Event Planning · Planning & Inspiration
Chronicles of Bola, the Wedding Planner
Written by Bola Abioye | Prospect76events
Published on Owambe Connect
Being a wedding planner is not for the faint-hearted.
The chaos. The pressure. The rush of emotions. And all the little things happening behind the scenes that couples
and guests may never even know about.
Walk with us as we get a little glimpse into what it really feels like to be a wedding planner. And trust us… these wedding planner stories are
worth telling.
Part 1: Confessions of a Wedding Planner
The Things That Almost Went Wrong (And Nobody Noticed)
By Bola Abioye
It is 5:47am.
The hall is dark, the chairs are still stacked, and somewhere in Essex a bride is sleeping peacefully, dreaming of her
perfect day.
My phone lights up. It’s the decorator.
“ Aunty Bola. Small problem.”
If you have ever planned an owambe, you know there is no such thing as a small problem. There are only problems
that haven’t grown up yet.
After eight years of coordinating weddings across the UK, Europe and Nigeria, I have learned one great truth: the
best day of your life is built on a hundred tiny rescues that nobody ever sees. The guests see the gold. The couple
sees the love. I see the safety pin holding the whole thing together.
So today, I’m opening my little black book. Names have been changed to protect the innocent (and the guilty).
The Gele That Wasn’t
Forty minutes before the grand entrance, the gele stylist was on the M25. Not near the venue. On the M25, in a
queue, with her phone on 4%.
Meanwhile, the bride was in the cloakroom wearing a beautiful aso-oke and a very worried face.
Now, I’m a planner, not a gele artist. But I have stood beside enough of them to know which way the fabric folds. So
there I was, a bride’s cousin holding one end, a bridesmaid holding a YouTube tutorial, and me pinning like my
reputation depended on it. Because it did.
Was it the most architectural gele in history? No. Did the stylist arrive twenty minutes later and perfect it? Yes. Did
anyone in that hall know? Absolutely not. The photos were stunning, and the bride only found out the full story at
brunch the next day.
Lesson: every planner’s kit needs pins. Many pins. More pins than you think.
The Dinner That Disappeared
Picture this:
Guests flying in from Lagos, driving down from Manchester, taking the Eurostar from Brussels. All
checked in at the hotel the night before the wedding. All expecting the pre-wedding soirée.
And then, the soirée was cancelled.
Now, you can cancel a party. You cannot cancel hunger. A Nigerian guest who has travelled four hours and not been
fed is not a guest. That is a situation.
So within hours, we had a caterer cooking, packs labelled, and hot food delivered to rooms by 7pm. Jollof, chicken,
the works. The next morning, one uncle told me it was “the best part of the whole trip.”
I chose to take that as a compliment.
Lesson: plans change. The goal never does. Look after your people.
The Smoke Machine vs. The Fire Alarm
The couple wanted magic for their first dance: lights down, lasers on, a cloud of smoke rolling across the floor like
something out of a music video.
Beautiful idea. One tiny detail: hotel ballrooms have smoke detectors. Very sensitive ones. The kind that clear 400
guests into a car park in their finest lace.
So while the couple dreamed of clouds, I was in a back office with the duty manager, going through equipment
specs, confirming the machine was water-based, and agreeing exactly when the detectors in that room could be
isolated, and for how long.
At 9:14pm, the smoke rolled in. The couple floated through it. Everyone gasped. Nobody evacuated.
And somewhere at the back of the room, a very tired planner exhaled for the first time in three hours.
Lesson: the magic moments need the most paperwork.
Why Nobody Noticed (And Why That’s the Point)
Here’s what I want every couple to know: things will go wrong on your wedding day. Not because anyone failed, but
because weddings are living, breathing things with hundreds of moving parts, dozens of vendors, and at least one
aunty who has “her own plan.
”
The difference between a stressful day and a seamless one isn’t whether problems happen. It’s whether you ever
find out about them.
My job is to stand between you and the chaos, so that when you look back on your day, all you remember is the
dancing, the laughter and that moment your partner saw you for the first time.
The rescues? Those can stay in my little black book.
Well. Most of them.
Coming in Part 2: the uncle who arrived with 30 guests nobody had invited, the cake that met a speed bump
on the A12, and the day I learned never, ever to trust a venue’s
“the lift is fine.”
Stay tuned …😉
About the Author
Bola Abioye is the founder and lead coordinator of Prospect76 Events, planning
weddings and celebrations across the UK, Europe and Nigeria.