Let me just preface that the venue itself is PHENOMENAL! It's absolutely beautiful and guests keep raving about how enchanting the venue was. The space is amazing, the animals are wonderful to be around, and the details are spectacular.
So the...n, why the 2 star review?
The staff that works there are really unprofessional, inefficient, and unhelpful. We worked mainly with Kara.
1. The staff initially held a date for us, and then let us know a couple of weeks later that they had actually were giving that spot to another couple so we needed to choose a different date.
2. They didn't tell us anything about valet except that we needed to use their valet company and that valet would be complimentary for our guests. Yes, there was one small line in our lengthy contract that asks us to contact valet services. However, how were we supposed to know that there was to be a fee if they never once mentioned it or even told us verbally to make sure to contact valet services. 6 days before our wedding, we got an email from the valet company saying we owed $1100.
3. Since they only offer Thurs., Fri. morning, or Sat. morning for a rehearsal run through, we had to choose the day of/Sat. morning run through to accommodate the everyone's schedule, especially those flying in from out of town. The venue had told me that we had the venue from 9 AM to 12 AM. As we were trying to have our run through, one of the staff members led a group tour DIRECTLY into our venue area. WE had to walk around the group and wait. The guests of the group tour were obviously very sorry since they were literally led right into the middle of the aisle and they tried to scoot to the side. However, the staff member stood literally right in the middle of the aisle, so we had to wait till they left...Which then pushed all of the bridesmaids hair & makeup back 45 minutes. My husband went to speak to Kara who said that there was nothing she could (or would) do about it since guests were allowed to tour the venue till noon. Again... we understand to a certain extent, but couldn't they have had some decency to wait for our rehearsal to finish or... at least stand off to the side and not literally smack in the middle of our aisle.
4. The venue told us we would have access to the venue and though there was a small event going on in a closed off area, our guests would have the venue to ourselves. After our ceremony, during our cocktail hour, my husband, photographer, videographer and I were taking pictures. The guests from the other event started coming into our cocktail hour area, taking pictures, and I even heard that they ate our hors d'oeuvres. I asked the 24 carrot staff to please help us with that and THAT staff was amazing.
5. Our sweetheart table was swarming with bees, so Brian and I weren't able to sit. Finally, we just asked the staff to take away our food since the bees appeared to be attracted to that. Once they did, the number of bees subsided, but at the cost of us not being able to enjoy our meal. I later heard that people from the wedding from the night before were stung by the bees! The venue didn't bother to tell us nor did we see or hear of efforts to try to get rid of the bees on our wedding day.
The caterer company 24 carrots was AMAZING, the staff was extremely on top of it, and the food went above and beyond any wedding we've ever been to. The venue itself is so gorgeous. It's just a shame that the venue's staff tainted our experience.