Engaged - Iyut & Mul

Iyut and Mul are our friends and an avid follower of 1QL (at least Iyut is, we hope). They are recently engaged and asked us to shoot a pre-professional-photographer-engagement-shoot. This engagement shoot had no props, no particular theme, just two people expressing their adoration toward each other. In fact, it was a spur of the moment thing and we only shot it in an hour or so.

It is our first attempt on an engagement shoot, and hope that you guys think it's not too bad. Enjoy! =)

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Craving for some English Trifle

Don't know why but I got a sudden craving for some yummy English Trifle.
I think I love the different colors, the layers and the outburst of several tastes and textures in one bite of a trifle. And it's just too cute to look at! Will somebody make me one? 

To have a whole dessert table full of different flavors of English Trifle is simply bliss!
Have a good weekend!

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Why don't you - be surrounded with flowers?

These pictures just stole my breath away...

From amazing flower designer Karen Tran florals.

pictures taken from blog.karentran.com

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Wedding Shots Wednesday

It's been a tough week for me, with work and Jakarta's extreme weather and of course, the unbearable traffic that comes with the rain. But alas, it is Wednesday and time for us to share some amazing wedding pictures!
Rain in Jakarta might cause terrible traffic, but rain on your wedding day, is said to bring good luck! More often than not, rain will create some pretty awesome pictures of your big day. Don't believe us? Check out some of the breathtaking examples below

I particularly love these shots below by Comfort Studio Weddings. It looks like an ad for a perfume campaign or something. So sexy, so real! Click here to view all of the pictures from this wedding!  

So, fear not of the rain all of you bride to bes! Chances are, it's gonna create more great memories and great pictures for you to cherish for the rest of your lives! =)

{images taken by Lucida Photography via Intimate Weddings, Comfort Studio Weddings via BridalHood and Edmund Tham photography}

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Bangkok Budgeteers

If you are the easily-pleased, fun-loving, food-crazy, on-a-budget type of person like I am, have I got a story for you!

So, I went on a trip to Bangkok, Thailand last week. People, if you’ve never been there, please do me a favor, GO! Aside from the scary similarity between Bangkok and Jakarta (ie. The traffic jam), I’d like to call Bangkok as the “cool” sister that Jakarta wishes she had.  

Started my journey with my best buddy, Air Asia, and bought roundtrip tickets for IDR 1,200,000. For a three and a half hour trip, I don’t think I have the right to complain. Budget travelers, Low Cost Carriers are our best friends. Repeat 3x. So make sure you check their promos religiously.

Now, Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport is an hour away from the city, you have the option to take a bus, a shuttle, or a taxi like me. The 4 of us shared a taxi to our hotel and spent around IDR 50,000 per person.  Ain’t life grand?

For a great place to stay, I really recommend this cute design hotel, Ten Face at Soi Ruamrudee, 2 minutes away from Ploenchit BTS station. It was an all-suites hotel with an amazing rate of IDR 600,000 per night.  Satisfaction guaranteed! Huge clean space with superb service. Also perfect for the honeymooners. 

images taken from Ten Face website

For girls who like to shop, Platinum Mall and Mah Boon Krong are a must. The feel is so much like Mal Ambassador, only 3 times as big and the air con is actually cold. Stuff sold there is so much better in quality and cheaper in price. What more can you ask? Word of advice: don’t think, just buy.

Have I mentioned my love towards food, yes Thai food is mm…mm... good. The brown noodle soup, the pad thai, the curries, the seafood, the minced beef with basil, the mango sticky rice, the papaya salad… oooo I can go on and on. For starters, try a Chinese Thai seafood restaurant called Baan Klang Nam. You could enjoy your Tom yam Goong while enjoying the Chao Phraya River. You may also find lots of street food at Jatujak Market, Yaowarat Road in the Chinatown district, and well, practically everywhere.  Even the food courts are crazily good. My favorite is the fruit stalls along the streets. The mangoes, the pineapples, and the guavas are all so sweet, healthy and cheap.

I’m sure there are a lot of other cool places or things to do than the ones mentioned above (ie. Grand Palace, Floating Market, Sleeping Buddha), so make sure you research well and oh yes, a few tips for you: make sure you write all your destinations in Thai. Ask help from the hotel’s front desk or the restaurant people to write them for you so you could show them to the taxi drivers. At best, find English-speaking ones. 

Go have your own adventure!

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Attention shoppers!

Ever getting tired of same old wedding color scheme? Yes, i'm talking about red and gold. The uber-favorite color of Chinese Indonesian, they just can't stay away from them! My family, has always been a fan of red and gold. Every single celebration was always celebrated in none other than those two colors. I am actually getting reaaalllyyy tired of it. But when I saw these new Spring 2011 collection from Monique Lhuillier, I think I might have liked it a little bit :)

pictures from style.com

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Non-matching Bridesmaid Dresses

Non-matching bridesmaid dresses, yes or no?
We say, with all our hearts, YES! But a word of caution, if you want to dress your bridesmaids in non-matching outfits, make sure that they are still cohesive. This way, it'll add to the whole aesthetics of the wedding.

We love cohesive non-matching bridesmaid dresses because of several reasons:
1. Everybody has different body types, so, your bridesmaids will love you more for acknowledging that.
2. It's very unique and not traditionally done, so there will be an element of surprise for your guests.
3. It's FUN =)

If you've been thinking about doing this at your wedding, we suggest that the bridesmaid dresses be similar in the color hue, the length and that their dress relates to the whole feel of your wedding i.e. romantic, vintage, modern, classic, etc.

Check out some pictures below for cohesive, non-matching bridesmaid dresses in real weddings.

{images taken from Ruffled, Southern Weddings, and Style Me Pretty}

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My Future House!

You know that book, The Secret, that was really big a few years back? I never did read it, but I pretty much heard the gist of what the book was all about - being positive and sending positive thoughts out to the world about what you want in this life, and you will get it.
Well, this is my version of being positive. I want this house, really, really bad. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that it'll be my future house someday. It doesn't have to be the exact same house, but a similar one will do.

Love the airy kitchen, the country style furniture, all that natural light, the swimming pool. SWOON

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Why don't you - Create your own invitation?

Hello lovely readers!

Aside from wedding shot Wednesdays, we are going to start a new routine each week called "Why don't you...". This is basically our findings on things that are not normally done on normal basis...err...what are you sayinn'?

Here it goes. As an example. Indonesians typically do not make their own invitations. They usually go to card specialist who charged super expensive amount of money---> on invitations --->which will be thrown away in a near future. Get the logic? We understand that with regards to parents, they are still going to need a hard copy invitations for special family and special VIP guests. But what about your friends?

Why don't you try to spend less on your invitations for friends, and DIY aka Do It Yourself? I found this link which provides a super cute wedding invitation templates and they are for FREE. What? What? Did I say it out loud? Yes, FREE.

I made these two invitations on behalf of my BFFs. They are engaged to George Clooney and John Hamm..maybe in their dreams, but who are you to judge?

BFFs, I hope you guys live happily ever after and have cute babies and invite me to Oscar and can I stay over at your villa in Lake Como and play date with Brangelina, please? please?

Templates available at loveandlavender.com.

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Wedding Shot Wednesday

It's Wednesday again! And boy am I excited to share this picture with you! I'm not too good with adjectives but if I were, I would type words synonymous to PHENOMENAL forever! Yes, Stephan Maloman of Maloman Photographers did a great job, but kudos to the couple for their willingness to pose for the photographer! Not a lot of couples would pose like this, especially dressed in their wedding attires! Would you?

{image taken by Maloman Photographers via June Bug Weddings}

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Another Video save-the-date!

It's another Video Save-the-date!
1QL is definitely loving this stop motion save-the-date video that seems to be in trend right now. Found this save-the-date via 100 layer cake. We love love LOVE video save the dates, since it's such a creative way to inform everyone about your upcoming nuptials, and most of all, it's paperless! Us Indonesians don't really have a save-the-date tradition, but we think that Indonesians should start doing it and every save-the-date should be as cute as this one or as cute as Candice & Amos'.

Hopefully you can be inspired by this video save-the-date! Click here for the full coverage of this save-the-date.


Wedding Save the Date! from Joe Fayer on Vimeo.

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Engaged - Boyke and Ike

We are so happy for our friends Ike and Boyke for their engagement!  Boyke and Ike are so cute together that even their names rhyme! They had a traditional Indonesian engagement session and will be followed by a traditional wedding next month. Traditional weddings are always nice to feature since it is full of pretty little details! I would imagine it to be a wedding photographer's dream come true to shoot all those details.
Their engagement session is shot by The Photograph and we think they did a great job in capturing the essence of the day - happiness between two families!

Don't you just love Ike's kebaya? Beautiful! 

Here's a little story from our friend, the bride-to-be about her engagement:
Boyke and I met at work 2 years ago, but we did not started dating until early this year when he finally contacted me and asked me out. We officially started dating in April 2010 and 2 months later, he asked me to marry him!
The engagement party was held at my house in September. It was a private engagement session with only our families attending. Boyke's family came to my house to officially ask my Dad's permission for my hand in marriage. It is tradition in Indonesia for the groom-to-be to bring some "seserahan" as a symbol and we also exchanged rings.
Our solemnization (Akad Nikah) is in November but our reception will be held early next year. And to honor both traditions of our family, we will be using a Palembang tradition for our Akad Nikah, and Javanese tradition for our reception. 
We chose The Photograph to document our engagement because a friend recommended them to us. And after meeting them at a wedding expo, we found that they are so very cooperative, professional and nice! I am really really satisfied with the results on my engagement day and cannot wait for them to document our Akad Nikah and reception!  

Congratulations Ike and Boyke!
Be sure to check out The Photograph's website and facebook page for more of their lovely work!

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Featured Wedding Photographer - Ira Lippke

Here at 1QL, we are not only inspired by beautiful things but also by beautiful people all around the world. But when you come across a beautiful person that also creates beautiful things... then it's a no brainer that they are worthy to be mentioned here in 1QL.

Ira Lippke is a world renowned wedding photographer, has received many awards and has shot weddings all around the world! His photos are simply stunning, check out some of his work below!

 

Junebug Weddings recently featured him in a full fledged interview. When I read the interview, I was very moved because he mentioned that his all time favorite wedding location was a wedding that he shot in Bingin Beach, Bali. Coming from a renowned photographer that has basically seen and shot photographs most of the world, that is HUGE.

Check out the full interview here
 

Aside from shooting astonishing weddings, Ira does a lot of humanitarian work. Believe it or not, Ira was one of the first westerners that went to Banda Aceh in December 2004 as a volunteer right after the Tsunami occurred. Wow!! This was mentioned in the interview with Junebug Weddings, as well. I was truly humbled by this fact. Being an Indonesian, I've never even been to the ground zero of Tsunami in Banda Aceh!

 

{Ira (far right) and his friends about to leave Banda Aceh after days of volunteering}

If you want to see their full journey, click here

So, if you are looking for a prominent wedding photographer, consider Ira Lippke and you'll be glad to know that you're not only hiring a professional photographer, but also you will be contributing to his humanitarian work as well.

{images taken from Junebug Weddings and Samuel Lippke}

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Smitten with Preston

I am pretty sure 1QL readers are already familiar with the name Preston Bailey. Needless to say, he is THE person to go to for event decorating. If you have enough cash sitting idle in your big giant treasure box, or if you are blessed with promising rich soon-to-be-husband who is kind enough to make your dream come true, then get smitten with Preston :)

And the man himself....
                                      

Prettiness, yes? We are in awe! :)

(Image taken from prestonbailey.com)

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Save the Date - Candice & Amos

This must be one of the most original Save-the-date I've ever seen. Too.Darn.Cute!!!!


In the words of the bride-to-be:
"this was so much fun to make...we wanted to show our love for food and eating and also to show how at our wedding, there will be lots of food, so we came up with this idea".
Well, I think it's brilliant! It's original, fun and so so funny! And what amazes me even more is that Candice made this video all by herself! Just goes to show how much fun their wedding is gonna be next year! Can't wait!
See you guys in Bali =)


amos & candice save the date from Candice and Amos on Vimeo.

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Wedding Shots Wednesday

It is necessary for me to post this wedding because of its uniqueness.
Where else can you find a wedding that has a bride wearing a green dress, a wedding aisle paved by authentic Moroccan rugs and live camels as decoration on the altar?? That's right, CAMELS! Did your brain explode yet? 

{all images taken by Our Labor of Love}

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An Intimate Birthday celebration - Our Debut Event

This weekend was a special one because we had our first event for a very special friend's intimate birthday party. It was all about YELLOW (coz it's the birthday girl's favorite color) and POM POMs (coz we think they're the cutest!).

99 Restaurant at Grand Indonesia had a private function room that was perfect for our intended event. We decorated the chairs and had a centerpiece of DIY pom poms, it was an instant hit with the girls!

 

It was a semi-surprise party as the birthday girl didn't really know what exactly was going down, so we had a friend blindfold her as they made their way to the venue. Special thanks to Iyut for that, good job, Yut!

It was great to see people enjoying themselves accompanied with good food, good wine and great friends. 

 

We had one last surprise for her and made her a friendship photoclip. It was a hit!

 

Happy Birthday again, girlie! Hope you enjoyed your intimate party!

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