Melania Trump’s Wedding Planner Describes Party, Guests 20 Years Later

Tariffs, TikTok and immigration are top-of-mind for President Donald Trump today, but 20 years ago the main thing on his agenda was wedding – number-three.

The businessman married his third wife Melania Knauss at Mar-a-Lago on Jan. 22 in front of a celebrity-studded crowd. Orchestrating that extravaganza took some legwork, and no one knows that better than Preston Bailey, the New York-based wedding planner, who pulled it off with aplomb.

The ballroom in Trump’s Palm Beach manse was covered with white roses, gardenias and hydrangeas, hanging from the main chandelier, lining archways and adorning dinner tables. The bride’s Dior haute couture dress by John Galliano was said to have had a $187,000 price tag and to have required 1,000 hours of work to assemble. Celebrity guests sat in gilded gold-colored chairs. The rose-covered cake was ridiculous – you get the picture.

But 20 years later Bailey said what jumps out at him now is how instrumental Melania was in setting the tone for what they wanted, including nine-foot candelabras on the dinner tables. One images that Bailey can never forget it was “Mr. Trump coming in and saying, ‘Oh my God, let’s take those down. Melania was like, ‘No, no, no. let’s leave them.’ Eventually, of course, they stayed on the tables.”

All in all, Bailey, who had replaced another event designer less than three months before the Trumps’ nuptials, said, “It was a really, wonderful experience. He was a complete, complete gentleman. Regardless of what he is now, the experience that I had was fantastic.”

As for whether Bailey ever imagined the Trumps’ trajectory would take them to the White House, he said, “Not in a million years – one million. One of the most ironic pictures is of Hillary Clinton, who was one of the guests. [Trump’s 2016 Democratic presidential opponent was in the crowd with her husband Bill.]

Asked how much he was paid for the wedding, Bailey said, “Absolutely, there was a lot of negotiating that was going on. If I am correct, it was $350,000 or $400,00, which at that time was a lot of money. I also know that whatever she wanted, he didn’t question it. Whenever I submitted a bill, it was immediately approved by him or his office.”

The 350-person guest list was stacked with media types like Barbara Walters, Les Moonves, Julie Chen, Tina Brown, Harold Evans, Katie Couric, Matt Lauer, Chris Matthews, Stone Phillips, Deborah Norville, Kelly Ripa, Cindy Adams and Gayle King. Other notables included Tony Bennett, Richard Branson, Mohammed Al-Fayed, Steve Wynn, Donna Summer, Heidi Klum, Billy Joel and his then-wife Katie Lee, Simon Cowell, Kimora Lee and Russell Simmons, Rudy Giuliani and his then-wife Judith Nathan. Bailey said, “I remember the press was just crazy waiting outside.”

Mar-a-Lago’s chef at that time prepared the dinner, and the intricate rose-festooned wedding cake. Melania did her part to, Bailey said, “She was a great hostess – I have to hand it to her. She was so involved with every detail, and she was making sure that everyone was comfortable. She studied the evening very carefully to make sure there were no boring moments.”

The bride’s John Galliano-designed voluminous Dior wedding gown was “just so incredible. Andre Leon Talley from Vogue, was very involved with her, making sure that everything fit and with the fashion portion of the night. Trump’s wedding landed her a cover on American Vogue, but that thus far has been a one and done situation. (The fact that Anna Wintour did not feature Trump on a Vogue cover, during her White House years has been a point of consternation for Trump, since former first ladies Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton had been cover stars.

Unlike some extravagant weddings that can be glorious in scope, but not exactly fun, Bailey, said that was not the case with Trumps. “No, no, no – this was party, party, party and so social. There were a lot of cliques, Everybody seemed to know eachother. This party was really going. There was no downtime so to speak.” (And an after-party was held by the pool, but Bailey said they abided by the town of Palm Beach’s restrictions, “so we were very careful not to go too late,” he said.)

Bailey also recalled two other Trump weddings.

When Ivanka Trump wed in 2009, the expense did not worry her father, according to Bailey. “He was like, ‘Whatever Ivanka wants, she gets,’” said Bailey, adding that she, like Melania had been very involved with her own wedding. So much so, that Ivanka Trump contacted Bailey the morning after she accepted Jared Kushner’s proposal. Bailey recalled how Trump told him, “’Preston, I got engaged. I want you to do my wedding [at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster] in New Jersey.’” he said.

Having also designed Eric and Lara Trump’s nuptials at Mar-a-Lago in 2014, Bailey said Eric was “very cautious about costs and spending. That was not the experience I had with Mrs. Trump or Ivanka.”

Bailey added, ”Lara gave us a little more leeway to be creative. But both Melania and Ivanka wanted it to be classic. They wanted it to be white. Melania wanted something that was beautiful, but not too over-the-top. But those nine-foot candelabras – that took me a while to talk him into it.”