Mixed feelings on our wedding experience here. (Pardon the book. LOL) I would rate this 3.75/5…read morestars.
There was a lot we didn't know, as it was a first time wedding for us with little connections in the area, and we would do a lot of things differently were we to do it again. Initially, we thought there would be a lot more provided than there was at this venue, especially for the one day rental of $10,000+.
Things I would keep in mind for this venue (or for any other):
Take your time choosing the right wedding venue: It is easy to feel time pressure when it comes to securing a wedding spot or vendor. We found Haiku in early 2024, and loved it. But we hadn't looked at anything else, and felt like we had to make an immediate decision because we wanted an October wedding. I wish I had taken the time to read through the contract before signing and asked more questions. We based our choice on the support we thought we would have. If I had under 50 people, and could have done their elopement package, I would have. They provide more support for that option. We had right around 70 people and it created a lot more work for us.
Hire a wedding planner if you don't have family/friend support:
I sincerely wish I hired a wedding planner to take care of a lot of the details that I missed and also who could have played intermediary with the venue and vendors. I thought that I would have more guidance that I did from Haiku, and opted to do the planning myself. Most of my stress came from details that would pop up out of nowhere, and having someone else fielding the minutia would have been amazing In retrospect, and well worth the moola.
Pay attention to the contract, and get everything in writing: We signed a contract in Feb 2024, for our wedding in Oct 2025. As we started planning our wedding in early 2025, a number of things that we were told initially(not in the contract), were changed when we met up again later. Pricing, rules, etc. For some of it they were able to honor their original pricing, however some of the conditions we were forced to accept. The mixed expectations had us lose trust in our communications with Haiku, and made us realize we would have to be very careful for the rest of the process.
Also, throughly read the contract and ask about contingencies. Ex. The contract makes the tents sound optional, and when it came down to it, we had a lot of push back when we thought we wanted to forgo the tents. There were also quite a few seemingly arbitrary rules, which every venue is likely to have, but left us confused and frustrated at times.
Communication: I felt like their communication prior to a month before the event was lacking. Do not hesitate to ask them questions, and clarify everything. It would have been helpful to have some guidance to the portal we were given access to, along with dates things were due by....especially since it had many doubles and misnamed folders which made it hard to keep things straight. (Hopefully they have fixed this by the time you read this!)
I spent a lot of time going back and forth with emails (Them and other vendors) where questions were missed multiple times.
When it came to the actual event, it mostly went off without a hitch. The decor looked lovely, Haiku arranged things we had brought and meshed it with theirs creating a lovely effect.
Things will always go wrong... and my issues at the wedding had more to do with the caterer cold food was served, people couldn't find our snack/hot beverages table (no one knew it was there), and missing unused cups/snacks that were not returned. An issue with the DJ being rude. We did have some miscommunication with how we needed to have some of items repacked to us, and had a couple things go missing (Labeling things would have done a world of good, I think) . ;) ) But overall, the guests had a fabulous time, of which I was grateful.
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