Tag Archives: wedding venue

Our Wedding Venues

8 Replies

A handful of you have asked me about my wedding venues, so I thought I would write a post instead of responding individually.

As you might recall, our venue search was extremely thorough – Nouman and I must have visited atleast 15 places together (I probably went to 5 additional ones). We’re both detail-opriented and had a specific look in mind (thankfully, the same look); satisfying both of us was harder than I thought.

Mehendi
From the get-go, we knew we wanted Chandni for the mehendi. It’s a good venue with decent food, good pricing and a few extras – they have colourful overlays and centerpieces are included.

So far, our dealings with Chandni has been great Alhamdulilah. They always get back to us (WHY is it so hard for people in this industry to get back to clients in a timely fashion?) and are accommodating.

Image via Chandni Banquet Hall’s Facebook Page

Wedding
This was probably the hardest venue for us. Nouman wanted a place that wasn’t in an industrial area and had a grand entrance. I wanted something traditional with high ceilings and an “open” feel. We searched far and wide. If there was a venue that I liked, Nouman would shoot it down. If he actually liked a place, I would not approve of something. We went back and forth. We both really liked West River – the only part we could not get over was their entrance. To get to the hall/lobby, you have to either take stairs or use an elevator; this would be fine except that his baraat entrance and our rukhsati would be squished and cramped.

At one of the South Asian wedding shows (I don’t remember which one), I had seen a booth for an amazing venue. I had initially thought of this venue during our initial researching but then put it out of my mind – there was noway I could get that venue. At the end of one of our frustrating venue hunting days, I casually mentioned (Me and casual? Yeah, right. I’m pretty sure I told him how much I loved, loved, loved this place and it was my dream location) the venue to Nouman. He saw pictures of the venue, Grand Empire, and fell in love. Score!

Two issues came to mind straight away: budget and construction. Obviously, this GRAND venue seemed like it was way out of my budget. Secondly, the venue was under construction and expected to open late summer 2011 – there was a slight chance it might not be ready in time (construction delays happen all the time).

Long story short, Nouman spoke to the owner and we finally signed the contract! The owner, Gurjit, has been amazing to work with. Nouman and I have been so extremely happy because he has personally taken care of everything for us from day 1. Their service, so far, has extended to beyond just their own venue – they are always around to give advice or help out when there is an issue with other vendors. Nouman and Gurjit talk so frequently that I’m pretty sure they have each other on speed dial.

Image via Grand Empire’s Facebook Page. I love their lights.

Valima
I have to give credit to my older sister – she was the one who referred us to our Valima venue, Apollo Convention Centre. Similar to Grand Empire, Apollo was under construction when we first booked it. From their picture projections, it was everything we wanted – modern and oh-so-chic. We have been dealing with Uncle Bassi and he has been great – extremely accommodating and reliable; he has given us everything he had promised… and then some :)

Image via Apollo’s Facebook page. This is the girls washroom!

I can’t wait to see how these look with our decor on the 3 days!

p.s. if you’re looking for venues, I would absolutely recommend going to these places. Feel free to use Nouman/my referral – especially at Grand Empire :) I’ll be posting a full review of each venue after the wedding.

Venue Review: Candles Banquet Hall

4 Replies

Finding a venue is one of the hardest things to cross off the wedding checklist. For my sisters Nikkah, we had initially planned on having an intimate ceremony at home. However, we’re desi and containing our guestlist turned out to be impossible. Hence, we had to find a small venue in a reasonable budget – much harder than you might think!

Our first pick was Chandni Banquet Hall’s smallest hall – it’s pretty, the food is good and the price is unbeatable. Since we only started looking around 3-4 weeks before the actual event, Chandni (to our disappointment) was booked. Boooo.

We then looked at Candles and Sahara – the latter being slightly too cramped for our guestlist. So how was our experience with Candles? Here’s a breakdown:

  • Really liked the hall when we saw it – they renovated it a few years ago and it looks MUCH better now
  • The sister and I were slightly taken aback when the owner asked us who the decision maker is – from that point onwards, it seemed as if we weren’t being taken seriously because we were 2 girls (we have gotten this ALOT). We tried negotiating but we left slightly annoyed – we wished we had our parents with us to do the bargaining
  • Nouman volunteered to go and talk to Candles – hoping that a guy talking to another guy might help. It didn’t. Most venues do offer to throw in atleast 1 thing for free – i.e. a chicken or vegetarian item – but Candles was pretty rigid and refused
  • After weighing in costs and realizing the difference was marginal, we finally decided to book them
  • When both our parents went in to talk to them, we did notice a difference in their approach –> keep in mind, this seems to happen at ALOT of desi venues. It definitely is not an exclusive behaviour at Candles
  • The day of the event, the owner listened to every single thing we asked – they were on top of EVERYTHING Alhamdulilah. I made last minute changes to some of the table settings and they accommodated it easily. They were present the entire night and checked in with me numerous times. My family and I were really impressed at their professionalism on the day of our event – they didn’t give us room to complain about anything.

Overall, I would recommend Candles; their venue is pretty and the price is reasonable. Their in-house decorator is awesome as well – review coming up soon!

Tips:

  • Make sure you have an elderly male figure when you are bargaining – I would recommend this for any venue you are going to
  • While it is a pretty hall, I wouldn’t recommend it for a Mehendi – the dance floor in the big hall is off to one side which can kill the mood. In the smaller hall, you will always have your back turned to one side of the room or you’ll be staring at a blank wall (divider)

Vendor reviews and tips on how to wrap presents for your in-laws coming up! :)

Venting Session – Not Really.

7 Replies

I realized that I haven’t updated you guys on my wedding planning – and alot of you have been asking. So here goes:

I had a medium panic attack last week. I say medium because it was nowhere as severe as the one I had a few months ago but it was not small enough for me to just shrug off.

I think what caused my anxiety is the realization that I have around 8 months to go (InshAllah) and not alot done. Ahhhh!! Just thinking about it right now is making me anxious.

Anyway, 3 things that brought upon this realization:

  1. I met alot of people over the last month (due to Eid and other events) and I was asked about my wedding preps and how far along I am. I know everyone was asking me to see if they can help in anyway (thank you so much for everyone’s offers!) but I panicked. I realized that I don’t have much done and even though I always got the response “don’t worry, you have alot of time!”, I still freaked out. I’m crazy, I know.
  2. I spend alot of time on wedding blogs and websites and I freak out when I realize that people getting married around the same time as me have so much more done than I could have imagined.
  3. I am way off the schedule I had set for myself when we first got baat pakki’d. I like schedules, lists and pre-planning. I don’t like chaos and last minute stuff. Sooo when I go off schedule, I feel unbalanced.

So here’s my game plan for the next few weeks:

  • Must pester parents for guestlist: Okay, seriously. What the heck. Not sure what is going on but m parents are just not on top of the guestlist business. Sure, it’s great to invite all your relatives back home but I need a headcount of who will actually be able to come to the wedding. I mean physically be here. We probably have around 50 or so people (this number is completely made up. I have no idea where or who some of these uncles and aunties are) who are invited but don’t live in the same country – are they really coming?!
  • Must figure out Mehendi hall: Completely my fault. Not sure what is going on with me either. This is SO unlike me. I’ve had over a year to plan… no mehendi hall?! Nouman and I really don’t want to look at more halls (we must have been to over 15 venues for our shaadi and valima) sooo any help would be appreciated! I may just pick Chandni (to Nouman and Hafsa’s horror :) ) because I can’t be bothered to venue hunt anymore
  • Photographer: What’s going on with wedding photographers in the GTA? Why is everyone SO overpriced? The fact that you picked up an SLR from future shop and have no actual training in photography means that I don’t want to spend $5,000 on you. Especially when you spend half the night getting “detail” shots and forget that there’s an important ritual happening on stage. Jus sayin.
  • Decor: Umm yeah. Must find a decorator. More importantly, I must find a decorator that doesn’t charge $3000 to put up a simple backdrop.

There’s a bunch of other things I need to do… but this will do for now.

Hope you all have an awesome (long) weekend! :)

Can't wait for this day!

The Start of it All: The Perfect Venue

Leave a reply

Or in our case, three perfect venues.

Luckily, we’re both having our mayoun’s at home so we don’t need to look for a 4th (or 5th) venue.

Finding the right venue seems to be the hardest decision for me. I know what I want my decor, outfits, cake etc to look like, but the venue is something I’m struggling with. Anything that I really love and want, is way over our budget. In my head, I tried justifying the price tag that comes with some gorgeous venues (Royal Ambassador anyone?),  and I almost succeeded. But then I thought about it a little more and realized I’d rather spend money on some other things.

I made a list of things that will (hopefully) help me narrow down from my extensive list of venues:

  • Affordable: Money, money, money. Everything has a price tag.
  • The overall look of the venue: Do I want a formal banquet hall? A gorgeous view of the skyline? A little bit of outdoors? Daytime vs. Evening look?
  • MUST haves at the Venue: Example: nice carpet. A few weekends ago, I was convinced I had my wedding venue. I went in to see the place and realized it wasn’t as awesome as I remembered it and I hated the carpet. Um, black, pink and green carpet? No thanks. Although most people probably don’t even pay attention to the carpet, it is something I take note of at every wedding.
    Lighting is another major thing for me – some places have bright white lights whereas others have more of an orange-y glow. One type of lighting may work better than the other based on the kind of look you want to create.
  • Food: Very important to me (and the parents!)
  • Capacity: Our guest list is sort of in the middle – we don’t have a small wedding (less than 150 people) nor a big wedding (400+). Finding the perfect venue for our wedding is challenging because:
    1) Many venues are too small for us;
    2) While the larger venues offer “dividers” for our size, I really don’t want to have my wedding next to someone else’s. The additional soundtrack playing in the background from the wedding next door really alters the ambiance of my wedding. While there are tear-jerking speeches going on at my wedding, the next door wedding may be  having a dance off. Do I really want to hear Punjabi MC (ok, I’m not up-to-date with the Punjabi music scene but they were cool at one point, right?) during our speeches? I think not.
    Oh and dividers are simply ugly. Unless you want to shell out the $ and cover the dividers completely, I’m not a fan.
  • Parking: Soooo I found some gorgeous halls downtown Toronto. Yes, they were pricey but not crazy pricey that I’d cancel them out completely. The problem? Parking. Desi people just don’t like paying for parking – I’d probably offend a million and one people if there was paid parking at my wedding. Some venues do allow you to pre-pay for parking – but at a cost of between $500 – $1,000, I decided meh. I’d rather spend that on money on something else.

My advice: Prioritize. List everything you want in the order of most to least important.

Look out for my next post on some insanely gorgeous venues!