A couple of months ago, my younger sister got married in a beautiful ceremony at her church. Our father has pastored this rural, evangelical church for the past twenty-nine years. Therefore, this special place to both of us was the obvious right venue to have her wedding at. After the wedding ceremony, my parents hosted a reception in the church’s activity building. My sister even decorated this large building herself. Have you picked a venue for your wedding, but don’t know where to have your reception at? When looking for the right place to have this special event, consider your personality and the personality of your future mate. For instance, if you’re cowboy or a cowgirl, you probably wouldn’t enjoy a wedding reception at an upscale country club in town. On this blog, you will discover the best places to host a wedding reception at.
While there are those more cosmopolitan brides who prefer their venues to be all modern art and chrome, there are others who dream of a more rustic wedding to echo their more down-home, sensible mindset, aesthetic and/or lifestyle. But when it comes to choosing your wedding venue for a wilder theme, it can be hard to draw the line between beautifully rustic and just plain worn down. So if you're trying to decide what rustic venue is going to be best for you and for your guests, then here are a few things to consider before signing on the bottom line.
Facilities
It's not just the bride or even just the bridal party that needs access to bathrooms, water, and electrical outlets during your wedding and reception. Chances are good your guests will need places to fix their makeup, go to the bathroom, or try to work a bit of the main course out of their evening wear – so one of your main concerns with your venue is to have those places, and to have them in abundance relative to the size of your guest list. Remember, it does no good to have a five-star bathroom at your venue if there's only one in the entire building – and a dozen three-star bathrooms are going to be better for your guests than the one perfect restroom.
Accessibility
If your venue is out in the country (like if you chose it for the lack of light pollution so you and your new spouse could dance out under the stars, for example), you'll need to make sure that it's also accessible to your guests, no matter what. That means ensuring that guests can still get there and back if it decides to rain or storm, whether that means laying down planks on a dirt road to help cars manage the terrain a bit easier or transporting your guests from their own cars/hotels in a few all-terrain vehicles to and from the venue itself. If your venue requires all 300 of your guests to ride on horseback for a few miles to get there, you may want to pick a more accessible venue and leave the horse riding to you and your spouse.
Backup Technology
For all the charm a candle-lit reception hall might hold, that charm can evaporate really quickly if the cold from the outside starts to seep in through the walls due to a blown fuse in the power generator. When choosing a rustic venue, it's important to ensure that the venue itself provides backup technology (a generator, for example), in case of a storm or blown fuse or any other act of God or man. If you have your own large generator, you can ask to use it, but beware of a venue that isn't willing to keep itself functioning.
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