, and she was absolutely incredible. Her guidance, her input, her sweet personality, her organizational skills, her foresight, her patience, her flexibility, her thoughtfulness, her ability to put us at ease… all made her so wonderful to work with. I didn’t worry about a single thing on wedding day, because I truly trusted that Colleen had helped us prepare so well, and that anything that would come up she would handle. And she sure did!! Colleen handled a lot of issues that arose on wedding day without us knowing!! She handled all communication with our vendors leading up to the wedding which was a HUGE burden off of our shoulders. Colleen spared us a lot of stress, and we’re so grateful that she allowed us to be in the moment and enjoy every minute of the day.

So many people in my bridal party / other guests at the wedding mentioned how amazing Colleen was!! The bridal party / other VIP's LOVED the detailed timeline/itinerary that Colleen prepared and distributed prior to the wedding. People knew where to be and when, and didn't have to reach out to me with small questions as a result. People around us noticed and appreciated all that she and her team did, and we certainly did, too. AND, Colleen did it all with a calming presence and a smile on her face. We were so impressed.

Colleen and Joan humored my many overly detailed questions, requests, anxieties, etc.! I honestly felt like nothing slipped through the cracks on our wedding weekend because Colleen and her team were there to catch it all. She remembered and honored everything we mentioned to her over the past few months (which was A LOT!)!

We could go on and on... 100% recommend Five Grain Events and Colleen Fahy was an absolute GEM.

Due to COVID our wedding was postponed 3 times. Joan and her team were absolutely amazing through all of it- re-organizing vendors, updating the venue, etc. Joan was so great during the rehearsal and day of! I honestly don't how we would have gotten through it without her. She ensured that every detail, down to even clipping tiny threads only she noticed sticking out of my dress, was perfect. Apparently there were a few snafus but we didn't even notice, nor did the guests, because she took care of them 100%! The catering vendors she organized for us to try were spot on and she thought of EVERY small detail for us to think about prior to the big day. I even had a horrible dress issue just 2 days before the wedding and she organized a meeting with a great tailor in the area (we came up from Dallas just the day before) who sorted it out. She really went above and beyond for us, and we can't thank her enough for a truly memorable event- we wouldn't have changed a thing.

I was torn about hiring a planner, as I'm a relatively organized and type-A person who had already exceeded her wedding budget. Let me tell you - this was the best decision I made in the entire wedding planning process! Looking back now, I don't know what I would have done without Joan and her expertise! The selling point for me was the realization that it doesn't make sense to spend thousands of dollars for an event without hiring a professional to oversee and coordinate the many moving parts involved. I didn't have to be the point person for all the vendors and most importantly it limited my interaction with my challenging venue manager. I got to just enjoy the day and not worry about anything - our wedding truly went off without a hitch (or I didn't know about any issues, which is fine by me!). There was a huge benefit of having someone with extensive experience give me advice and tell me what works well in various situations. Planning a wedding is an intense process and it was made easy by Joan and her team. I was able to trust and outsource nearly all of the last minute coordination between vendors, which was a huge relief with my demanding work schedule. I've since been to a handful of weddings where there were minor snafus (couldn't hear the vows, DJ didn't have the first dance song (!) etc) and I couldn't help but feel grateful we avoided any similar glitches. I have nothing but amazing memories from that day and I am truly grateful to Five Grain Events for being there for me.