Laice & Doug Bollen

At first glance, Laice and Doug Bollen, the duo behind Sydney-based event planning business Place of LB, might not look like disruptors. Polished, personable and deeply in love with what they do (and each other, for that matter), their brand exudes a kind of calm confidence that doesn’t scream, but resonates. That said, it didn’t take more than a few minutes of conversation for me to understand quickly what the industry already knows: that these two are quietly, stylishly blowing up the blueprint of what a wedding should be.

In a sector so often underpinned by tradition and ‘the way it’s always been done,’ Laice and Doug are building something rarer: a business rooted not just in exceptional taste, but in emotional intelligence, lived experience and fierce intentionality. Weddings are, after all, high-stakes theatre, and Place of LB is rewriting the script with a clear, modern voice and a distinctly antipodean spirit.

Their story begins, fittingly, in fashion. Laice was in visual merchandising at a multi-brand store, Doug was a manager at one of the brands they stocked. And so they first met professionally, styling windows, coordinating launches and managing deadlines together. It was fast-paced, creatively demanding work that honed their aesthetic instincts and operational nous (skills that would later become the backbone of their business). Eventually, they fell in love and after a few years, found themselves planning a wedding, a process that Laice (unlike many brides who undertake the task) found unexpectedly fulfilling.

"I didn’t find it stressful at all," she tells me. "I planned everything and I actually loved it. It felt like what I already did, working with vendors, designing spaces, managing timelines." That realisation stuck. But it wasn’t until the world stopped in 2020 that she gave the idea space to grow. During the early days of the pandemic, Doug was made redundant and Laice’s hours were reduced. They moved in with her parents, “the saving grace,” she calls it, and she used the time she had to get busy.

As a way to kick off her creative vision, Laice styled four tablescapes in a local park, photographed by friends from her fashion circle. From there, LB Styling was born (what would eventually become Place of LB) and it wasn’t long before people noticed. One of those people was renowned bridal designer Lillian Khallouf, who tapped Laice to plan her wedding at Mona in Hobart. The brief? No flowers. Six outfit changes. Total creative freedom. “That wedding broke the mould,” Laice reflects. “It was wild and contemporary and unapologetically her.”

From there, word rapidly spread. Suddenly, Laice’s weekends were stacked with celebrations she had been tasked with planning. “But we were still working full-time during the week,” Doug says, with a laugh. “It was nuts, but we knew we were building something special.”

What they were building, it turns out, was something the wedding industry hadn’t quite seen before, especially not in Australia. At a time when many planners were still offering pastel packages and Pinterest pastiches, Place of LB was bringing fashion thinking, high design and cultural curiosity into the mix.

And while the look is one thing (Place of LB weddings are stunning, visually rich, layered and often cinematic) that’s only half the story. The real innovation lies in their dual strengths: Laice’s fashion-forward creativity paired with Doug’s calm, intuitive operational brain. Together, they’ve created a service that is as utterly bespoke as it is impeccably run.

"We didn’t come from events," Doug says. “We came from fashion. And I think that’s our edge." What they lacked in traditional training, they made up for with instinct, and a desire to do things differently. “We weren’t constrained by how it’s ‘supposed’ to be done,” adds Laice. “We just built what we thought felt right both for us and for our couples. It was gut-driven. That’s probably why it works."

For couples who approach Laice and Doug to execute their big day, it’s clear from the get go that Place of LB is not your average planning business. There’s no menu of packages. They offer one service only: full planning and production. No half-measures or fluff. Just everything taken care of, start to finish. And for Laice and Doug, deciding who to take on really comes down to personal connection and instinct. From there, the pair will take a couple’s ideas and vision and transform them into something spectacular, unexpected and entirely bespoke. “We go above and beyond in so many ways,” Laice explains, “whether its building a huge structure from literally nothing, or organising restaurant service from your favourite local spot, or having special bottles flown in… we balance honouring traditions with creating something that is wholly unique to our couples, and now we have relationships with so many incredible vendors who help us bring these productions to life.”

Their clients are often creatives themselves, stylists, designers, editors, architects. People who want a wedding that doesn’t just look good on the surface but that feels like them, and that reflects their individual passions as well as their love for one another. “We seem to attract like-minded people,” says Laice. “They see something in the work that feels different. And then when they meet us, they realise that they can truly trust us with the whole process, not just aesthetically, but operationally too.”

One of the most compelling elements of their work is how they incorporate cultural storytelling without cliché. At one recent Place of LB wedding in Queenstown, both a Māori haka and a Jewish hora unfolded over the course of the day, each offering an incredibly moving moment that reflected the cultural backgrounds of the bride and groom respectively. “Where else in the world does that happen?” Doug tells me. “It was one of those times where we were like, this is what it’s all about. That fusion, that emotion.”

Instances like those are reminders that while weddings are aesthetic ventures, they are also deeply human ones. Something that Laice and Doug seem to understand more than most. “We feel so lucky to witness it,” Doug says. “To see love, real love, up close. Every couple we work with is different, but there’s always this moment where we look at each other and say, they’re so in love. You can just feel it.”

It’s clear that they don’t take their role lightly either. After all, they are taking on the responsibility for one of the most personal events of a couple’s life together. The result needs to feel as expansive and celebratory as is does intimate and meaningful. Not an easy balance to get right.

For Laice, it’s those small moments, often quiet, unphotographed, that stay with her. “The dad always gets me,” she says. “That moment when he sees his daughter dressed, just before she walks down the aisle. I’ve seen it dozens of times, but it still floors me. It’s so raw and real.”

For Doug, the highlight is usually the reactions of guests when they first see the set-up. “That intake of breath when they walk into the space. The couple has been on the journey, but the guests haven’t.” He pauses, “that surprise, that moment of wonder, it’s magic.”

The pair have come a long way since those early days juggling full-time work and back-to-back weddings. In 2023, Doug joined the business full-time, a leap that the duo never thought would happen so soon. “Laice came home from a site visit one day, and she was glowing,” he says. “And I was like, I want to feel like that… Why am I working for someone else?”

Now, with a vast and varied portfolio of weddings under their belt, the pair is shifting focus and choosing to do fewer weddings but at a higher level, with Laice explaining that they did 30 events last year and only took on 12 this year. More intention, less volume. Fewer stressful, overlapping timelines, more thoughtful detail. “It’s not about being everywhere anymore,” says Laice. “It’s about doing the right work, with the right people.”

That mindset is gaining traction, not just among clients, but in the industry at large. Australia and New Zealand, long considered outliers to the global wedding scene, are suddenly setting the pace. “There’s something happening here,” says Laice. “Antipodean weddings are having a real moment. We’re no longer following, now we’re leading. People are looking at what’s happening in Australia and New Zealand and saying that’s the vibe.”

So what advice do they have for couples just starting the journey? “Begin with what’s important to you,” Laice says. “Not what you think it should be, or what your friend did, or what Instagram is showing you. What you want based on who you are. That’s the foundation.”

"And be present,” adds Doug. “You’ve picked up a part-time job. It’s a year-long collaboration. Show up for it. Trust your team. Don’t sweat the wrong stuff.”

And maybe that’s the real secret to Place of LB’s success: their belief that a wedding isn’t a checklist, it’s a conversation that unfolds with time. A beautifully curated reflection of two people, their story and the people who matter most.

In an industry that can sometimes feel like it is stuck within the boundaries of its own traditions, Place of LB is proof that weddings can be anything but predictable. They can be modern, stylish, joyful, unexpected, deeply personal. And most importantly, yours.