Asilomar Conference Grounds

are comparable to any beach wedding in this area. While we did spend $100 dollars a person per plate (for a buffet) , the food made up for it! The chef is well known in this area and our guests were left full and happy. As for the coordination of these staff and the preparation process for the wedding; well that's where they lose a star! Are starters the miscommunication between the wedding coordinator and the bride caused more than one issue along the way. However upon finally meeting Natascha, the wedding coordinator at Asilomar, the bride was feeling much better about the process and dedication that would be put into her big day. Natascha proved to be very helpful when the bride was feeling flustered the day of the rehearsal dinner and helped to make sure that the rehearsal dinner and the rehearsal itself went on without a hitch. While, Natascha had made it very clear that she would be available on the day of the wedding until 5 PM (which was while we were taking photos after the ceremony) and that she would be handing over responsibilities to another a Asilomar staff member named Antonia, her leaving without first quickly communicating it to the bride and groom just ended up leaving everyone with some panic when an important bag was taken from the brides personal attendant. Luckily though, the bride's tote was found just-in-time and the rest of the night went on without a hitch! Last but certainly not least, the reason they lost another star; the conditions of the guests rooms. Luckily for us we only had two of our wedding guests choose to actually stay where are our wedding venue was; the Asilomar conference grounds. All of the rooms at Asilomar DO NOT HAVE: televisions, microwaves, Coffee pots, wi-Fi or air conditioning/ heat!!!!! While the buildings are gorgeous, the rooms are bare bone! No artwork, old yellow paint on the walls, two super dim lamps provided the only light, dingy beat up orange and brown carpeting from the 80s, one mirror, tiny dresser and mini desk just made it feel VERY MOTEL 6! And while the room had a back deck with a table and chair, they were informed before even entering, that the patio door was busted!!! Mind you, that patio door was the only window to the room, which meant they couldn't even get proper ventilation into the room! So my overall review is that this is a beautiful location to hold your rehearsal dinner, ceremony and reception. However, couples should strongly encourage any tech savvy or younger guests to seek other options for rooms! And make sure to ask for Natasha because she will do everything in her power to make your day perfect; to see my wedding Cordinator in tears just before I walked down the aisle showed me just how much she had invested in OUR BIG DAY and WE will be forever grateful for that!

both ceremony and reception sites in one vicinity. We love the ocean and nature so Asilomar was the perfect location for our special day. We had our ceremony at the Asilomar State Beach and reception at Seascape Room. We were very lucky & privileged to have Natascha VonThiele as our event coordinator. I can’t tell you how thankful we are for her. She was very responsive to any form of communication from start to finish. She is reliable, organized and on top of things. Our wedding day ran so smoothly all thanks to her. I give Natascha so much credit for how our wedding day turned out. My husband and I couldn’t be happier having Natascha as our coordinator. She is truly a gem.

ight of our wedding, which was appreciated. During the reception the wait staff was excellent and overly accommodating. The food was fantastic and we were very appreciative that the head chef did a tasting with us when we visited in December. The lead up to the wedding was the reason I gave this 3 stars. My husband and I were less than impressed with the "wedding planner." Asilomar defined this person as our wedding planner, but she basically was in charge of payments. 3 weeks into choosing Asilomar as our venue, the original wedding planner quit. No one informed us of this and it was not until we contacted the GM that we found out. 2 months later they hired a new wedding planner. I understand that she was new to Asilomar, but she was in no way helpful and left 20 minutes into the wedding reception. She did designate someone to take over for her, but this person did not seem to take charge of the planning duties. This resulted in the top of our wedding cake being taken off prior to us cutting our own cake. When we visited the the venue in December we were under the impression that she was taking notes for us. Two months before the wedding she sent us a packet with many of the questions I had sent her months prior or answered during our visit. My husband and I chose Asilomar Conference Grounds, because we wanted a place that everyone in our party could be together. This was not the case. The wedding party and our families were in two separate buildings. We were not far from each other, but it was frustrating that they did not make this accommodation for us after indicating that they would. When we attempted to originally book a group rate the first person we worked with did not communicate with us and simply sent us paperwork to sign. After countless phone calls, two months later we were able to speak with the GM who assigned us someone else to work with to accommodate our request. Many of the members of my wedding party called to book a room multiple times without a call back.

blend of beach and woodsy, which was exactly what we wanted. We live locally and surveyed a number of locations for the wedding and found this one to be competitively priced. Coordinator - the wedding coordinator, Joselynn, is a dream to work with. She is very responsive via email and really willing to work with you and help you get the very most out of your budget. I loved working with her and cannot recommend her highly enough. She answered my millions of questions (seriously), and could not have been nicer. Food/Wine - My family is extremely picky when it comes to food (they are foodies for sure) so I was very worried about having bad wedding food, but everyone raved about the food. We didn't know exactly what our wedding food would be; the chef will design the meal based on what is local and in season, so we had a general idea of what we would be getting but we didn't know exactly. Our passed hors d'oeuvres were great, Ahi Poke on a wonton, chilled Tenderloin with horseradish cream on a crostini and a chicken and apricot curry in a phyllo shell, all delicious. We selected the buffet option and ended up with a beautiful salad with beets and oranges, a crab cocktail, potatoes, green beans, mahi mahi, steak with crispy onions, roasted butternut squash ravioli and fresh baked bread. We chose chocolate covered strawberries and cupcakes for dessert and those were delicious as well. You are not allowed to bring in your own alcohol, but that is pretty standard for most hotels/wedding venues. Lodging - since this is a conference grounds, the lodging here is more rustic and does not include many amenities that some people would look for (TV, updated rooms, etc.) Included in the wedding package (if available), is a complimentary room for the bride and groom for the night of the wedding. We had a room right by the water and could hear the waves crashing all night - it was heaven. We were also able to secure a small meeting room for during the day as a getting ready local for the groomsmen at a very reasonable price - a cheaper option than selecting an overnight room. Ceremony - our ceremony was located on the beach, a beautiful location that you cannot beat. Asilomar contracts with a local company to handle the ceremony, (chairs, sound, arch, set up, tear down, etc.) This is the main reason I'm giving four stars instead of five. The vendor requires that you bring your own music for the ceremony, which I found to be a bit overwhelming (others may not!) But trying to plan out how much music I needed for before the ceremony, during and after felt a bit daunting. You had to provide the music to the vendor on a phone/mp3 player yourself, and you had to make sure that he knew what music to play when, etc. There were two small snags, we did not get the arch we requested and they didn't play any music during the post-ceremony recessional after the big kiss, which was kind of a bummer. But I must say, this was a very, very, very small snag in an otherwise perfect day. If you are looking for a beautiful, rustic location, a dream coordinator and fantastic food, I really recommend this location. The staff was incredibly easy to work with and kind. Our wedding was such a dream, the weather was perfect, I really could not have asked for more.

fter the sun set due to being on the coast