Renaissance Baltimore Harborplace Hotel

AVOID AVOID AVOID AVOID We were initially so excited with booking The Baltimore Renaissance for our wedding, however that excitement quickly abated. From the beginning, they were not transparent and delayed allowing us to book their Watertable room citing that another couple was in negotiations for weeks (They gave us 1 week once the contract was created). Only after we complained about the logistics of two weddings happening at the same time did they give us this room (for $1,200). We then had 3 different wedding planners over the course of the year causing us to have to repeat conversations multiple times. Katherine, who ended up leaving, would go weeks without answering emails. We were then assigned Nadine, who did a good job but appeared to be overwhelmed with the amount of work she had. Things really took a turn for the worse with 45 days until the wedding. At that time, we found out a 250 person wedding would happen literally right next door to our 150 person wedding at the same time. The hotel assured us that this would not be a problem, however it only took until cocktail hour to realize that was not true as our guests had to LITERALLY walk through their cocktail party to reach our cocktail party. The venue also told us that they would have ushers and an area roped off so our guests would not interrupt their party, however this didn't happen and guests were confused and it looked messy As for the "day of" planner included by the hotel, we literally saw her once or twice at most. Thankfully we hired our own planner who was basically doing both their jobs. We suspect the hotel planner was busy tending to the larger wedding, which made our wedding feel even further like an afterthought for the venue. There was no part of this that honestly went smoothly. Multiple guests of ours had issues with their room cards not working locking them out of their rooms and the check in line was frequently 50+ people deep. The hotel cancelled our parent's reservations and did not follow through on them getting complementary upgrades. Our parents had already gotten settled once we found out and we asked for the hotel to give them a bottle of wine which they agreed to do, however this was never followed through. During the tasting, the hotel planner told us that they would send up any food we wanted and we requested all of the food from cocktail hour. At 1:00am, we made it to our room to find that they sent up soggy pretzels and bratwursts instead (our after party food). If they simply didn't say anything we would have just done it ourselves but we (incorrectly) relied on them despite all evidence pointing against doing so. Finally, if you somehow weren't scared off by all of the above, take my advice and get everything they say in writing. At the eleventh hour, the venue suddenly increased its champagne toasts from $2 pp to $7 and bottles of wine went from $51 per bottle to $60. They did honor our prices once we showed the email correspondence, but it was just another example of us needing to be on top of anything that involved this venue. Overall, our wedding went very well and we had an amazing time in spite of the hotel/venue being one of the most incompetent places I've ever experienced. I can't recommend you avoid this venue enough and would urge you to go literally anywhere else in Baltimore. If you do decide to go with them, do yourself a favor and hire a planner day one so you don't pull your hair out before your big day!