The Venue: I’m in love

Previously, on The Venue: The bride and groom to be found out that stuck-up golf resorts are better left to stuck-up rich people, but botanical gardens may be the key to their wedding. The only catch now is finding an affordable garden that works with the hours of the day that allow guests to wear more than bathing suits without drowning in sweat.

I have to tell you, for all my rambling of what am *I* going to do with planning The Wedding, it really has been helpful to get the groom-to-be involved. I have to give credit where it is due. The truth is that once I went off the deep-end during December with trying to reason out our budget with what we want, Christian stepped up and focused his efforts on finding us a venue. He almost found the perfect one with Pinecrest Gardens, but with further research he came across the one I have fallen in love with: The Fruit and Spice Park.

With something like 39 acres these days, it boasts an impressive variety of fruit and spice flora and so much space that I won’t even know what to do with it all. We got a tour of most of the grounds and while some plants were not even near blooming, these were the ones that would be blossoming during the summer — hopefully making the ambience that much more magical.

The herb garden was under a lot of work when we showed up. Mostly greens and browns, but the park manager described what plants were expected to bloom there by the summer. Normally, I would be skeptical about venue managers who try to sell you the place based on what it will look like months later after some work, but with after visiting Cornell’s herb garden during different seasons, I can trust that plants do really work that way. All gorgeous and fragrant during one season and all dead-looking and sad during another. I do believe this will work out once July rolls around.

We also viewed different open spaces that have been used for ceremonies in the past. They have this cute little mound that, hypothetically, could be really romantic as the location for the altar or whatever it’s called where the bride and groom meet. Christian disagrees though, since it would make it strange to have the guests cramped around it. It would likely be more fitting for a DJ or band as it has been used before I think. Read the rest of this entry.

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The Venue: Almost but not Quite

After looking at the rich and boring golf resort from last time, we decided to get more creative with our research and think of the beautiful but affordable locations that Miami can offer. In the back of my mind, I’ve wanted a beach wedding during sunset with minimal flowers and decorations. That may not be possible though since summer weather in Miami can be too temperamental to work around. We’ll either be scorched or rained out. In either case, planning for it could end up racking the bill a lot more than it’s worth. Back to reality.

Through the awesome powers of the interweb, Christian found Pincecrest Gardens, a location that brought back childhood memories once I got there because lo and behold, this was where Parrot Jungle and Gardens used to be before they decided to find a larger space to contain the birds and plants and the kids who go crazy for them.

This park offers a few different locations based on how much space is needed and how elaborate you want to make your event, but what I couldn’t understand is why one of the locations, called the lakeview terrace, looks so spacious in photographs and feels so cramped when you stand in it. Is it me? Have I gotten that wide that my perception of space is altered? I didn’t take a picture of said terrace, but it essentially looks just like their hallways: Read the rest of this entry.

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The Venue: For the Rich and Boring

The first place we checked out in Miami a few weeks ago was a place my parents saw and couldn’t stop talking about. “Ooh, this place is so big!” “It has a really nice resort.” “The landscape could be really great for the event.” On and on and so I looked into it as much as I could online. The place? Oh, just a little corner called the Doral Golf Resort & Spa — a Marriott Resort. Yes, their main page has all these fancy photos and a header with the words “pampered indulgence”, but I couldn’t let that stop me from checking out their prices and packages. No way, you should always check out the package. (TWSS moment, sorry.)

Anyway, I didn’t feel like looking too much into their website because of all the images that never load correctly and the way the pages just look so messy on my browser. Geez, I’m not the coding expert in the relationship, but I get annoyed by websites that try to be so fancy to the point of just making everything so difficult to load.

Website aside, we visited the resort as a happy married-to-be couple. We were greeted by the overly fancy valet and then by the concierge who had us fill out a form with as much info about our wedding plans as possible. We walked around a bit and the only word that came to mind was: POMPOUS. So many kids walking around with golf clubs and golf outfits, parents in their country club outerwear, high school girls with their sidekicks and designer name bags. The list goes on and on of all the signs that this was the wrong place. It’s not that I can’t stand rich people — well, actually, most times I can’t, but more than that, seeing the country club atmosphere was just sickening and boring. After working at a yacht club for several years throughout high school and college and seeing what these people are like in real life, the last thing I want to do is try to emulate them and get married at a place where they feel at home.

Before we could turn around and say nevermind, the special events coordinator showed up, white gleaming smile and hand extended. And see, here’s the thing. Even though my mind was already made up and I kept trying to come up with ways to say “no thanks, this place is so cliche” I couldn’t turn off the side of my brain that forces me to be polite. It’s something my parents taught me that has drawn me into uncomfortable situations where I just smile and nod and think “oh, geez, how long until I can make a mad dash out of here?”

So we followed the coordinator into one of their smaller rooms for a party of 100, which is what we mentioned is our target. This is where the sweetheart table would go and here’s where we would set up the buffet lines and the dance floor would be here and the tables would go like that. Minimum for this room is 75 guests with food for $10,000. Ok, cue the smiling and nodding and pretend like this wouldn’t swallow up the budget for the WHOLE wedding.

Maybe we were good actors or maybe she was just going through the motions of her job because after this she walked us to another room, a little larger than this first one. This has this nice view looking out at the golf course, nice windows, the tables would go this way, the dance floor that way and the minimum would be 125 guests with food for $15,000. Am I smiling? Can someone tell me if I’m smiling because I can’t feel my face all of a sudden. The thought of how the reception alone, without music, without a bar, without floral arrangements, here would be just too much left me frozen in place. Christian and I looked around, then looked at each other and all I wanted to do was say “Andiamo” through my teeth as I learned from the Italian guest lecturer in wines class with the hand gesture, too.

We made it out of there as politely as we could. We saw a little more of the resort, I asked a few questions about what else they provided (as if) and then we said, “Thank you very much. We’ll look over this literature and get back to you.”

Overall, the place does have its luxuries, but so does any place with man-made lawns and a hotel. It’s a fancy place for rich people who run out of ideas or don’t want to think too much when it comes to finding the venue for a special event. Don’t get me wrong, if someone sent me a check for the $15,000 to specifically hold my event at this place I would take it, but the truth is we’re not well off. The key to making this wedding fabulous without the fabulou$ ca$h is creativity, finding a place that will give us a memorable event without having to sell our first born some day.

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