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Riverdale is great, especially if you are looking for a one stop shop but not a cookie cutter wedding, and want control of the costs. We did not want to have a hotel wedding but liked the convenience and cost savings of having one vendor for the venue and the caterer; Riverdale fit the bill.
When you contract with Riverdale, you are going to be the only event at Riverdale that day. They allow you to use the farmhouse to get ready there, to have a five hour event (rather than the standard 4 hours), and to have your ceremony there for a nominal cost. The rental of the site also includes tables and chairs for the reception. Things they do not include are tablecloths (which they will rent on your behalf--one less vendor for you to have to deal with), cake plates and champagne glasses. We felt a little nickle and dimed about the plates and glasses, but when we added up all the costs, Riverdale was still more affordable than other comparable options we considered. You also can control your costs since you are able to choose your menu a la carte, and provide your own alcohol. The latter was a huge money saver, when compared to open bar prices elsewhere.
The quality of the food was excellent. We offered the beef medallion or the portobello mushroom. Guests liked both. The appetizers were also very good. We do wish they did a better job of serving those to the guests; the people near the kitchen were bombarded with passed trays and other guests never saw them. This was partially due to the fact that our guests were primarily in the farmhouse and not on the patio, since it was a bit chilly outside.
We also liked that Riverdale had a place for both us to get ready onsite (most do not have a place for the groom), and basically provides a coordinator for the wedding. We worked with Dayna. We dropped off all the alcohol, escort cards, picture frames, votives, etc. the day before and Dayna took care of getting everything set up, just the way we had planned. Dayna took care of all the set up for the ceremony as well. She also made sure everything was packed up and ready to go after the wedding. We did not hire an outside coordinator and having Dayna available before and the day of the wedding was fantastic. Whenever we had a question that Dayna did not know the answer to, she was quick to tell us she would find out. Riverdale also has an excellent vendor referral list. The only area we wish they had provided more guidance in was in the quantiity of alcoholic beverages to purchase. We ended up using the recommendations of a friend's caterer since Riverdale did not provide us with this information. (we'd be happy to share our experience in this area if you need the information--we had WAY TOO MUCH!)
As other reviewers noted, the one downside of Riverdale is they are a bit set in there ways. You could say they know what works and want to run a smooth event, which is why they heavily push to do things a certain way. Or, you could say they can be a bit inflexible at times. For example, they insist that we write our guests' entree selection on the escort cards, rather than indicating what a person had ordered through a colored ribbon or some other symbol. They were very inflexible about this. We wrote the entree choices on the inside of the cards, and one of our guests reported that when dinner was served they were told to turn their cards inside out. Seemed a bit of an overkill to me. But it was nice to be offer a split entree without a surcharge. They also were not thrilled that we wanted to have our meal served with intervals of dancing between courses; we were upfront about this before we signed the contract and were told that was fine. At our final planning meeting, we were told that we may have to pay for additional hours of service if we did this. They backed down, but the night of the wedding, they DID NOT follow our schedule. They served the dinner a half hour early and the cake immediately following. (they said people weren't dancing--they were.) Our guests did not know the difference, but we did. We were very explicit about what we wanted, and we are pretty sure that the owner of the company never had any intention of serving the meal on our schedule.
On the whole we were thrilled with Riverdale. We wanted a farmhouse setting, but also saw the benefit of having modern amenities, like climate control. We were able to hold our ceremony in the pavilion, which we did not know was going to be an option when we contracted with Riverdale. It is a wonderful addition to the place and we were so glad to have been able to use it, especially since using the patio would not have worked well in late March.
We considered venues all over the Mid-Atlantic and looked at venues in Baltimore, York, Annapolis and Lancaster. We considred many different places, Riverdale was able to give us everything we wanted at a price we could afford. If we were to do it all over again, we would definitely pick Riverdale Manor and gladly work with Dayna.
Marion Omlar of Backwoods Florist provides excellent service for an excellent value. When she first met with us, she did not ask our budget but asked what we were looking for for our bouquets, boutonnieres, and centerpieces. She then sent us a proposal with the cost. I liked that she didn't try to hit a number, but provided us with a figure for the flowers we wanted-and then we could adjust from there. We didn't have to adjust because she is VERY affordable. She has a studio at her house and doesn't advertise (because she doesn't need to) which I imagine keeps her costs down.
We didn't know exactly what we wanted but knew the style and colors we wanted, and Marion made it a reality for us. We highly recommend meeting with her if you are getting married in Central PA!
Choosing a cake vendor was one of our hardest decision because we had so many good choices! We met with Bella Manse, Rosie's Creative Cakes, and Providence Spotts-they were all excellent. We chose to work with Renee because we liked that we could get multiple flavors of cake and filling without a surcharge, and because we loved her peanut butter icing! Also, we wanted someone who would design a cake for us without telling her exactly what we wanted. She drew up a few designs for us and we picked from those. We were out-of-town, so she emailed and faxed us the drawings.
The cake was a huge hit at the wedding-even with our guests that weren't from central pa and accustomed to peanut butter icing! We picked chocolate chocolate chip with peanut butter filling, vanilla with coconut pecan filling, and marble with peanut butter filling and chocolate mousse filling. All had buttercream icing.
As for delivery, she was on time and low maintenance. She does many weddings at Riverdale Manor, where we got married, so she was very familiar with the venue. She also does not require you to return the standard "cake board" she delivers the cake on, which saves post-wedding hassle.
Bella Manse also includes a free anniversary cake if you purchase a cake for over 100 guests, and she has it wrapped up in a box with directions for freezing on it.
I Do I Do Wedding Gowns Gaithersburg, Maryland 20877
I Do, I Do Bridal has a good selection of wedding dresses, both new and consignment, in a variety of sizes. They also have dresses in a variety of price ranges. I went to two other stores, a charity sale and Filene's Running of the Brides. I had the best experience at I Do I Do. The store is not as glamorous as those in downtown Washington, nor is it as as expensive. I highly recommend checking out the merchandise here. I bought shoes here as well, after looking all over town and online for a pair.
I also had my dress altered at I Do I Do and had a very good experience. Dawn did an excellent job, worked very quickly, and also stored my dress since I did not have anywhere to keep it until I was ready to pick it up.
Occassions Disc Jockey is a very professional company that is easy to work with. They provide an online form that allows you to provide a schedule for your ceremony and reception, including exactly when you want certain events to take place. The form makes it very easy to indicate which songs you want played for special moments, such as the cake cutting, and the entrance. If you don't want to pick specific songs, you can also pick music styles and eras that you prefer for the reception.
We used Occasions for the sound system only during the ceremony and for the music during the reception. Matt was our DJ. He was GREAT! One of our guests called him the DJ from Oz, because he kept playing great music but you never saw him. (we had asked for him to be low profile, but if you want him more involved in the party, he will do that as well.)
We wish we had a chance to thank Matt in person that night, but we were having so much fun on the dance floor, which was full all evening, that we didn't get a chance to. Thanks Matt!
Chad of Back Row Video was very easy to work with and provided an excellent product; which he delivered three weeks after the wedding! We wanted a video that captured our ceremony and reception without being overly-produced. Chad provided exactly that. In addition, his company's name is very fitting; most of our guests were surprised when they learned that we had a videographer because they never noticed him. He captures the event without detracting from the guest's enjoyment, or blocking their view.
Back Row video was the last vendor we hired and very reasonably priced, especially considering the quality of his product. He went above and beyond; he met with us in York prior to the wedding since he would not have to travel far for the event, and he also came to the rehearsal since he was free that night. We would hire him again in a heartbeat. You should definitely give Back Row video a call! As my husband said, Chad was awesome!
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