Wedding Planning and Design in New York
You want a wedding your guests will talk about for years. You also want to enjoy the year it takes to get there.
Sense of Moment is a wedding planning and design studio in New York, founded and led by Olha Barabash. We plan and design weddings in Manhattan, Brooklyn, New Jersey and Upstate New York, and anywhere else your story takes you. Many are for two hundred guests or more. Many run across several days.
Full-Service Wedding Planning: One Team, the Whole Wedding
You hand us the wedding, and we carry it from the first conversation to the morning after. We find and secure the venue. We build the team and hold the budget. We manage guest logistics, write the run of show to the minute and lead the day itself.
Nothing comes back to you that we can handle ourselves. On the day, you are guests at your own wedding.
Wedding Design That Starts With You
Your wedding starts with one idea. We find it together. Before a single color is chosen, we spend time talking with you about your story and what the day should mean to you. Somewhere in those conversations, the idea shows up, and we shape it into a design.
That idea runs through everything your guests meet. The invitation in their hands, the arrival, the table, the light at nine in the evening. We call it dimensional cohesiveness. Every element is aligned, and there is still room to adapt when the day asks for it.
Design is not decoration added at the end. It’s the first thing we work on. See wedding design.
A Guest Experience That Lasts
We plan the energy of your evening as carefully as the menu. When the room should rise, when it should rest, how it ends. Your guests will remember the close of the night longer than the start, so the last hour gets as much attention as your first dance.
How We Work Together
You have one point of contact from the first call to the last. Early meetings are unhurried and spaced out. They come closer together as the date approaches, and in the final week we talk every day. We meet in person in New York or by video, whichever suits you. Everyone involved works from one shared plan, so you always know where things stand.
How Full Wedding Planning Works
12 to 18 months before
Vision and venue
We start with you, not the date. Who is coming, what the day should feel like, which traditions it carries. Then we find a venue that can hold it, walk it with you and secure it.
10 to 12 months before
The team
Photographer, florist, caterer, band. We bring in the people we trust most in New York, and we review every contract before you sign it.
6 to 9 months before
The design
The concept, the palette and the paper take shape. Hotel blocks and guest travel are set, along with the weekend’s other events.
1 to 5 months before
The details
Tastings. Flower design. Floor plans. The run of show, written to the minute. The weather plan gets the same care as the main one.
The week and the day
The wedding
Deliveries, rehearsal, final confirmations. Then the day itself, from the first delivery to the last departure. You have one job, and it’s to be there.
After
After the wedding
We close every account, return every rental, and follow the photographs and film until they’re in your hands.
What You’ll Feel
Calm, mostly. And completely there. You catch your grandmother’s face during the vows. You see who’s crying at the speeches. You taste the dinner you chose months ago, and you stay on the dance floor as long as you want. Every question comes to us, so all of your attention stays where it belongs, with the people you love.
Weddings we have planned
Erica & Wilson’s Rockleigh wedding
A ceremony beneath white flowers and crystal, emerald bridesmaids, and a ballroom in bloom.
Rebecca & Nick’s Yale Club wedding
A chuppah of flowers, then the chairs lifted on the dance floor. The Yale Club, Manhattan.
Amy & David’s Blue Hill at Stone Barns wedding
A tea ceremony and a lion dance around a farm dinner. Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Westchester.
“She is an absolute joy to work with and makes wedding planning fun and stress-free.”
Olha, in the press
“Usually, the event itself isn’t where things get managed. It’s everything before it: the seating, the flow, the structure of the evening.”
How to Invite Guests Who Don’t Get Along to the Same PartyJune 2026“The last thing you want is to be running around the bridal suite at midnight looking for your earrings.”
Planning Tasks Couples Often Leave Until the Last Minute (and Shouldn’t!)June 2026“The rule that you must have a bridal party is almost gone.”
Wedding Advice That’s Outdated in 2026September 2026
Other ways we can be involved
Partial Wedding Planning
Some couples come to us with part of the wedding already in place: a venue booked, a few vendors chosen, a clear sense of what they want. Partial planning picks up from there. We fill the gaps in the team, review what’s already signed, and bring the design together so the whole day feels like one idea. In the final months, we take over the details and run the wedding from start to finish.
Wedding Management at Select Venues
Wedding management works most smoothly where we already know the venue inside out: its rooms, its team, and how the evening moves through the space. That’s why we offer it at a select list of venues we’ve worked at many times. You plan the wedding, and we step in during the final months to confirm every detail, write the run of show and lead the day itself.
Questions couples ask
How far ahead should we begin?
Most couples come to us twelve to sixteen months before the wedding, and longer ahead for a celebration across several days or a venue in high demand. More and more now plan on shorter notice, closer to eight months, and that can work well, so if your date is sooner, write to us anyway. If the venue is already booked, partial planning may suit you.
How many weddings do you take on each year?
A limited number. We keep it small on purpose, so that every family has our full attention from the first meeting to the last dance.
What is the difference between full planning and partial planning?
Full planning begins before the venue is chosen and carries everything to the day. Partial planning begins once the venue is booked, with a plan already in motion. Our guide to planning levels sets out the differences.
Can you work with a venue or vendors we have already chosen?
Of course. We review what is in place and tell you honestly where we see risk.
Do you work with families who live abroad?
Often. Our international families page explains how.
How do we begin?
With a short inquiry. Olha’s office replies within one business day and arranges a first conversation.
Tell us about the celebration, and the family behind it.
Tell us about your wedding, and we will take it from there.