The Virginia Cliffe Inn

ground running! We planned the whole thing in a week! Not to mention the DJ quit the morning of and Jenn was amazing and tried to handle everything to take a load off of myself and new husband! Everything went as smoothly as possible considering. I cant thank them enough!

and service. 
 Throughout the planning process, Amanda took the time to answer all of my questions and reassure my concerns. She was approachable, transparent and helped me articulate and identify my priorities and vision. Thank you for everything, Amanda, and the whole crew at the Virginia Cliffe Inn! Our wedding day would not have been as good without you.

ner is so sweet and so helpful. We were fortunate enough to rent this inn out for the entire weekend to make it easier on the bridal party and everyone was great. And the price was amazing for everything you get with this venue. Don’t choose a place until you visit the inn!

very accommodating. We were delighted we found them!

meeting. I rearranged our family activities to make the meeting happen. Well, no one showed up and when I called no one answered. There were still beverages on the front porch from an event that I assume was the night before. If they can't even hold a meeting for the event then I wouldn't trust them to host our wedding. I count my blessings that we learned this before committing.

worry so much about renting a tent or bad weather. The part that really sold me, as cheesy as it may seem, was the pair of swans that live on the premises, aptly named Romeo and Juliet. Also, the rose garden and beautiful landscaping was so charming. The interior of the house was perfectly Southern Romantic, which turned out great for photos. The bride’s dressing room had a very comfy bed we all hung out on and a lovely stand up mirror. The groom’s room had dark rich wood and looked like a cigar room. We loved it. The price was right, so we booked it within the week without even looking at other venues. They did have some staffing change about 6 months or so out from my wedding, which really didn’t affect us. It eventually changed over to the granddaughter of the owner, Jen, who is well versed in various aspects of wedding planning. She was gracious in making suggestions and was very open to any requests we made. Furthermore, she has experience in making flower bouquets, so we also booked her for our bridal party flowers and boutonnieres, which turned out beautifully). They do have a preferred catering list, and we used Deep Run Roadhouse. Also, we had to acquire a Special Banquet license and liability insurance, which is to be expected. For a Sunday wedding, the venue allowed us to have a Friday rehearsal and drop off our nonperishables (alcohol, centerpieces with flowers, and other decorations) in an indoor space. The venue’s onsite wedding attendant/event coordinator/mistress of ceremony/lady-of-awesomeness was named Mary Lee. I cannot even begin to describe how sweet, wonderful, and hardworking this woman is. From the moment we arrived on Friday evening all the way through to the end of our wedding reception, she was on top of it! Rain was in the forecast, and we were thinking we would need to move the ceremony to the back of the house under a tent. Instead, she and her team waited until the last moment to make the call, and it turned out not to rain and we were able to have the ceremony where we had planned in the front!! Also, she kept making sure during the wedding that the groom and I had enough to eat and always had something to drink. Overall, this was the most wonderful experience of my life. The vendors all got along very well and were extremely coordinated. Everyone knowing their jobs so well really made the planning process very painless. I cannot recommend this beautiful venue enough for your wedding day!

for that reason. The pond with the swans was a favorite of our guests. I liked the fact that the wedding package includes tables, chairs, and linens as well as someone to direct people where to park and a day of coordinator. The reason I didn't give this venue 5 stars was for several reasons. The venue gives you 7 hours for the wedding, which includes set up and breakdown. If you need extra time you have to pay $125 per hour, even though they only do one wedding per day. Even though you can bring in whichever caterer you want, if the caterer is not on their preferred vendor list, you have to pay $200. When I first booked the venue, I was told that the venue provides wedding insurance. They changed that policy after booking and I was required to pay for the insurance. Also, when I first booked the venue (one and half years before my wedding), the venue had an event coordinator that was wonderful. She was nice and made you excited about the venue. She even offered to help set up table decorations on the wedding day. Over the course of that year and a half, they changed coordinators. The new coordinator let me know up front that she already had a full time job and this wasn't as important to her. She was hard to get a hold of and took a week to respond to emails (only responding after I had to text her asking her to respond). I had set up a time to meet with her and when I showed up, she said she had totally forgotten about our meeting. She was 30 minutes late to our rehearsal (she was mistress of ceremonies). She told me up front that she would not help in setting up centerpieces. I hardly saw her during my wedding day and she left for THREE HOURS during the reception so she could go home and feed her dog. Overall she was rude and had an attitude and made excuses for everything. One other complaint I had is the fact that no one told us that we had to "book" our rehearsal time. Since my wedding was on a Saturday, I assumed that we would be able to choose the time that we did our rehearsal the day before. I was informed that the couple getting married the following week wanted to do their rehearsal on the same day and they had chosen the prime time (5:30ish). So we either had to do our rehearsal early or late. We chose to do our rehearsal at 3:30. The coordinator was late getting there so we had to rehearse while the other couple and their party watched us. Overall I had a good experience with the Virginia Cliffe Inn and would recommend them to anybody. I just suggest that since they are a wedding venue, that they invest in a full time coordinator, not someone who does it on the side and acts like they don't want to be there.

contingency plan, which consisted of every guest piling into the attached (small) barn and wait it out. Despite all of this, we still wanted to support the small businesses and decided to commit. We had a verbal agreement with Jen to be followed up with a contract and deposit 2 weeks later because we lived out of state. The week of Christmas, when we would be visiting, we had the rug pulled from under our feet when they called to say they had “accidentally given away our wedding date.” We were told they were sorry, and to have a good Christmas or "whatever it is that y'all celebrate”. We are deeply disappointed and disgusted with what happened. At that point we were 6 months out and had already made other arrangements including a non-refundable deposit to the caterer for that date. We literally had to begin the whole process from scratch at that point and losing out on all the deposits that we put down. I do not recommend this venue as they are not professionals, and their lack of organization is regretfully apparent. Ineptness aside, the venue does not have any rain contingency plans, and they want to nickel and dime you for everything. Hiring Jen as a coordinator would mean she’ll answer phone calls that day, but nothing else, no decorations, no centerpiece placements, nothing. You or the caterer will have to clean up all the trash yourself, and be out by 10pm due to noise restrictions. Be prepared to tell guests that they cannot go inside the house in front of the pavilion, even if it storms. We also felt somewhat uncomfortable getting married in someone's backyard, knowing that the occupants of the main house would be in there potentially watching us. In retrospect, we were lucky not to get married at the Inn. Instead we had our wedding at the Manor House at Kings Charter, which charged $400 less for use of the entire house and grounds (novel concept!), whereas the Cliffe Inn charged more for use of only the backyard!

the reception, your guests will be pleased with the accessibility and spaciousness. We've received so many compliments on the charming look of the Inn and its overall character and unique atmosphere. The staff at Virginia Cliffe, especially Jen Clifton, are extremely knowledgeable and accommodating. Jen went out of her way to answer questions, coordinate with vendors and make sure our wedding was exactly what we had in mind. Go take a look at this gem -- it's one of the best kept secrets in Richmond, VA weddings and is a true southern wedding dream. I highly recommend Virginia Cliffe and will continue doing so. Thanks for making our wedding the best it could be.

aint. I would recommend to anyone.

e cake seriously....amazing. We also were able to bring our own (extra) food and drinks. This is a GORGEOUS location especially to have a bridal shower! We had about 20 guests and it was perfect!!!! I would HIGHLY recommend them!

ures came out because of the beautiful setting.

my opinion for set up, event time, and clean up, and getting charged $100 for each hour exceeding time limit is pretty bad considering there is no other event that day. Also only one hour for rehearsal time and the day before the wedding is not confirmed until a month before the wedding. It did work out that I could rehearse the day before but if not why would want to rehearse days before the day? Also the upkeep of the grounds is something like at my grandmothers house, not bad but definitely nothing professional. Overall it was pretty good though!