The Mulberry is what I would classify as the ultimate "Instagram versus reality."
My husband and I hosted our wedding at The Mulberry in May 2021. We had exactly the same experience Amanda McLeod (unaffiliated with our wedding) describes in a Google review of the venue. Her review is definitely worth a read if you are considering the venue for your wedding.
Overall, the overwhelmingly negative way we were treated left our special day shrouded in a dark cloud. My points of contention are outlined below -
Communication - Jessica is a busy mom, and as a result, communication was inconsistent and challenging. For example, after our initial venue tour, we scheduled a call with her to go over some questions. The call was scheduled for 10 a.m., and we didn't end up hearing from her until 4 p.m., despite following up with calls, texts and emails.
Rehearsal - The contract states you can have your rehearsal during office hours, which are Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. What is not clearly defined is the vague "upon availability" verbiage. We were thrown for a major loop when we found out there was a wedding at the venue Friday evening - and the latest we could host our rehearsal on the property was 11 a.m. Not being local to the area, we were unaware events were booked on week nights. We had already told our wedding party they could fly in Friday morning, so a large percentage of them had to change their travel plans and arrangements at the last minute.
On our rehearsal day, though we were contractually guaranteed one hour on the property, we were asked to leave well before our hour was up. Our rehearsal only took about 25 minutes, so my husband and I tried to do a quick, final walk-through of the property to finalize our decorating plans. While we were doing so, the caretaker very rudely insisted she had vendors arriving and that we needed to exit the property immediately. We had only been there for 30 minutes.
Coordinator - There are multiple coordinators on the venue's preferred list, but Jessica paired us with the company she felt was the best fit for us. This came as an unwelcome surprise to us, as we felt that was a decision that we should ultimately have been able to make.
Staff - The poor attitude of the staff is easily the most negative aspect of the venue. As stated earlier, we were very rudely asked to vacate the premises minutes after our rehearsal concluded - and well before the hour we were allotted.
Similarly, though we were supposed to have possession of the venue until 11 p.m. on the day of our wedding, we were angrily and aggressively approached by the head caretaker at 10:15 p.m. She said, and I quote, "Per your contract, you need to be off the grounds by 11 p.m." At that point in time, we were already halfway through cleaning up, so it's not as though we were still celebrating. At 10:30 p.m., the staff proceeded to turn out all the lights, rendering the final half hour of our cleanup chaotic, to say the least.
The Mulberry's staff legitimately does not care it's your wedding day. As Amanda McLeod stated, they are "snarky, condescending and rude."
Missing Items - Between our unprofessional coordinator (who left well before the end of our event and without saying goodbye), being harassed to get off the property and having the lights turned off on us, several of our personal items were lost.
Because the coordinator didn't personally tell us where the food items had been stored, the top tier of our cake, our expensive custom cake topper, our honeymoon boxes and all of our catering leftovers were thrown into the trash.
Additionally, $200 of BBW hand sanitizer and several LED candles disappeared, and two expensive platters gifted to us from our registry, which we used in our dessert display, were inadvertently left in the catering prep room's sink. Post-wedding, Jessica confirmed via email the platters were still at the venue, and promised to mail them to me (we live out of state), but I have yet to see them.
This venue is unbelievably beautiful but also inherently flawed. read more