When Should You Book Your Wedding Hair? The Vendor Order, Answered

Every bride asks me the same question with slight variations: everyone tells me to book vendors in order, but what is the order? After fifteen years of Palm Beach weddings, here's the sequence that protects both your budget and your calendar — and where your hair artist sits in it.

The honest order: venue first, because the date and the place decide everything downstream. Then planner, if you're having one — they'll tighten every decision that follows. Photographer next, because the best ones in this county book a year out. Then florist and catering. And right in that same early window: your hair and makeup. Brides are often surprised hair sits this high, but in Palm Beach County the strong artists hold one bride per weekend — which means Saturday dates in season go a full year in advance.

What booking early actually buys you: not just the date, but the planning. When your artist is locked in, the timeline conversation starts months out — the preview gets scheduled, the extensions plan (if there is one) gets its timeline, and the morning gets engineered rather than improvised. Brides who book hair late don't just risk losing their artist; they lose the months of quiet planning that make the morning feel calm.

The one exception to the order: engagement photos. If your engagement session is happening months before the wedding, styling for it is $500 — and it's the perfect low-stakes way to meet your artist before the wedding morning. Many of my brides book the wedding first and the engagement session second; both lock the calendar.

The rule of thumb I give every couple: when your venue is signed, your hair inquiry should go out the same week. Send yours now, and see every service — party styling at $225 per person, the Bride Experience at $1,000 — in our instant pricing tool.