A Heartfelt Beach Wedding Weekend at Westin Desaru

Eric and Debbie met more than 10 years ago while studying in Adelaide, but it wasn’t until returning to Malaysia that the duo started dating. In 2019, Eric proposed to Debbie whilst on a trip to Cappadocia, Turkey against a backdrop of floating hot air balloons.

“Debbie had always wanted a beach wedding. We heard about the newly opened Westin Hotel in Desaru and reached out.” explains Eric. But then the pandemic happened, and we had to postpone the wedding due to travel restrictions since they both now reside in Singapore. “It never crossed our minds that we wouldn’t be able to travel for such a long time. The event team at Westin were so thoughtful, they offered to refund our payment so we would be able to proceed with another venue we could get to, but we decided to have faith and carry on waiting a little longer.”

When travel restrictions did lift, the couple kickstarted their wedding planning to host 230 guests over a weekend. Families and friends travelled from afar and gathered after what felt like forever and a day. The couple shared their vision with the decorator – dreamcatcher events. “We knew we wanted pops of pampas grass, neutral colours and bohemian touches,” the bride says.

Their ceremony took place on the beach. Debbie’s vision of white florals with pops of pampas grass came to fruition with ground arrangements and a bold triangle ceremonial arch. For months, Eric practised riding a jet ski for his surprise debut out from sea and the wedding entourage had a whole dance routine ready for the bridal procession. But alas, it was not meant to be, it started pouring heavily and the ceremony was put on hold whilst they held out. The rain went on for over an hour and heavy downpour turned to a drizzle, Eric made the difficult decision of sticking to the original plan. “We had a quiet moment to ourselves, I remember giving each other a tight squeeze before deciding to just go with it.” recalls Eric. When the green light was given, hotel staff worked unfeigned, gathering as many umbrellas as they could and drying up the seats. Family and close friends were unfazed and gave their unrelenting support, making their way down to the beach. It was hard to tell from their faces that it wasn’t a light drizzle.

There were so many high points throughout the day, Eric and Debbie had a tough time narrowing down their most memorable moments. After the reception had ended the couple stood readily outside the ballroom to personally thank their guests but soon realised no one was ready to leave. Their once-in-a-lifetime day ended with an after-party on the beach to the music of popular Singaporean DJ – NashD. One of Debbie’s favourite memories from the wedding day? “Seeing friends and families gather and mingling after such a long time and not wanting to leave” she laughs.

The couple would love to credit the whole wedding team at Westin Desaru who went above and beyond to realise their dream wedding, Ms Annabel especially stood out for her most attentive and heartfelt service. Lastly, Zach Chin, their photographer who went out of his way, without hesitation, to capture their wedding day despite the unexpected weather.