From the very start, he was incredibly attentive, thoughtful, and organized. We had total faith in him throughout the entire process—and because of that, we were so relaxed while planning our wedding, something I never thought I’d say! Thomas truly thought of everything. He anticipated needs we didn’t even know we had and was incredibly detail oriented.

The team that surrounds him (Julia, Rachel, Bonnie + others) were just as impressive—so kind, helpful, and professional. Thanks to them, we didn’t have to worry about a single thing and could actually enjoy every moment of our wedding weekend.

We’re still getting compliments about how beautiful our wedding was, and we know most of it is because of Thomas and his team. You will not regret hiring Thomas—do it.

Honestly, I’d marry Jordon all over again just to attend another Thomas Bui event!

This review has been due for a long time and I am so sorry for the delay! I cannot say enough kind words about Thomas and his team. They are professional, compassionate, and will not hesitate to go above-and-beyond for you. Thomas is a true artist and whatever vision you have, he will not only deliver, but he will literally make your dreams come true. Our wedding was beyond beautiful and even better than what we imagined it could look like. I trust Thomas and his team wholeheartedly, and cannot recommend them enough. Thank you so so much to Thomas and his amazing team!!!

We had the pleasure of working with Thomas Bui and the Thomas Bui Lifestyle team on our recent wedding. Picking Thomas was hands down the easiest wedding decision we made (well besides asking my now wife to marry me :). The multi-day event he put on was beyond our wildest dreams and as each detail came to life we were more and more enamored with not only the production but Thomas and his rockstar team who overdelivered. When the wedding arrived there was not one finger to lift, his entire team was there to help with any and everything. It is cliche to say our wedding was perfect, but to us it was was and Thomas made sure of that by first learning what was important to us on this big day and going above and beyond to cater to those needs.

Thomas was the ultimate professional and guided us on this 2 year journey with grace and confidence, and despite the unknown of planning a wedding during a pandemic, having clients with picky tastes and a million other obstacles we threw at him, he navigated the challenges with ease. Which in turn made our lives easy and allowed us to enjoy the process instead of rushing through it.

Thomas is an excellent communicator, with a brilliant design eye, and his passion for this profession but more importantly his clients is so obvious and at the forefront of everything he does.

The highlight of our weeks was getting to meet with Thomas be it in person or late nights via phone to plan the wedding and discuss details. Thomas was always able to accommodate our hectic work and personal schedules and would meet with us for hours until all our questions answered, chat on nights , weekends or holidays if that was our preference, and reconvene as frequently as we’d want. He was prepared with quotes, ideas and contacts (the latter being a true calling card of Thomas, his ability to connect with others and every vendor we met with even the ones we did not select raved
about Thomas and how lucky we were to work with him).

We built an incredibly strong connection with Thomas and knew that would last long after the I do’s, which it has. We cannot say the same for some of the other planners we met with as we could tell from the jump that most of them we were just viewing us as a number, but with Thomas he took the time to get to know us and our families and because of that was able to weave our personalities, likes and history of how we became a couple into the wedding, making it more bespoke and personal.

We highly recommend Thomas and his amazing team!

Thank you for the amazing wedding!
-Harrison and Adrienne Laifer -

From the moment I first met Thomas over Zoom we instantly clicked. He was so thoughtful and kind, and listened intently to my vision. He was open and honest, and made me very excited about the whole process! I originally had to talk my parents into the idea of hiring a wedding coordinator, and a few months in they were both gushing about how fantastic Thomas and his team were, and agreed it was worth every penny. As a bride he will make you feel like a princess, and he makes the effort to make everyone involved feel comfortable and heard. He is so well connected in San Diego - he found us exceptional vendors, which he has strong relationships with. Day of - his team was a dream. When my husband and I walked into the reception room for the first look, it took our breath away! He even surprised us with a very special gift the day of the wedding. I could not recommend Thomas Bui Lifestyle more!

Thomas Bui Lifestyle are made up of a team of incredible individuals, each of them bring a unique talent to the planning and execution of your special moment. For me, they were integral to the smooth running, execution of events and vision, and general energy of my wedding weekend. I am so glad to know and have worked with Thomas and his fabulous team.

Couldn’t have gotten married without this team. Thomas saved us money but more importantly he saved us on the things you can’t get back- time and energy. His positive energy pushed my wedding stress away so many times and he was always 1 phone call away when I needed him. He became a thoughtful friend through our planning process. His team the day of made me so comfortable and really tended to my every need. Even the crazy ones. Need a cheeseburger? Hot in-n-out is there 15 mins later. I can’t picture my wedding without this team. From the design and style (all Thomas, 5% me) and how smooth the day went, I thank this team with my whole heart for giving me a perfect wedding, priceless memories & peace of mind.

Where do we begin!? I’ll start by saying Thomas Bui far EXCEEDED our expectations!! We initially met Thomas in October 2018 at Hotel Del Coronado. My husband and I live in Colorado but would visit the Del often and we fell in love with it. So much so, that we decided to have our wedding there. I researched the list of wedding coordinators provided to us by the Del and narrowed it down to the top four. We flew out to Coronado to meet all four selected wedding coordinators and met with Thomas Bui first. Within the first 5 minutes of our visit, we knew he was the one! My husband and I just canceled the rest, we didn’t want to waste their time.
Being that this was going to be a destination wedding, timely communication was key. There was never any delay in communication with us when we reached out to Thomas, either text, via email, or phone. Because of this, not once did I worry that things weren’t getting done nor did I ever feel the need to micromanage. This truly put me at ease! I was confident I could fully trust Thomas with everything. With that being said, I also knew the vendors he recommended to us were top notch! Thomas was consistently on point with every aspect of our wedding!
Our initial wedding date was July 2020, but with the pandemic we ended up postponing the wedding twice and Thomas was in close contact with us throughout. We ended up moving the wedding to Colorado and were married July 10th at The Broadmoor this year. Thomas coordinated the move to Colorado with every single one of our vendors in California and it was seamless! All 15,000 flowers were transported from California to Colorado in a refrigerated truck and they were beyond gorgeous at the wedding.
I always had a vision for our wedding, but sometimes that can be hard to relay, but not with Thomas! He knew exactly what I wanted and made that vision come to life. Same is true with my wedding dress. Thomas and I visited a few bridal shops in San Diego, and nothing really caught my attention. Thomas recommended a designer by the name of Galia Lahav. We found a bridal shop in Denver that carried her line of dresses and was he right! I found the wedding dress of my dreams!
Thomas and his team have superb attention to detail. Everything was perfect the day of our wedding, there was nothing I would change. We were absolutely amazed and beyond impressed with his work! Friends and family have described our wedding as stunning, magnificent, breathtaking, beautiful, classy and elegant and have said “It’s nothing like they’ve ever seen before” and my favorite, “The wedding of the Century”!
My fairytale wedding came true thanks to Thomas Bui, and we will forever be grateful!

I cannot say enough about Thomas and Thomas Bui Lifestyle. Thomas and Bob are consummate professionals and their attention to detail is impeccable. Thomas is brilliant at anticipating the needs of his clients and their guests and his creative genius exceeds expectations. He is everything one is looking for in an event planner and maker of magical memories that last a lifetime.

We hired Thomas Bui for my mom's 60th birthday celebration. We have always admired Thomas' work as native San Diegans. It has always been a dream of my mom's to hire Thomas, so we were very excited to work with him and Thomas and his team exceeded all of our expectations.

We told him a brief idea of what we were thinking for the party and he took it to a new level. His knowledge of the industry and vast experience is unmatched. He has incredible relationships with the best, most reliable vendors, so the entire process from planning to the actual party was efficient and seamless. Thomas coordinated the invites, a dance floor on the pool, gourmet appetizers and dinner, a band, rentals, hair and makeup and much more. The day of the party was relaxing and stress-free thanks to his meticulous planning.

Thomas and his team are friendly, outgoing and easy to be around. We always looked forward to our meetings with them prior to the event. Thomas has endless ideas, but knows how to narrow down the priorities to fit within budget. We will absolutely be hiring Thomas again. If you want to throw a first class party, Thomas is for you.

My wife and I have had a year to reflect on this since the wedding and I’m finally glad to publish it. For anyone that’s reading this review, I can only imagine the stress you’re feeling and sheer magnitude of items that you will need to address ahead of the wedding and things that you probably have not even thought of yet. Now imagine that and transporting yourself to the other side of the world (12 time zones away) and you may feel a sense of hopelessness or lack of control over such a creative process.

For my wife and I, that was exactly how we felt when we set out to plan our San Diego wedding from the UAE (San Diego because I’m from there). Now enter Thomas, a very friendly, easy to get along with person and very well connected in the event planning industry – additionally, he has an incredible attitude, bringing a sense of calmness and measured control during the planning and execution phase.

We started a year out for planning this wedding and during the first eight months, it was the occasional email on “let’s decide this because this is when we need to decide it” which was perfect given the time difference and our busy schedules. Crunch time came around T-4, when we were planning to meet Thomas for the first time (he was hired based on an initial Skype interview and seeing him plan other weddings for my family members). As expected, our schedules changed and we could only be in San Diego a month later; “no worries” said Thomas, all vendor were able to accommodate the schedule change with the utmost courtesy. Meeting Thomas for the first time at the Park Hyatt Aviara, we ate our way through a 20-course taster to dwindle the selection down to 8 choices. We picked out the final invitations with the meal choices and stopped by Blush Botanicals to see the proposed table settings and florals. I’m certain there was a ton of work in the background but to us, it was effortless and fun.

We come back to San Diego a week before the wedding with what we thought was a nearly finalized wedding plan, but we had a few ideas to make the wedding more fun and enjoyable for our guests. Conversations from one week out began and all ended like this:

Conversation #1
Us: Hi Thomas, can we please have an ice luge for next weekend next to the bar outside?
Thomas: Of course, I know a good ice sculptor. How big do you want it and what do you want inscribed?

Conversation #2
Us: Hi Thomas, can we ask Melissa to print out detailed itineraries for all of the guests given it’s a 3-day event?
Thomas: Of course, I’ll coordinate with her.

Conversation #3
Us: Hi Thomas, can we order 100 cubes of Dom gummy bears as party favors from Sugarfina and add custom stickers thanking the guests?
Thomas: Definitely, ship them to my house and I’ll work on it with Melissa

Conversation #4
Us: Hi Thomas, can we make 50 hangover kits for the guests staying at the hotel?
Thomas: Yes, these are the items I suggest…

I think you get the message here – the answer was never a no and no request was too much. We even asked to have free roaming peacocks at our farewell brunch – Thomas enquired and then suggested that we shouldn’t have them because they shed their feathers in October; featherless peacocks wouldn’t be too fun and we passed upon Thomas’ suggestion. In hindsight, we probably could have asked Thomas to import some from Australia for the brunch and he probably would have found a way. It’s this measured calmness and impression of being in control (and actually being in control) that gave us the calmness and confidence to push to the finish line. Having a panicked and tough to deal with wedding planner would have deteriorated our event which thankfully Thomas was not in any way.

A couple things to note: communication with Thomas was easy and effortless. You can always expect prompt replies to any questions or requests. He is a reasonable person and presents himself confidently, something that is very important when we’re all about to embark on something that we have never done before. We really enjoyed working with Thomas and hope others will have the same opportunity as well.