See how this fashion startup aims to fill the gap where Pinterest has failed

It plans to be the go-to site for future brides.

Eight years ago, Shana Buchanan was on top of a $1.1b portfolio of ASX-listed firms as a fund manager. Her market experience spans marketing with bigwigs like Red Bull and selling real estate developments. She also ran a family textile company which got picked up by Harrods in London.

Today, Shana, who has a deep passion for interior design, is making a big leap from finance to fashion as founder of idecorateweddings.com (IDW), a Hong Kong-based startup offering stylish décor at competitive prices using a styleboard tool.

"We want to be the go-to solution for couples planning their wedding. Our vision is to become the leading global brand for online wedding décor by disrupting the way couples currently plan their wedding," shared Shana in an exclusive interview with the Hong Kong Business.

"IDW seeks to be the Net-A-Porter of weddings and provide the solution where Pinterest and Polyvore fail," she said. IDW banks on the simplicity of the homepage design which allows infinite scrolling of imagery with minimal effort and distraction.

"In an effort to mesmerize users, images take up the majority of space. The styleboard is an essential tool (like a budget or checklist) that couples use to communicate how they see their wedding.

Brides-tobe can easily send products and inspiration to their styleboard with a simple click, add photos of their dress, venue or cake inspiration and share it with loved-ones and people involved such as planners and florists etc," she said.

"The inspiration for iDecorate Weddings came to me when I was engaged and overwhelmed. Like most brides, I spent countless hours online (mostly at work) searching for products and inspiration but was frustrated that I couldn’t buy the products I’d see on Pinterest, in magazines or blogs.

If I could find them for hire they were so expensive; it made more sense to buy the items and resell them. With my shopping obsession and wedding frustrations, iDecorate was born," she said.

Despite its achievements, IDW isn't resting on its laurels just yet.“We see our site evolving almost like Pinterest for weddings but with a key difference – you can buy the décor you see in styled images and have it delivered to your door. We built our first site on a very limited budget and we knew we needed to make it better. We’ve listened to our customers and
added features to make the site more user-friendly but also more cutting edge. We still have a long-
way to go.

We want the wedding industry and couples to tell us what they want from a one-stop-wedding-shop and we will keep listening and developing the site to meet the needs of brides and grooms online,” she added.

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COMPANY PROFILE:

Name of the company: iDecorate Weddings Ltd trading as IDECORATEWEDDINGS.COM
Founder: Shana Buchanan
Website: WWW.IDECORATEWEDDINGS.COM
Major Investors: Private investors in 50% Australia and 50% in Hong Kong
Total funding: US$200k
Target fund: US$500k-US$1.5m
Source of funding: Angel Investors
Start of operation: Feb 2013