Our daughter's wedding was held June 29, 2024. The venue is beautiful and well layed out. The…read morebeautiful farmhouse accommodated five couples for the bridal party, and the day of the wedding, the Bridesmaids for hair and make up.
Food was delicious! Dessert was pies, and they were delicious.
The after-wedding bonfire was wonderful where friends and family relaxed with a drink, s'more and snack choices (by bride and groom) provided by the venue.
However, there were several issues that we encountered during the day of the wedding, primarily involving the venue's owner.
I feel that Leigh Clark, owner and planner, would serve her guests better if she didn't directly deal with them.
From the get-go, while trying to corral our guests to the deck area for the ceremony because of rain, she belittled them and was condescending, making facial expressions and rolling her eyes, while using a microphone.... especially for our group photo. Guests mentioned to us that the staff began clearing the hors'doerves well before the guests were called up to the reception.
The first issue was with the dozens upon dozens of our homemade cookies. These were outdoors several hours before the 5 pm ceremony.... many of which became soft and crumbling due to the humidity. No food should ever be left outside, uncovered.
Tables were set, and water and wine glasses (for the toast) were filled in advance.... making the sparkling wine flat and the water warm. Furthermore, not one server visited tables in my immediate view...the whole barn...to refill water or wine. Red and white wine were to be served.
We were also told that the barn would "be cool, trust me," (Leigh Clark). However, one corner fan was not turned on, the other was broken, and all the windows were closed. It was a hot day made worse by no air flow. I went to reach table stains the windows and told them to open them. It did rain right before the ceremony, but there was time during the ceremony to open these windows and create a cross draft.
The flow of the evening was rushed and out of order and not what we had requested. The "money" dance was done first when it was expressly stated during the planning stage that the dance must be reserved for the very end of the wedding. At that point, the bouquet and garter toss, as well as the cake cutting, happened in short order. Leigh felt the cake cutting was an insignificant part of the reception despite us saying that it has been a fun tradition in our family.
We also paid to have welcome bags set up for guests to take back to their overnight accommodations. They were completely forgotten, which puts me in a predicament of what to do with them.
There are no handicap parking spots and no clear parking spaces. The venue needs this desperately, especially to make easy access for the golf cart shuttles. (Gravel can be spraypainted.)
Leigh and her limited staff, along with our paid photographer, thought it appropriate to sit at outdoor guest tables to eat. Staff should never take seating away from guests, especially to eat. Ever!!!
Sadly, many guests came to us during the reception, informing us that Leigh was rude to them, not knowing who she was. At one point, Leigh became highly agitated with the parking situation and golf cart shuttle accessibility. She was recorded by one guest exclaiming she was "f......g done." I was also told by Leigh as she carted me to the farmhouse to retrieve a pair of shoes that if I was longer than a minute, she would leave me there and I would have to walk back. (In the heat, in my gown.)
When we came in Monday to retrieve leftovers, I was told that although the soft pretzels and pepperoni rolls can leave with us, the graham crackers, marshmallows and chocolate could not because of food safety issues. With everybody touching both the pretzels and the s'mores, I couldn't see where the food safety issue came into play. We paid for these bonfire snacks and left with half of them.
