How did the idea of becoming a wedding planner come to you?
It is strange, but the idea came to me all at once and never left me. Since childhood, I had planned to become a surgeon for an organization like Doctors Without Borders. But toward the end of my final year of high school, I started thinking about the world of weddings and event planning. Thinking the idea would pass, I went to medical school. It took only half a day for me to tell myself that I had changed my mind and needed to follow my own desires.
So I went back home and searched for schools in communication and event planning. I moved in that direction and felt fulfilled from the very first days. After finishing my master’s degree and working in corporate events, I quickly realized that the wedding world was still in my mind, and that if I loved organizing events so much, then I could only love organizing weddings.
In the end, I was not wrong.
Tell us about your background before getting started
I worked in several companies where I organized events such as seminars, evening events, sports events and fashion shows. I particularly loved working internationally, and my favorite experience was probably organizing the official evenings of the Marrakech du Rire festival in Morocco.
What difficulties did you face before getting started?
The main difficulty was simply taking the leap. It is a life choice and a career move that is not very common. So at some point you have to tell yourself: all right, I am going for it. But to be honest, I did not really feel any major difficulties. I think this profession truly suits me, and I am surrounded by people who support me in this process, so everything felt rather easy.
Tell us about your agency
I decided to become a wedding planner because it is a profession that combines three of my passions:
I have always been passionate about fashion and trends, and I love interacting with people. So I launched myself as a high-end wedding planner to create a complete service.
I created Moment Mio, an agency that reflects who I am and brings together what I see as the essentials of a good wedding planner:
How did the first year of activity go?
I launched Moment Mio in April, out of necessity, because a fairly major contract came in and I had to officially start in order to fulfill it. Since then, I have been moving forward step by step. I do not want to rush things, so there have been many meetings with vendors, venue visits and process setups in order to offer the best possible service to my clients.
My biggest day-to-day difficulty
The biggest difficulty is keeping a steady level of motivation. There are moments of doubt, moments of euphoria, moments when everything goes right and others when nothing works. You therefore have to learn how to deal with all of that, how to take a step back and remind yourself why you do this profession and what your motivations are. I think it is more of a challenge that cannot be avoided and that is more linked to the beginnings of the activity than to the profession itself.
But I knew what I was getting into, so I cannot say it was a bad surprise.
What did the IWI program bring you?
The IWI program brought me many things. First, it allowed me to confirm my working method and improve it in certain areas. Since I was already advanced in my project, it gave me the opportunity to compare my work with that of other professionals.
The choice of speakers is very relevant, both because of their experience and because of their professions. Each of them brings their own perspective, which allows you to have different views of the profession.
I left this program not only with tools and feedback, but also with a huge dose of motivation.