Wednesday 8 December 2010

We're featured on Martha Stewart's Dreamers into Doers again


Yaye! Our photo was chosen and featured on marthastewart.com again! :)

This time, it was for Ashley's Cupcake. So this one's for you, girl! Do keep this as a momento yea...our birthday present to you :)

Here are the cupcakes again...
The featured photo



Monday 6 December 2010

More Designer Isles by Mariah & Sham

When we met up with Yana, her sis and her then fiancee almost a year ago, I suggested creating something different, new and special for their wedding hantaran and wedding cake.

Instead of just doing up the cake for instance, I decided to create a Wedding Cake Designer Isle. And so with a serving size of 100 - 200pax, I suggested breaking up the servings into one cake centrepiece and the rest all pre-packed as favors, and aesthetically presented on our Isle.

Thing is, we love designing and creating favors - for which we were first known for - and we love gorgeous arrangements of anything beautiful. So we suggested this Isle idea to our many other enquirers, thinking we were doing good service...by being forthcoming and generous with new ideas during our non-obligatory discussions / consultations. Some politely declined cos they were understandably not ready for this, considering they've had budgets set aside for other wedding expenses...but some actually abandoned us and got other vendors to build up on this idea :(

It was heartbreaking...but in retrospect, we're all the wiser now. Moving on, we've taken it in our stride to accept all these as part and parcel of business, and hence to continue evolving.

Whatever it is, we're lucky to have many other great clients and fans who have kept us going
and encouraged us on to strive for the best.
In this light, we're grateful for Yana's and Akhbar's trust and loyalty.
So here's one specially decicated to you newly weds, and of course, sis Ezsra. :)
 
  
This Designer Isle featured our wedding cake centrepiece of fondant covered rich chocolate cake, with matching favors, decorative accents and bespoke monogram.
The 'two tiered' cake was actually made up of four layers of  real rich chocolate cake. We had to make it this high cos our groom is one tall young man! Doing up a 4 tiered cake however would make the cake look too 'overbearing', what with the motif design and all. So yup, we made it 2 tiered but 'tall' instead :)

                            
  And then we designed the favors to match our cake. Notice the rosette design on the favors and on the TOTALLY EDIBLE rosette icing.

 We didnt have any inspiration boards cos most of the time, our inspirations are conjured up in our imagination, some of it 'at last moments'. But we knew what colours we wanted to work on....so here, we married the two colours used by our newly weds. (Bride chose blue with dashes of pink for her Hantaran, and groom chose purple with gold for his Hantaran)

        
 And for the all-important harmonized look, we placed a matching bouquet of fresh flowers to balance the whole set-up.
And now, another special dedication to the newly weds.
Presenting the totally revolutionary Wedding Hantaran Designer Isle by Mariah & Sham....


All the gifts for exchange were presented on our Designer Isle. Bride chose a blue-pink colour scheme to present her gifts to her husband. After the solemnization ceremony, the gifts from both sides of the families would be exchanged, and the groom's gifts for his bride (purple gold!), which we designed to match, will be placed on this same Isle. Lucky for us, both Yana and Akhbar have got a keen eye for colours. The gifts they bought were all of the right tones and designs, making our work way much easier :)

 For Him gifts were all placed on our gorgeous slick white stands, as opposed to the more traditional 'dulangs' or trays.






 Notice the backdrop rosette motif which was reproduced in their Wedding Cake and Favors previously mentioned.

Loving the fresh peony in full bloom.
                    


 We designed this bespoke monogram for them to match their get-away car signage.



For once, featuring camera-shy Mum in action!

And so now, here's a look at the groom's gifts for his bride...

They chose romantic purple for this. And so to up the glam and grand factor, I decided to match the look with champaigne gold.


The groom was a bit apprehensive about handling fresh flowers...so we used faux ones instead.
Luckily, we had a whole year to scout around for the highest quality faux flowers, and we're delighted to have had worked them well.

Mariah's gorgeous frame in action...for the customary 'mas kahwin' cheque due to be slotted in, complementing the bride's gorgeous Tiffany bracelet.


Ok so that's all for now. A very big thank you to Haz Workz for all the help rendered, and of course, I'd personally like to thank mother-in-law for helping with everything else while I got busy with projects, work and house moving. And to Mum, great great job as always! And to my four cheeky kids...Universal Studios here we come!! So now, on to our next project. Stay tuned! :)

Just Married!

Here are our first two maiden 'get-away car decoration' projects!
And we're opening up more slots ;)


Props all ready, waiting for groom's arrival...
  We got the requests just a day after our announcement for this new service. So I got down to design the bespoke Just Married Monogram signage, from scratch, for both our couples, and managed to get things done on time.

Here's a closer look at the waterproof signage which the couples get to keep...

Our Signage in action!


The door knob.
Congrats Fahmi and Fadzlin!
 I designed a matching monogram for all the door knobs. Afterall, the bride and groom deserved all the attention :)

Front view
          My idea was to keep the design safe and simple, yet totally special and romantic.
Getaway cars are not meant to be feminized with too many flowers, dangling ribbons and laces....especially when the grooms have chosen slick and sporty MPVs and SUVs to 'get-away' with their brides.
     
   
Congrats Md Akhbar and Nur Zaiyanah!
   
Another bespoke signage for another beautiful couple.
Seen here in mauve and blue.
                                    
Here's one without flowers.
                                


Moving

So we're finally getting our keys!
Hope to get things organized real fast.

Sunday 14 November 2010

Bridal Car Decoration by Mariah & Sham

Our new service is now open for booking, subject to date availability.

Saturday 13 November 2010

Feature : Landscape paintings

    Introducing paintings by Jennifer Young.
    Vibrant and authentic, her works normally involve landscape drawings and paintings.

Now while I love the European countrysides, I normally enjoy visiting them more than looking at them off paintings. But these 2 paintings by Jennifer really captured my attention. She managed to "feel' her surroundings and bring forth her experiences and interpretations onto her canvas. I felt almost as if I was there. Just loving the details!

landscape painting southern france by Jennifer Young
Southern France
Notice how she uses her colours fearlessly, to accentuate the tracks. The strokes were deliberate, as if trying to draw attention to the "beaten path"...a sign that there is "life" and probably plenty of activities too in that seemingly remote village.

French landscape painting by Jennifer Young
Landscape painting
Looking at this painting, I can almost feel the light breeze. Notice how everything else seemed still and quiet, save for the few lightly swaying vines which she marvelously captured, again with her deliberate strokes.

Monday 8 November 2010

True masterpiece

Lily of the Valley & Vintage Veil by cake guru Peggy Porschen....

Saturday 6 November 2010

New tentages by Mariah & Sham

We have a couple of Designer Isle projects coming up in 2011, and our clients wanted the same tentage concept we used for our previous Isles.

We'd love to do just that, but as always, we get easily bored....cos a tentage, spruced up, is just that. Where's the challenge, right? And because we love designing the fine details, we've decided to design and produce our own tentage. New concepts, new designs. In fact they are being designed from scratch in-house by us, and will be sewn by our chief seamstress a.k.a Mum.
And we're thinking whether a hexagonal one would be hot in demand. What say you?

I dreamt of having a tentage like this, as opposed to the dais concept, for my wedding (and that was 10 years ago), but hey I'll be just as happy doing it for others...

Friday 5 November 2010

Time to blow our trumpets?

Of late, we've been nudged by friends and fans alike, to have our biz advertised and promoted. I so can understand the necessity, especially cos most of our works have been under recognized and under marketed.

But the thing is, our biz is really a hobby for us, in every sense of the word. Inadvertently however, we have been pulled into the playing field, and now expectations are mounting.

All this while, we have only been leveraging solely off our blog, FB and word-of-mouth for publicity, and we have been politely putting off interviews and publicity offers for fear of not being able to meet demands for our services and products. It was supposed to keep our orders under control. Despite that control however, our orders are beyond us now...

Yup so maybe we now have to consider investing in this business and actually run it like a real business?...complete with marketing strategies (that word makes me giddy) and all. That way, we can meet precious demands.

We also want to be recognized for our passion....cos many a time, we have been out-smarted by the bigger players. Our works and ideas, no matter how original and fine, have also been dwarfed and out-marketed by the bigger fanfare these other players get to enjoy, from the marketing they have done and the reputation they have subsequently gained.

Alas, we shall not dwell on this cos we believe in moving on and improving for the better, but now at least we know that talent alone is not enough...

But if and when we finally decide to spread our wings, it will do us good to remember that contentment and true beauty lie within...and so we will continue playing the game with dignity and honour.

Wednesday 3 November 2010

Just a bit on Mum

Mariah & Sham has always been synonymous with sis and myself. Understandably so...cos apart from the obvious biz name, we sisters are the ones always updating our FBs and blogsite, keeping in touch with fans and friends alike.

It is not superfluous however, for me to introduce the real unknown talent behind our family biz. Our Mum.
She finds content in just doing things together as a family, and is possibly unbothered about recognition. Well, I can respect that wish, but once a while I think it's ok to showcase her talent just a bit, especially cos I've recently found a beautiful picture of sis in her wedding gown. Mum sewed it of course.



I love the design. It was simple, classy and most importantly, created with TLC.
Probably just right for a naturally gorgeous bride :)

Sunday 31 October 2010

Deep Purple & Blue by Samia

This is entirely long overdue.
We'd like to thank Samia of Deep Purple & Blue for featuring our Pink Black Dessert Isle on her journal blog.
It's an honour really ,and likewise, your blog is worthy of mention too!
Love your stories, eloquence, inspirations and dedication to all things creative and beautiful.
Do keep in touch, and stay inspired! :)

Saturday 30 October 2010

New! Wedding Car Decoration

Ok so just before i really sign off for the week, here's just another small announcement.

We're itching to do wedding car decoration, complete with its "Just Married" signage. The ideas are floating around in our head, so you can't ask us for the catalog yet. But then again, if you trust us enough and would love to be surprised with something chic, classy and utterly gorgeous (and especially if you're getting a vintage car for your wedding!), do drop us a mail soon.

We're booked up for other projects, but we're opening up only 2 slots in between (and at promotional price too), for this new project design.

So email us today at mariahnsham@hotmail.com

A new archive

Here're just some minor updates for our site.

Apart from the new topbar icons, our sidebar now bears our Archive of Fine Details.
Just a collection of our past works, designs, posters and even unpublished ideas.

Much time and effort have been invested into this part time family business / hobby, and we'd just love to share these works and ideas, right from their conceptualization to their production, with like-minded individuals sharing the same passion and panache for design, styling and all moments beautiful.

See ya next week (after the kids finish their exams yea!)
Meanwhile, take care and have a great week with family and friends ya all!

Sunday 24 October 2010

New designer cupcake by Mariah & Sham

Last week we collaborated with Haz Workz to come up with a new designer cupcake look for our new client Ashley's 23rd birthday. (Happy Happy Birthday Ashley ~ )

Cupcake and Cupcake Wrapper by Mariah & Sham.
Cupcake Topper by Hazworkz.
We worked on the cupcake wrapper, here featuring a white chandelier silhoutte against our modified Aqua-Tiffany Blue (a shade between aqua blue and tiffany blue) background. Hazrin worked on the monogrammed topper, and we simply love his fine workmanship! (Yes, you can order generic and personalised toppers from him too)



We then designed a new label for Ashley's cupcake take-away box.


Our designer cupcakes, packed in a clear box and embellished with ribbon and crytal beads.
And then of course...because we're always quite the fickle minded lot, we decided to pack the cupcakes in a clear box as well...just for variety :)

And so like always, we would combine all our various ideas and designs...to come up with the all-important harmonized presentation.

This "harmonized variety" has apparently been said to have become one of the distinctive trademarks of Mariah & Sham. So ok we're sticking to that ;)

So anyway, that's all folks!! See ya in our next post...ouh but hey dont forget to check out our constantly updated albums too. Some pics may not find their way to our blog post, but we always put our projects up, no matter how small they may be, for all our clients to see. Just a small way of saying thank you. Thanx for trusting us :)

Wednesday 13 October 2010

Collaborating with The Wedding Chateau

We were honoured, albeit slightly skeptical, when my friend Najihah messaged us, at the eleventh hour, to check if we could help take on some wedding cake orders from her.

We thought we had a lot on our hands, but we're glad to have eventually taken the orders. Cos for one, we learned to be more efficient, rising up to the occassion, so to speak. And especially for myself, working with Najihah brought back fond memories of us, back in Pharmacy School, doing our experiments in the lab :)

But best of all, we actually enjoyed working with TWC. True there were some discrepancies and miscommunication here and there, but we were lucky to have been given the trust and freedom to modify and improvise. But then again maybe Najihah had no choice but to be accommodating,  at least for friendship's sake! Heh.

So anyway, here are the pics...

Sorry our dearest photographer sidetracked just a little :)
So again, here are the cake pics...

We were extremely satisfied with our fondant this time round.
Our new preparation technique and top grade ingredients helped us achieve this flawless icing finish.
                                             

Mariah working on the final touches.
Striving to design a cake that would look rich and classy yet subtle and elegant, we decided, after much deliberation,  to use only ivory - one of the colours included in Najihah's colour palette - throughout...

This monotoned three tiered fondant cake would then be embellished with ivory filligree motifs, lustre pearl icing, ivory ribbon trimmings and white chrysanthemums, to elicit that rich yet subtle texture. It was to our horror then, when we found out, after setting everything up, that the bride had wanted a purple cake.

Fortunately, we managed to get over the initial panic, and just like many other times when we were setting up our own dessert isles and things didnt go quite as expected, we would start modifying and improvising.
Here, we added in our purple ribbon trimming, which luckily was a matching shade to TWC's decor, and accentuated the chrysanthemums with tiny bits of purple heather blooms to harmonize and balance the whole look.

Overall, we thought the colours worked well, but much more crucial would be whether the cake had fit right in to the decor. We hope it did.

Tiffany Blue
And then Najihah needed help to make a simple blue cake to match her blue themed dessert bar. But it being a last minute request, we unfortunately could not grab hold of a one-half inch matching blue ribbon, as requested. So there we went again, modifying and improvising. We trimmed each tier with our shorter half inch ribbon instead, and added in a running layer on top, deliberately leaving a slight gap in between. This way, the trimming had an added pattern / effect to it, yet still remained simple enough to complement our simple cake and TWC's gorgeous dessert bar.

Myself, straightening out the trimmings.
Najihah and Sarah setting up their dessert bar.

Sham, Sarah, Najihah and Mariah....
 of Mariah & Sham and The Wedding Chateau.
All looking rather tired here...
So thanks guys, for the opportunity and the trust. Looking forward to working together again. And perhaps, if we ever get overwhelmed with dessert isle projects, and you guys have gotten a new shop with a big kitchen, you all can help make our cakes too?! :)