Oak Island Mansion

we talked, our visits with you, text messages and emails with one another till the end during our follow up phone call together, my experience with you and all of Oak Island Mansion was top notch! Elizabeth was very helpful, kind and accommodating during our entire wedding day. Everything was set-up as planned, cleaned as promised and beautiful as you said it would be. Thank you, Cody, for your top-quality service!! Oak Island is blessed to have such a dedicated, friendly and accommodating front man! You are the best! Ever! Period! We will surely share our wonderful experience with our family and friends and suggest everyone to turn to you and Oak Island for their event needs. Thank you again, Cody and Team, Jessica Mazzei Protz and Lisa Mazzei

t I’ll make sure to call him up! Thank you so much :)

e areas on the property for the ceremony and/or reception. However, communication and professionalism was severely lacking. It would take reaching out to Elizabeth, one of the owners, multiple times to hear anything back. One time after attempting to call her four times and texting her twice, I heard back about ten days after the initial contact. When I tried to politely mention how difficult it was to contact her, she went on about everything going on in her life. I completely understand that, but we are paying you a good amount of money for you to not even be willing to answer a question that I need answered for another vendor. Up until a few days before our wedding she was trying to confirm details and had them all wrong. We had clearly asked when touring the venue if they ever book two events on the property on the same day. I was told no. I was told I could have guests park at the barn and could rent golf carts to escort them up to the venue. When I showed up to set up for my rehearsal, there was another event setting up at the barn. I asked one of the male owners about it and he told me my events parking would now need to be up at my venue, and that people would need to park in the mud. I reminded him what I was told and what I had blatantly asked, and he told me it wasn't in the contract. So, I wasted $1000 on golf carts, and people were parking in the mud like a freaking redneck wedding. After the wedding, I asked to be compensated for that and mentioned that you can see cars all in the background of my photographs. Elizabeth told me I should have hired a better photographer. Our contract said that we needed to vacate the venue by 10:00 P.M. the night of my wedding, but when I had been talking to Elizabeth leading up to the wedding she kept saying it was 11:00, and I just never checked my contract to confirm. So after our send-off at 9:30 the venue people were walking around telling everybody they and all of our stuff had to be out in less than 30 minutes, which ensued in mass chaos from our families packing up and the vendors. That incident is partially my fault for not confirming the leaving time, but it was just another example of communication issues. These were just a few of the incidents that happened during my wedding. Like I said, the venue is beautiful and I think it is a pretty fair price. I would warn to get absolutely everything in the contract. There are four owners of the venue, and I would recommend possibly asking to work with one of the other three owners.

ret. All the major and minor details of your big day are going to turn out absolutely perfect in this place. To give you a perspective 1. The venue is breath taking. Take a look for yourself. All our guests were astonished by the beauty and splendid view. 2. Yolanda is the angel sent on this earth to make your day the most amazing experience you can dream of. She will work with you in a comprehensive manner to make sure all the details are suited to perfection and your style. She is the true meaning of southern hospitality! 3. Terri is the most wonderful wedding planner you can ask for. She had thought of everything and made sure every aspect of the day was carefully tailored and taken care of. 4. Staff are extremely professional and courteous. We also had several unexpected incidents but the meticulous handling of Yolanda and Terri ensured our event was not interrupted by any means. Again, I can’t emphasize enough how happy we were with everything and how happy my wife and I are to have chosen this place for our magical day. I highly encourage you to consider Antebellum!!!!

gorgeous. I’m from New York and I truly found the southern hospitality here. Yolanda is the most wonderful person. She is not just a venue director. She takes it personally to make sure you have all the details to perfection. She will work with you as long as needed until you have all the specifics planned to excellence. She is extremely kind and welcoming and we soon realized she was as concerned about the perfection of our big day as ourselves. The venue is flawless. Perhaps it is fair to say that the pictures can’t describe all the beauty that is entailed in this place and you have to experience it by yourself. We had a great deal of details based on our culture that were not part of her routine but she absolutely and comprehensively took care of all of them. Most of our guests were from out state and the amazing venue, professional and polite staff and level of meticulousness overwhelmed them all. On our big day Terri was an absolute caretaker. She had a thorough game plan and played it to perfection. She amazed me by her kindness and calm even in the face of unexpected events. I can’t tell you enough how amazing everything about this place is and as a bride to be, you can have peace of mind that all your dreams will be coming true at this astonishing place. I absolutely, firmly, highly and unequivocally recommend this place to any couple who want to make a memory that even their grand-children will be amazed by. Lots of heart felt love to Yolanda, Terri, the florist (Demaris), our officiant (Jeremy), Candace (wedding planner), our chef (Chef Troy), DJ (Russ), (indulge sweet shop who made our cake) for their kindness, professionalism, detail-orientation, fantastic performance and also want to thank them all for creating the most wonderful experience of our lives.

e changed a thing. They were FABULOUS and I would recommend them to anyone!!

lling through or ripping you off or all of the above and we chose wisely. We visited the venue and after meeting Yolanda, we immediately said “this is the one”. We looked no further and this is the only venue we visited. It is as beautiful in person as you see in the many photos on their website and in other bride's pictures. I cannot wait to get our pictures/videos back. It is a family owned business and quite reasonable in the grand scheme of average wedding costs. We had unlimited contact and visits with all staff. We moved to the south a year before getting engaged and decided to have everyone come down to us for a good ol’ southern wedding. The logistics were overwhelming and Yolanda, Candace and Terri were wonderful in making sure everyone was picked up, transported and generally accommodated. They take care of all the major details so for a detail-oriented person like me, it was great because I had time to craft my own little personal touches. We rented out the mansion for the immediate families and wedding party to spend the night with their guests and when we pulled up, we got nothing less than Ooos and Ahhs about how beautiful and serene it all is. Every vendor Yolanda has in her arsenal is remarkable and a joy to work with - she wouldn't have it any other way and that is how you know you're looking at the right venue/planner. The day-of coordinator (Terri) is a MUST-DO for Brides. We actually ate at our wedding! We had our first meal as husband and wife and no one even knew and just assumed the wedding norm ( that you don’t get to eat the delicious food you hand-selected!) It was absolutely incredible. Everyone was so surprised that she answered all of their questions, let them do whatever they wanted within reason and even partied and had a blast with us. You will not find a more flexible venue/planner anywhere. There were bridesmaid's guests that were not a part of the wedding party and while we were off taking pictures or getting ready, she let them hang out, swim in the pool and generally do whatever as if they were at their own homes. In terms of the wedding, she was willing to go above and beyond to make the day special for us. She found us the perfect officiant who let us do a cultural element as part of our ceremony – something they were equally as excited to see executed. We wanted to light off lanterns at the end of the night and she said absolutely. Nothing was out of the realm of possibilities or "against the rules" and that is how your wedding day should be - exactly as you want. Everywhere else we looked there was a “No-no” list of things you cannot do – be out by 11, no open flames, no loud music, etc etc. That list does not exist at Oak Island and they will try to accommodate all of your requests within reason. If you are looking for a one of a kind wedding experience with seasoned professionals, listen to their advice (they've done way more weddings than you!) and go with Oak Island Weddings. We could not have been happier with our choice.

t's where it ends. Yolanda Tolbert, the owner of Oak Island, is a very nice lady who clearly enjoys her job. However, when it comes to running a business, some huge improvements need to be made. When we first signed a contract with Yolanda and handed over a 25% deposit of $4,000, I was excited to start planning my wedding! That excitement, however, quickly turned into one giant headache. Since Oak Island claims to be an all-inclusive venue that provides mostly everything for you, I thought it would be a breeze making decisions on flowers, food, music, etc. Wrong! As I started trying to piece together my wedding, I realized it was a very daunting task. I had a budget of $16,000, but had no idea how much money went into each category of our wedding package. How much did their florist charge? How much did the DJ cost? Would I like to splurge on a live band instead? I had lots and lots of questions, but I always seemed to receive very few answers. In fact, as time started ticking away and it was getting closer and closer to our wedding date (about 4 months out), we completely lost communication with Yolanda. Between my mom and I, 6 emails were sent over a few weeks time and not a single one of them was answered. My mom called and left several voicemails and each one went ignored. Needless to say, I was freaking out. My dad suggested that I start researching other venues since something was obviously not right with this place. It took me writing a very firm public post to their Facebook page to FINALLY receive a response. However, the person who immediately called me was not Yolanda; it was Candace, the wedding coordinator at Oak Island. I was so confused. Why had I never been informed of this planner in the last 8 months? That would be because she had been hired just two months prior. (After a little Facebook investigating, I figured out that Candace was actually Yolanda's daughter, but they keep that a secret for whatever reason). Anyways, the excuses I was given for having been ignored for the past month were ridiculous and inexcusable. After so much lack of communication and unprofessionalism, my parents and I felt the need to schedule an in-person meeting with these people to finally get everything in place and to have our many questions answered once and for all. One of the things we had asked for over and over again was a previous invoice of a past wedding (with the peoples' names blacked out of course). We needed some sort of example to go by so we could determine how much money we wanted to designate to each component of the wedding. After a run around, we were told that they "don't do invoices". It was never explained to us exactly how much each vendor cost and how our money was being spent. I could go on and on, but I'm running out of space for this review so to wrap up in short.. The wedding director Terri was very frustrating to deal with. She was extremely pushy and somewhat rude. We constantly felt rushed during our reception. The officiant never showed up to the rehearsal dinner and ended up not even being the guy they had originally booked and given me information for. The 3rd floor of the home was poorly cleaned for our stay. It is a beautiful venue, but do yourself a favor and hire a professional wedding planner if you decide to book there

as the ONLY place that I wanted to get married. The entire venue looks like its out of a fairy tale - I couldn't have asked for a more perfect place to have my wedding. Words truly can't describe the breathtaking beauty - you definitely have to see it to believe it! I LOVE the fact that the venue has all-inclusive packages, and I took advantage of their catering, floral, and DJ services. I was extremely happy with all three services. The DJ was great and did a great job of coordinating with me beforehand on what songs I wanted (or didn't want), and was also present for our wedding rehearsal so that we could practice along with the music. One of the cool things about the DJ is that he actually recorded our entire reception, and gave us free copies at the end. I also really have to brag about the floral service -- they are WONDERFUL. I wasn't really sure what I wanted in my bouquets, so I just sent some examples of what I liked to the florist. When I saw my bouquet on my wedding day, I was absolutely blown away by how gorgeous it was. It was everything that I had wanted for my bridal and bridesmaids bouquets. Furthermore, Ms. Yolanda is WONDERFUL!! She is so incredibly nice and absolutely dedicated to making your big day perfect. She sat down with me multiple times to go over details of what I wanted, and was completely open to anything that I wanted or suggested. I loved that I didn't have to worry about a single thing on my wedding day -- Ms. Yolanda and her staff took care of absolutely everything. I've been in multiple weddings as a bridesmaid and MOH, and things have always gone wrong. My wedding at Oak Island, on the other hand, went absolutely perfectly. NOTHING went wrong the day of my wedding. Everything was done exactly as I'd asked, and they even took care of the little details that I hadn't even thought of. I've seen many brides stressing out on their wedding day, but I had such a wonderful day and didn't have to worry about anything! I can't imagine having a more perfect wedding day. Oak Island, Ms. Yolanda, and the wonderful staff made my wedding everything that I had ever dreamed of. Go visit Oak Island and meet the wonderful people there -- you will fall in love with it just like I did!

the venue. I highly recommend Oak Island!

ODY at Oak Island who made this a reality for one happy Bride & Groom and their families!!!

truly amazing ladies that take the time to make sure your big day is perfect. The staff and vendors they provide really care about you and your wedding. Everyone has been a true pleasure to plan with and they have great attitudes every time! We selected the wedding package that includes mostly everything (minus a photographer) & it has made our experience stress-free. I stop by every now and then for planning and they are always a pleasure! Oak Island has a great staff and is an absolutely gorgeous place to have your wedding. It is truly a unique wedding venue and we couldn’t ask for a better place to get married! Cannot wait until September! :)

ak Island are wonderful, and they have been working hard to make sure our wedding is exactly what we want. If you're looking for a beautiful place for your special day, you need to see this place for yourself. After one visit to the property, you'll fall in love!