Weddings are beautiful affairs but it takes a certain type of person to ensure that everything goes according to plan.I never expected to become a wedding planner. I kind of accidentally fell into it!” says Ann Lee, 32, a bubbly personality who seems perfectly suited to her line of work.

It’s easy to warm up to her.Prior to “falling” into her current job, Lee was working as a nurse manager specialising in emergency medicine in a London hospital. She moved back to Malaysia in 2003, a year that saw many of her close friends and relatives getting married.

“My good friend was getting married at the time, and she asked me for help. I didn’t know much about organising a wedding at that point in time but I took up the challenge as I am used to working in high-pressure situations.

“I found out that she hadn’t done anything yet, and, since I’m a highly organised person and have been trained to look at things from every angle, I got into the thick of things very quickly and helped her out,” recalls Lee.

Not long after, Lee’s cousin also asked her to help plan her wedding, and that was when Lee met her business partners, Allan Yap and Nigel Skelchy, of Just Heavenly. They hit it off instantly, and Lee was given the responsibility of growing the company’s wedding planning business.

That was when Lee realised that she had a knack for this sort of thing.“I am incredibly particular about timelines and deadlines — you can ask any vendor that has dealt with me. It has worked in my favour because I can get things done. That’s very me. 

“I help couples organise their weddings from scratch or pick up where they left off. Frankly, there’s nothing romantic about planning a wedding; it’s all about project management!” smiles Lee.She finds weddings in Asia very interesting because weddings in London tend to be very small affairs.

Most London weddings are for a group of 60 to 80 people. If it’s more than a 100, it’s considered a large wedding. In Asia, 100 is considered small!“I like weddings in Asia as we have so many different cultures. Each race and family has its own speciality and there are so many styles of doing things, which makes it really colourful.

“Traditions make it more meaningful as well. One of the most interesting weddings I’ve done is an Indian-Chinese one which had aspects of both cultures in it — the temple ceremony, the tea ceremony, as well as a Western dinner reception.

“It was a large wedding but what made it interesting was that both the bride and groom and their families were very much involved in the whole process.This made it a whole lot of fun and very personal. Everything that was planned was not only planned in detail, but spoke of the couple. It went so well that I didn’t think of it as a job and truly enjoyed myself,” recalls Lee.

Lee also enjoyed a large wedding she handled on Merdeka day this year at the Sime Darby Convention Centre.It was significant as the civil ceremony was held in the lobby. The foyer had a high ceiling, and it was mostly flat and bare but Alan (Yap) managed to transform the place into something totally different.

“The bride was close to both her parents, so she had both her mum and dad walk her down the aisle as she didn’t want her mum to feel left out.“Everything was really personal with the groom choosing songs that meant something to the bride.”

Another interesting wedding involved a couple who were so crazy about golf that they had their wedding revolve around it.“The couple were golf fanatics and they had played in around 65 golf resorts around the world. Everything was golf-orientated.

We used golf balls for decorations and they even wanted to come in a golf buggy, but the hotel didn’t allow it.“There was a miniature golf centrepiece, and they named all the tables after the golf courses they had played in. Wedding favours were two chocolates in the shape of golf balls and set on a green turf,” says Lee.

Besides the romantic moments, a wedding planner’s experience is never complete without a few disasters.“I had a wedding where part of the pre-wedding task was for the groom to drink a glass full of hard liquor before he could see his bride. Unfortunately, he didn’t realise that he would get such a severe allergic reaction to the alcohol and got totally disoriented and developed a high fever.

Everyone was upset, the bride was crying, and it was certainly one big commotion but we managed to get him to say his vows 45 minutes later, although he had to sit on a chair in the church because he couldn’t stand! It was a nightmarish moment but looking back, I am thankful for the experience (because it proved) that I could work under pressure.”

Outdoor weddings in our tropical country are extremely prone to unpredictable weather. Lee remembers the site of one of her weddings being flooded a few hours prior to the event.“The wedding was in October 2007, and we were having a bout of very bad storms at the time.

Roads around town were flooded, trees were falling down, and the entire Kiara Park  the wedding venue was completely submerged up to my shins.“We were panicking by 5.30pm, as it was still raining heavily and we couldn’t do any setup as everything was floating about. We almost had to cancel it but I had not cancelled a wedding before and I wasn’t about to start then.

“Thankfully we managed to scoop up most of the water from the tarmac area by 6.30pm. Although the lights were short-circuiting and the floor was wet and muddy, we still managed to have the wedding,” says Lee.

“I never really wanted to get into this business but after being involved in it, I get great satisfaction in seeing a project grow into something so beautiful. As a manager, I just want everything to go smoothly. At the end of the day, the greatest thing for me is seeing the couple have the day they want and being stress-free and really happy.”

Lee is currently organising a charity event in Bangsar Village from Jan 2-Jan 4 with other wedding industry players to raise funds for Ozanam House for Children with HIV. Seven top Malaysian wedding photographers will exhibit their work on children.