Probably the most stressful part of wedding-planning (in my limited experience as a bride) has been finding a date + place. The venue determines so much about how your wedding will look, feel, how many guests you can accommodate, the list goes on… And there are so many factors that you have to take into account! Is it available on your date? Is there in-house catering, and if so, are you required to use it? What is the facility rental fee, and what does it cover? Are chairs + tables included? What do the chairs look like? Must you use a certain rental company for extras? Is any lighting included? Does someone stay on-site during the event who knows the ins and outs of the venue? How many hours are included for setup, cleanup, and the event itself? Are there handicap-accessible ramps and bathrooms? Is there ample parking or is valet required for an additional fee?
Thinking about all of those things gave me a major headache at the start of Drew’s & my planning. It seemed so much easier to help a client find the perfect venue than having to decide myself! We had one particular place in mind that we’d fallen in love with for years, but once we realized all the costs related to having our wedding there, we knew we’d have to sacrifice some of our major priorities to stay in budget. Coming to grips with that was disheartening, but we kept our eyes and ears open to other venues we hadn’t considered before.
Then there was the issue of big versus small wedding. For a couple of hours, we even toyed with the idea of eloping (I do have a soft spot in my heart for pretty city hall weddings!). That idea was nixed shortly thereafter… I knew the MOST important thing to me was that we be surrounded by loving, supportive friends and family on our wedding day. For better or worse, I have an enormous family, too!
After some exhaustive research (and sending inquiries about our summer date), we came to realize what our priorities were for deciding on a venue:
It had to…
- accommodate enough people to fit Drew’s and my families and friends {our first-draft invite list was 200+ people!}
- be reasonably priced… ideally including chairs + tables
- have enough space to facilitate both our ceremony + reception
- look pretty!
- have air-conditioning! Southern summers are brutal. Despite my wanting to get married outside, I want MORE for guests to not be passing out and I don’t care to be “sweating at the wedding!”
- be easy-to-locate for guests and reasonably close to both Drew’s and my parents, who live a little over an hour away from one another
- be available for 10-12 hours to have ample time for setup/breakdown and the event itself
- have reasonably-priced catering options {either good in-house catering or the option to bring in our own choice of catering + beverages}
We also wanted to work with people we really liked, too!
Since November marked the eight-month-away point from our tentative wedding date {July 28}, I knew we had to start making decisions fast. Holiday engagements are so popular, lots of venues and vendors get booked up in January – March. Considering that Drew wanted to be pretty heavily involved in the wedding planning and he’ll be EXTREMELY busy come January (We’re talking school, full-time work, and starting the CPA process, all at once!), we’ve been aiming to try to knock out as much as humanly possible before the start of the new year. So by Thanksgiving weekend, I was determined to be decisive.
At that time, we’d looked at pretty much all of the greater Nashville area… Brentwood, Smyrna, Franklin, Hermitage. One place we hadn’t considered was my very own hometown: Pleasant View! I racked my brain and remembered my favorite local antique mall that had just been converted to an event space — The Livery Stables. I emailed them that Friday night. Saturday morning I tried my luck at calling them (impatient much?) and they just so happened to have been meeting with another bride, so they’d be free to meet in person until 2pm! Everything fell into place: Drew was at home with me after spending Thanksgiving with my sister’s family, so we were able to see it together. We hadn’t made plans, so we left within thirty minutes of calling them. My grandmother (Granny) stopped by to visit so she met up with us there… just perfect!
The Livery Stables was a horse grooming/boarding center back in the 1800s. While the space served a host of other functions through the years (post office, grocery store, fire engine station), it opened as an event venue this past July. The owners have renovated it to be as true to its original form as possible (minus the dirt floor + lack of plumbing!). It’s got a polished-but-rustic barn kind of feel, with pretty antique lanterns hanging from the ceiling, a green tin roof, and exposed wooden posts and beams inside. It kind of reminds me of Belle Meade Plantation’s Carriage House and the barn at Traveller’s Rest!
{Use your imagination… in July, there will be no ornaments hanging from the lanterns or Christmas lights strung up along the posts! Also, no ferns.}
The Livery Stables met all of our list of priorities… it’s big enough to fit 225 people, the price was wonderful (and included tables and pretty, neutral stackable chairs), we can “flip” the space between ceremony + reception by having cocktail hour outside on the front porch, it’s just country enough to suit Drew and myself, we can really fancy it up to fit our aesthetic, it’s TOTALLY air-conditioned (yippee!!!!!), the drive (be it from Nashville, Brentwood, or Chapmansboro) is a breeze, it’s easy to find (right off the interstate!), we can rent it from noon to midnight, they offer in-house catering (tasting to come!), and Kelly and Rhiannon (the owner and event planner) were WONDERFUL to work with. So sweet, accommodating, helpful, honest, willing to suit our needs as best they could… ideal situation.
By lunchtime after we saw it, the decision had been made. Venue? Check. :)
Inspiringly,
~ Kelly
(me in the Allure dress below!)
(Beautiful dress, great deal… just not very “KELLY!”)
(Please pardon the blurry picture and the fact that all the pictures from our engagement night are so similar.)
(and more recently, May 2011 at my sorority’s formal)