The Cotton Room

would never want my wedding to be held in a place ran by such foul business people.

ews before even coming out to see it !!!!! How can you not refund someone when they quite literally LOST their partner 5 months before the date!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I don’t understand how you can run a business focused on love but have no desire to help this woman that lost the love of her life. I’m sure she has funeral expenses. If anyone considered them, there’s many other great options in the RDU area

l refund for the services that weren't rendered. Please boycott this venue!!!!!

dy, we will be calling to cancel our upcoming appointment. I wouldn’t give this place a dime of my money. 

tablishment is such a rip off! 

other people's money to not give it back in the wake of tragedy. The family was never even offered event insurance when they originally booked the place, that's how cheap and pathetic the Cotton Room is.

eposit without compassion or flexibility. If you’re planning one of the most important days of your life, avoid this place and choose a venue that values people over profit. https://www.wral.com/consumer/5onyourside/durham-venue-keeps-deposit-after-grooms-death-2025/

s in Washington DC don’t even charge that much and have all inclusive catering and bars. Terrible business please run far away!

they are refusing to refund any of the $18K deposit that was made. Yes, the contract says it was a non-refundable deposit, but they have 5 months to rebook and in light of this tragedy, they really should make an exception and refund some or all of the deposit. My sister has tried to talk with them and come to an agreement, but they have refused to meet with them. Just bad business!

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the contract with the Cotton Room be cancelled and their deposits be refunded due to this unfortunate situation. The Cotton Room has insisted that they “cannot” refund the deposits paid, although they have done nothing to earn the nearly $20,000 that had been paid to them to date. We also requested a meeting with the owners of the venue to discuss the situation and perhaps come up with a solution, however the owners have refused to have a call with us. How can a venue that specializes in the business of love, happiness and weddings have such a cold, cruel and compassionless response to this tragedy that my sons’s family, fiancée and her family are dealing with. I would encourage anyone looking to book The Cotton Room to consider over venues first.

close to all the hotels. The space is so beautiful. You don’t need to add much décor because the space is so beautiful on its own. We got so many compliments from our guests on how beautiful the space was. Many of them said it made the whole day more fun. The CR team was wonderful to work with. The food was delicious, even better than the tastings we did. The drinks were amazing. (And we loved having our drink tasting and getting to create some fun specialty drinks.) They sourced a local beer and our favorite New England beer for us to have at the wedding too much was a great treat. The staff made the whole event flow seamlessly, the space was beautiful, and we felt so well cared for. We can’t recommend this venue enough!

t is rare for me to have such a negative experience with a vendor, but unfortunately, this was my experience with The Cotton Room. During the approximately six-month-long planning process, we had a very difficult time with our assigned event planner, Melissa, which I've detailed below. After the event, I contacted the owner of the company so we could meet and discuss the very poor customer service in the hope that we could use their venue again in the future. She gave me one option for a time (during my teaching school day) & since then has ignored my many messages (even though I told her I'm widely available to meet in summer). I'm now not that surprised about the customer service from the event planner after being treated this way by the owner. I will say that the bartenders and food servers at The Cotton Room were all wonderful. I'm including a detailed list of issues we encountered both during the planning process and at the start of the event, which includes changing prices two weeks before the event, changing food and drink items at the event without any notification prior, forgetting to include items we paid for, mistakes on decorative items, not checking in with us during the entire event, losing items we provided, incorrect menu items served, incorrect room layout so our centerpieces didn't fit, and many others). Since the owner will not make time to hear about these issues directly, I felt compelled to write a review in order to prevent what happened to us from happening to anyone else. It won't let me type more than two of the MANY issues, but feel free to message me for more details. - I was clear from the beginning that we were hosting a bat mitzvah with at least half of our guests being 12-13 year olds and that we wanted a station-style event with adult toppings on kid-friendly food items (e.g. a nacho bar with upscale add-on options for adults). We were quoted a less expensive kids price for all of the kids but were then told only a few weeks before the event that ALL GUESTS would be charged an adult price because the kids were over 10 years old (this was a $23 price differential per child and with 100 kids that meant an extra $2,300!). They refused to honor their original quote and we had no other choice but to pay the extra money or find another location two weeks before the event, which wasn't feasible. - The most important thing for my 13-year old daughter was the Boba Tea bar for her friends. She chose two flavors from the list they offered. Just two days before the event, they changed the flavors without telling us - I only noticed it on an invoice. We made phone calls and emailed to ensure we'd have the right flavors and Melissa ensured we would and I received confirmation via text message. However, when we arrived, they were the flavors listed on the invoice that my daughter didn't want (jasmine and matcha instead of strawberry and brown sugar, which is a huge difference for young teens). Instead of taking the family photos before our guests arrived, we had to taste test new boba tea combinations they were trying to put together with the ingredients they had on hand. There was never an apology from Melissa even though I explicitly expressed many times that this drink station was the most important thing to my teenage daughter.

r. The drinks and food were excellent. While we opted not to have a private tasting for food, the sip session was really nice. The open houses were a nice chance to sample some of the offerings from the menu of offerings. On the night of our wedding the food was amazing! We loved the look of the venue and how you could personalize with linens and decor. It was great having the dance floor as the center of the event space and our dance floor was so much fun throughout the night. It’s also an incredible value as far as chairs, tables, cutlery, etc. as so many nice things are included in part of the fee. There are some very nice bride and groom suites, however due to limitations in timing (for the evening event booking, access to the suites starts at 1 p), we didn’t really use them for getting ready. In order to have access to the suites starting at 8 am, we would have needed double the venue fee. In the grand scheme, this wasn’t a huge deal. On the night of the wedding, the staff was incredibly professional and helpful. Everything went very smoothly.

perfect. Throughout our planning, COVID changed A LOT of things. But Natalie and Courtney made sure we knew about what changes were happening to the venue, and always had suggestions of work arounds. Both were so attentive and understanding of the current situation and put our minds at ease while they figured out different ways to make sure we stayed on schedule with our wedding. The day of, was absolutely stress free and magical. Heather waited on us while we were getting ready in the Magnolia Suite and she was so sweet and made sure we were comfortable. She would check in on us every hour or so. Once the ceremony started it was a like a dream. The venue was so beautiful. And the food was FANTASTIC! I am so happy that we decided to keep our wedding date and grateful for everyone that assisted to make it happen. I would definitely recommend The Cotton to anyone and would definitely host another event here.

perfect. Let’s start with the flowers—- OMG!!!! So perfect, unique, abundant, spot on colors, - perfect big hits in just the right places. I used to be a visual merchandise manager- they could not have been more beautiful! Oh yes- the linens- perfect choice! The service- yes, I noticed you serving, making sure all went smoothly. Willa’s kid meal coming out nice and early, the vegan meals served exactly at the right time, and I understand you replaced Liz and Kevin’s meal when it got cold. And no wait at the bar- that’s huge!!!! I know your venue has hosted a zillion weddings, and they may all blur together for you. But our night, as Liz just said to me on the phone, was “the best day of my life!” Thank you for being a part of that special memory that my daughter will cherish forever! Liz’s mom Kim

avoid the same. The venue space was absolutely stunning with the provided Christmas decorations and then the brides added decor. Everyone seemed to have a wonderful time with our fantastic DJ and all commented on how beautiful the ceremony and the space was. I am thankful for that because the food and beverage service was absolutely terrible! Our trouble seemed to start with the ceremony being 20 minutes late for no explainable reason. Both sides were ready well ahead of the expected start time. The bar service was to include 3 bartenders at all times with 3 wine and 4 beer selections that had been made earlier. They never put out one of the most popular of our beer selections. We had our own experience plus were told of at least several others where guests were told to come back in 30 minutes because there was no cold beer or cold signature cocktails. Several times there was only one elderly and very slow bartender. The water and drinks on tables were taken up an hour before the reception ended and when guests went to get water from the bartenders, they were out of glasses. I could go on! Then the food....the passed hors d’ouvres at the cocktail hour were delicious. Beyond that, at least 2/3 of the food was completely inedible. The shrimp and grits were underdone and cold, the flaming pasta wheel tasted like pure alcohol and was cold, the chicken and waffles were cold, the fried pickles were cold and tasted like cardboard. The beef tenderloin was delicious but ran out quickly (before all guests went through the stations) and was never replenished despite there being a two hour food service listed in the contract. Soon after the event, both the bride’s parents as well as myself and my husband wrote and called The Cotton Room to talk about all of the issues. It was our experience that there was never a sincere apology for things gone wrong and instead, excuses. Finally after about eight weeks, the bride’s family was able to get a partial refund for the food (not nearly enough in our opinion...especially since we had raved about how great the food was going to be). For us, with a botched bar service, we were offered the cost of four cases of the IPA they didn’t put out for a total of $237 out of the thousands that we payed. I cannot even express the frustration that we (the parents) experienced with all of this. Avoid!

essional. They worked around our crazy work schedules to set up a tour and gave us a generous amount of time to decide whether to book with them. As soon as we decided to have our wedding there, we were assigned a coordinator and granted access to their online software called Base Camp, which was super convenient for organizing all our documents (vendor agreements, itineraries, contracts, etc), as well as having discussions between us and our coordinator about various planning details, both big and small. I could easily upload pictures to convey my vision, and see updates to all our wedding details in real time. We also got their preferred vendor list, most of whom we used since they were so familiar with the space and so highly recommended on multiple wedding sites. We were SO lucky to have Heather from The Cotton Room as our coordinator! From the beginning she set our minds at ease by letting us know she was there to help us communicate with all the vendors and stay organized in the planning process. She was also there on our wedding day from start to finish. She worked SO hard. She always returned my messages on email or Base Camp promptly. She advocated on our behalf to make sure we were able to get the lighting options we wanted and get as many food options as possible under our package. She was thorough in working with me on the timeline for the rehearsal and wedding day. She oversaw the set-up of all our decorations (which turned out exactly as I had dreamed), as well as packing everything up at the end of the night. Throughout the day she checked in with me regularly to make sure I had everything I needed and was feeling good. She even took charge of bustling my dress! As a result my (now) husband and I, and our families, were able to just relax and enjoy the day. Most of all, throughout the whole process Heather was upbeat and genuinely excited for us! She has a bubbly personality that kept everyone calm and focused on the important things- spending time with each other! Besides the excellent care we received from the staff at The Cotton Room, I want to mention how gorgeous the venue is! Floor to ceiling windows, exposed brick, and vaulted ceilings give it a feel of rustic elegance. The bride and groom suites were awesome as well! We each had our own suite attendants who ensured we had plenty of snacks and drinks getting ready that morning. The bridal suite is especially comfortable, with essentially an entire salon space in the back, a kitchenette, a bathroom with all the toiletry essentials provided, and a nice front room with tons of natural light for those pictures with your mom/bridesmaids helping you with your dress. We also had a ton of fun with Triangle Catering’s tastings. They do open houses at The Cotton Room rather than individual tastings, which are essentially whole weddings without anyone getting married. We got a chance to go to three of them, and try a ton of different food options from the menu. The bar tasting was amazing too. We got to try all different wines and cocktails and they gave us a bunch of appetizers to have with them- basically a great date night! All of the food at the wedding was delicious! Our guests raved and we were able to find a good balance to satisfy many different tastes.