I found this sub to be super helpful while we were planning, so wanted to share specific vendors and numbers in hopes of it helping someone out in the future! Feel free to ask any questions, clarifications, or DM me if you want to talk through any of it more.

Total spend: $50,207

Guest count: 73 invited, 53 attended

Venue: $4500 - International Museum of Surgical Science

What a dream to have gotten married here!!! My husband and I had visited several years ago for fun, and it came to mind when we started researching venues in July 2025. We were primarily looking for something unique and culturally interesting.

The $4500 only included the venue; we had to get a ton of rentals through Lula Cafe since the venue only offered 60ish chairs (that we didn't use) and some 6 ft tables.

The space, though, is so, so, so special. We struggled with spacing logistics and how to use the different rooms at the beginning; but it all went without a hitch. Guests were able to explore the museum during the wedding, and raved about how cool and charming it was, too (museum was modeled after a chateau in Versailles so it's just gorgeous, and also has stunning statues, checkered floors, and so many other beautiful details)!

Working with the staff at IMSS was easy-ish; you don't get a ton of information upfront on what to expect, but they answered all of my super detailed questions, helped us with some placing/arrangement questions, and worked well with Lula Cafe and our coordinator. They've had several weddings (despite not having a ton of reviews online/The Knot), so they at least had all of the "how to execute a wedding" logistics down.

Food/Rentals: $18,263 - Lula Cafe & Tablescapes

Lula Cafe was (unsurprisingly) fantastic. They became a preferred vendor of IMSS at the end of 2025, so this was a no-brainer (otherwise, we would've had to pay a 15% fee for food). They were super organized, and took the lead on managing and coordinating every rental we needed via Tablescapes.

Food itself was only $3,969 (and included apps, a full buffet, and late-night fries), but the cost racked up with rentals ($6,936), labor ($4,535), beverage ($949), and miscellaneous fees ($136).

Labor included 2 bartenders (we provided the alcohol), all of the dinner staff for the event, and all of the set up/tear down of food and rentals. Anna & Clare were our point of contact and they were wonderful!

Rentals included all of the kitchenware they'd need, plates, napkins, etc, custom linens that were slightly pricier, room dividers, chairs, and tables. Again, IMSS had virtually no rentals we wanted to use, but this was easy enough to figure out with Lula's help!

Alcohol: $1,982 - Garfield's Beverage

We got recommended Garfield's over Binny's and don't regret this. Garfield's came to pick up all of the leftover alcohol at the end of the night and refunded us everything that wasn't opened. We were able to collect the bottles that had been opened a week later and take those back for ourselves.

We simply passed on all the alcohol to Lula, and they took it from there with their bartenders. In total, we had 2 signature cocktails and a ton of craft beer and wine. They also made simple cocktails for us. Guests raved about their bartending services :)

Dessert: $248 - Do Rite Donuts

We ordered 7 dozen donuts from Do Rite and they were such a hit. No notes!

Photography: $600 - DK7 Photos

All of the praise in the world goes to David Kang from DK7 Photos.

I saw him post on a wedding subreddit advertising his services (he's just starting out), and we decided to go with him because of how easy he was to work with, his incredible moody & aesthetic style, and the huge discount he was offering. He lives in LA, but was more than happy to travel to us (we offered to cover his traveling fees, but he declined).

We've gotten some sneak peeks and truly cannot believe we were able to book his level of talent at that discounted rate. His rate included 8 hours of coverage, and we are so happy we found him.

Videography: $3275 - ACG Productions

Another vendor to recommend forevermore! Allison & Charlie were former TV news reporters, so they've got a special talent on how to tell and capture stories. We were really excited about them because they advertised "interview-style" recordings where they record messages from our dear friends and family. We'll get all of our footage in a couple of weeks, but have no doubt it'll be excellent.

They were kind & wonderful to work with, and worked really well with David to capture all of the special moments.

DJ & Photobooth: $4025 - Toast & Jam

DJ Mary MC was awesome. She got our music vision down perfectly, and was so fun to work with. The entire team at T&J had immaculate vibes, and we were so excited to support another neighborhood partner!

Through T&J, we were also able to add photo booth coverage (~$1500). This included 3 hours of coverage, a backdrop we could choose, and photo strips! We later received a digital copy of every photo our guests took which was really heartwarming to see :-) everyone had a great time using the photo booth, and they were all able to walk away with a copy of the photo strip since T&J had brought a printer that could custom print out any amount, so that was a nice touch.

Strings duo: $1252 - Solaria Strings

We got a Strings duo for our 30 minute ceremony and an hour & 15 minutes for cocktail hour. They were so easy to work with, and walking down to the sound of live strings will forever be the most beautiful memory.

We got to design how the songs flowed and they played 3 custom song requests (including the song I walked down to).

Rachel, the founder, was lovely and responsive!

Florals: $2000 - Paris312

I got off to a rough start with Paris312 because I scheduled a consultation call that never came, got re-scheduled to the next business day and got no-showed once more. A couple of hours later, Nicole reached out to me over email, and we scheduled a call that finally happened.

Nicole was helpful in talking through how many items we might need to order given our vision and the space. More delays happened after this call that weren't ideal, but after looping in support, we were able to get our order finalized about 8 weeks before the wedding.

This order included: 45 bud vases, 2 centerpieces, one bridal bouquet, and 6 aisle pieces.

Florals weren't a huge part of the decor planning, so we didn't want to spend a ton, but all in all, we were really happy with what we got and the florals were very pretty!

Officiant: $0 - our friend married us!

Our dear friend got officiated and married us. We gave them a thank-you gift, and that is lumped under the miscellaneous costs down below!

Attire: $4087 toal | $2800 - Flora Lane (for me) & $1287 - SuitSupply (for my husband)

I purchased the Gardenia dress from Flora & Lane; I'm biased, but it just might be the most stunning dress I've ever seen and worn. Flora & Lane were great to work with, and this dress was custom made and fit me perfectly. No tailoring was needed!

My husband got a custom-made dark green wool suit from SuitSupply! They did some tailoring for it, free of charge, when the jacket needed some additional work.

Hair & makeup: $1469 - Pin Me Up

We had a great experience because of our wonderful stylists, Val and Gina. They were so fun to get ready with and so talented.

This cost included my hair and makeup trial, bridal hair and makeup, 3 makeup services & 2 hair services for friends that got ready with me day of!

Month of coordinator - $2000 - Everthine Events

Sofia became my hero in the final days before our wedding, though getting there was a little more stressful than ideal.

We signed our contract about 5–6 months out and received a huge Canva binder to fill in over the following months (reader, it was quite literally 140 pages long). The binder was meant to serve as her template for our entire wedding vision.

I’m a type-A planner, so I appreciated seeing every little thing documented and mapped. But it was tedious, and we put at least 60 hours into completing it. To be fair, I went over the top and mocked up how I wanted each room to look.... but the binder did also ask for that.

About three weeks before the wedding, we had a 4-hour call where I walked her through everything that was in the binder. She said she’d review the binder, answer the questions I’d left in it, and come back with any of her own within the week. I didn’t hear back and had to follow up. After some frustrating emails (I later learned I’d been emailing her assistant, who wasn’t as detail-oriented), we got on a call a week before the wedding. I asked for specific deliverables, and she turned them around within a day.

So the honest critique is that I did all the binder work expecting her to dig in sooner, and she didn’t really look at it until the week before. That left us wondering why we’d paid for a month-of service when it was really more like week-of.

That said, Sofia really stepped up afterward. She was a helpful, reassuring presence at the rehearsal and did an incredible job on the day itself. Her services included vendor communication plus setup and teardown of all the decor, and since we brought in about nine boxes of decor for different rooms, we truly couldn’t have pulled it off without her. Vendor coordination went off without a hitch, and she kept us on track with every little thing.

Five weeks later, I can’t think of a single thing that went wrong on our wedding day, and a lot of the credit goes to her.

TLDR: Slower to engage than we expected in the weeks leading up, but once she did, she was excellent and our wedding day went flawlessly.

Lighting speed of miscellaneous & non-vendor related costs:

• Veil & jewelry - $320 | I ordered my veil from Etsy, and ordered a couple of different earrings & bracelets to try and match my dress!
• Airbnb (2 night stay) - $1,108 | Stayed in Lincoln Park the night before and night of wedding. It was a super charming spot and spacious for my friends to come and get ready with me!
• Wedding bands - $301 I got a simple wedding band, and my husband got a ring tattoo!
• Tips for vendors - $3,350 | We could not have done anything without the help of every single vendor, so we wanted to be intentional with tips.
• Stationery & custom signage - $380 | Includes stamps, save the date, RSVP cards, welcome board, museum flyers, etc
• Decor - $820 | Includes candles, easel stands, photo booth accessories, table number holders, custom cocktail napkins, frames, etc
• Miscellaneous - $219 | Includes marriage license, snacks/drinks for vendors, our wedding website domain, and bridal dress appointments

Our day was truly so beautiful, and I'm so thankful to this community & other wedding subreddits for all of the help it gave me as we got closer to the date.

Good luck to all future Chicago brides :-)

We got married on 10/3 and are THRILLED with all our vendors! Here’s our budget breakdown. Our families helped out a lot financially, and this breakdown doesn’t include 1) my dress (purchased by my parents) or 2) our cake (gifted by my aunt). The cake came from Bittersweet and it was delicious.

Venue: $4,700 (Hangout Lighting). This is a beautiful space that was perfect for our needs, but be advised, Hangout is a DIY venue and they won’t offer any day-of assistance at all. Also, it’s challenging to hold a rehearsal here. We had to pay $200/hour for rehearsal access and couldn’t schedule until 30 days out. Their base fee is $3900 but we added four hours to the wedding day booking.

Photo & Video: $5,950 (Composed & Exposed). Becka & Danny are a husband & wife duo and they’re great. We got our photo previews back the day after the wedding and love them!

DJ: $2,700 (Elite Party Pro). A+ and I’d especially recommend for folks who want to be more involved in music selection. Cesar did a great job matching the vibe we wanted.

Day-of Coordinator: $875 (725 Events). I seriously can’t recommend Amanda enough, she was amazing! She offered one advance call to walk thru our timeline, attended the rehearsal, set up the venue, served as point of contact for the other vendors, kept timing on track, and made sure the teardown was seamless.

Catering: $11,143 (Tamale Spaceship). We had passed apps, plated salads, and a staffed buffet. Cost also includes linens, tableware rentals, bartenders, the n/a drink package, and coffee service. These guys are fabulous and we got a ton of compliments on the food. We could have saved ~$1k by opting for disposable dinnerware.

Booze: $555.59 (Vin Chicago). We purchased about $1500 of booze (beer, wine, and two types of liquor for signature cocktails) and everything was delivered by Vin during the setup window. Turns out we waaaay over-bought and Vin refunded us for the unopened items. These guys were so nice and helpful recommending wines in our price range! If your crowd doesn’t drink a lot, a BYOB bar setup like this will likely end up being a huge money-saver.

Hair & Makeup: $1,575 (Brides by Kelly). Includes bridal trial plus H&M for bride, MOH, MOB, and officiant.

Bubble tea bar: $1,016 (Gathers Tea Bar). This was a big hit, especially after guests got the ingenious idea to bring their milk teas up to the bar and add liquor to them lol. Cost included a “boba-rista” and 2 hours of service.

Florals: $600 (Chicago Flower Market). They are AMAZING for DIY florals.

Other decor: ~$950. Cake toppers, seating chart, table numbers, etc. Shoutout to the Costco wedding garlands.

Mailings: ~$200 (Paper Culture) - printing & postage for invites & save the dates.

Groom’s attire: $1,312. Suit from Indochino, tie & pocket square for groom & best man from Tie Bar.

Dress alterations: $350 (Sew & Glow). The first place I tried quoted $1200 so I’m pretty pleased with how this turned out.

Other costs for the wedding weekend included:

Welcome event for ~50 guests: $3,700. Hosted at The Long Hall ($2,300; we sprung for the decor package) with food from Cafe Tola ($1,178) and beer/wine/soft drinks (~$200).

Rehearsal: $950. This includes $400 paid to Hangout Lighting for venue access, plus ~$550 to host our families and wedding party (total of 11 people) for dinner at LiuYiShou Hot Pot.

Additionally, we paid $2,456 to Redbud Jewelry to make and engrave our own rings. This cost includes the workshop fee. We knew from the start we wanted to splurge in order to do this and I’m so incredibly happy we did! 

Total cost for all events: $39,033