Organising a wedding at Buranco was an absolute nightmare. The location is lovely and the food was…read moretasty, but everything else was a complete disappointment.
None of what we agreed on beforehand actually happened. The venue's wedding planner Sarah told us ahead of time that we would have three large tables, so we made our seating chart accordingly. However, while we were on the train to Monterosso, she texted us to say that there would be two tables, so we had to completely redo the seating chart the day before the wedding.
We agreed that the apperitivo would start at 5pm, but when we showed up at 5, the management made us wait at the entrance for 20 minutes while making us feel very unwelcome.
We agreed that there would be five high chairs for children, but these were not brought out and I did not notice early enough because I was running around taking care of logistics (see more below).
We asked to have small ceramic gifts put next to the seats of guests who were over 5 years old, but they were put next to seats for small children, so I had to run around before the start of the dinner to make sure that everyone who was supposed to get a gift got one.
We agreed that we would have a table for a polaroid camera and a guest book at the apperitivo but Sarah just dropped off our stuff at the entrance and I had to use part of the drinks table to set it up during the drinks reception.
We agreed that we would get a round multi-tiered cake, but to our surprise at 10pm, we got one that was flat, rectangular, and did not look like something fit for a wedding.
We agreed that we would get Buranco's limoncello digestif at the end of the night, but this did not happen.
Sarah arranged a photographer for us who was meant to send us the photo album within two months of the wedding, but it's three months now and we have only seen five preview photos.
What was most disappointing though was I (the bride) had to spend my entire wedding running taking care of logistics. The wedding planner was not actually there, presumably because she was organising another wedding at a local hotel. She only came for 5 minutes around 9pm, after spending over an hour texting us "I'll be there in 5".
I had to go up to the staff before the ceremony to ask them to turn the music down. I had to initiate when the guests walked over to the dinner venue following the apperitivo. I had to set up the guest book and the polaroid camera, make sure that the gifts were moved to the correct seats, and check that people with food allergies were given the right meal.
The planning itself was not very pleasant or professional either. Although I visited a year in advance and spoke to one of the owners/managers, the venue refused to communicate with us and urged us to be in touch with Sarah. They introduced her to us as "their wedding planner", but she turned out to not be their event planner; rather an independent wedding planner based in Milan, presumably specialising in weddings for foreigners.
While negotiating the price, Sarah told us that she would speak to the management to ask if we can start earlier than 5pm. But this of course never happened once we paid the deposit. We specifically asked for 65 guests (which did not include the bride and the groom since they are not guests at their own wedding), but Sarah sneakily put a total of 65 people on the contract, presumably so that we would have to pay a higher fee to add anyone closer to the date. We ended up having fewer guests than expected and Sarah was supposed to reimburse us the difference "within a few days of the wedding". She took close to a month to wire the money and we had to spend several days of our honeymoon trying to make this happen.
Sarah did not want to give us a detailed cost breakdown saying that paying the lump sum would warrant that we would get "exclusive treatment" and wouldn't have to worry about any individual items. What this meant in reality is that we had to print out the menus and name tags (and bring them over from Australia). Because we did not think of printing a piece of paper with our names on it, there was nothing at the entrance indicating that our wedding was taking place.
While the food was lovely, I would not recommend this venue because it made everything so difficult.
