We found Villa Parker at the suggestion of our photographer, Tony Clapp. Villa Parker is absolutely breathtaking, especially during the summer. There are so many beautiful photography opportunities--the grounds are well-maintained, with plenty of flowers and options for indoor/outdoor lighting packages to add extra flair. We are thankful we spent the extra money on the lighting package we chose!
Our main interactions with Villa staff were with Kelsey, until we were assigned our day-of coordinator, Jen, who works in partnership with the venue. The price of the day-of coordinator is built into the venue fee, which was a huge plus of choosing Villa Parker. Kelsey was wonderful to work with. She is professional, kind, accommodating, and always answered our questions with exceptional detail. Jen was fun, collaborative, had fresh ideas and great advice, and made the venue look just as we dreamt it would be. During the event, she watched over every detail and made sure everything was taken care of. It even rained during dinner, and she & her assistant, along with our caterers, were able to pivot immediately to their Plan B floorplan. It was so nice that we did not have to worry about the details of the decor and events of the day!
On the business side of things, Villa Parker worked well with each of our vendors, even though some of them had never worked at the venue before. The bartender that Villa Parker provided was also fantastic and kept our guests happy!
Villa also has available several decor closets full of easels, signs, candles, candle holders, and other items which we were able to utilize and save a bit of money on decorations. They even let us borrow an easel to take to our ceremony site for our welcome sign. For the decor that we provided, we were able to deliver our items the day before the wedding, which added flexibility for us the day of the wedding.
Once the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Kelsey did a very good job with keeping us updated. When we contacted her with questions and concerns about whether we would be able to move forward, she was always compassionate and as flexible as she could be under the circumstances. There came a point where we weren't sure whether we would be able to have our ceremony at a church, and she kept the option of hosting the ceremony at Villa Parker open throughout the planning process. While we were able to keep our ceremony offsite, it was nice to know that we could still have the wedding we dreamed of. The only roadblock we encountered was when we were informed several days before the wedding of an unexpected policy change because of COVID. This certainly created a great deal of stress, but in the end, Jen was accommodating and helped the event run as smoothly as possible during the pandemic.
Overall, we had a great experience with having our wedding reception at Villa Parker, and we would highly recommend this venue!