The Blue Ribbon Culinary Center is a marina in the greater Seattle, Washington area where couples can host their wedding. This city venue features wrap-around windows with views of Lake Union and the Seattle skyline. Couples can find this venue just 10 minutes from the Volunteer Park Conservatory.
Facilities and Capacity Up to 200 guests can join couples on their wedding day at the Blue Ribbon Culinary Center. This venue has an outdoor wedding ceremony location on a paved patio space. This area allows couples to marry under a wedding arbor with decor of their choosing and a graceful sweeping willow tree as their backdrop. After the ceremony, couples and guests can reconvene in this marina’s ballroom space for the reception. This ballroom is unique in that it offers guests views all around with large arched wrap-around windows. There is a deck overlooking the rows and rows of docked boats. With these vessels bobbing in the background, this space can be used for photographs, cocktail hours, reception overflow and more. There is even a separate room where couples can host an indoor ceremony in the off-season, or if inclement weather prohibits an outdoor affair.
Services Offered In addition to a ceremony and reception, couples can also host a bridal shower, engagement party, or rehearsal dinner at this marina. The venue provides chairs and tables. All-inclusive packages at this location means that even the smallest details can be taken care of by the event staff. There is even a bridal suite where couples and members of the wedding party can relax and prepare while the Blue Ribbon Culinary Center’s staff takes care of setup, cleanup, in-house bar and in-house catering. Couples will even find wireless Internet so that they can stay connected on their wedding day. Other services at this venue include:
Cake
Event planning
Event rentals
Lighting/sound
Parking
Cuisine This venue offers everything in terms of bar service, with an open or cash bar as options for the couple. Trained bartenders can serve anything from specialty wine to house beer to premium liquor with any choices in between. For something special, couples can provide their own outside alcohol, or ask the bartenders to serve a signature drink for their wedding day. Meanwhile, chefs create culinary masterpieces to be served in any of the following styles:
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I am so grateful to Blue Ribbon Cooking, because they helped save my wedding in July 2019! I was originally planning to be married elsewhere, but found out 7 days prior to my wedding that my venue had been shut down by the City of Seattle, which left me scrambling to find a new venue/caterer. Very fortunately, the team at Blue Ribbon reached out to my wedding planner and offered their services. They were very understanding of my situation and with 4 days to go until the wedding, we were able to finalize the new wedding logistics and menu.
Comments on different facets of the wedding experience:
Bridal Suite: They converted one of their rooms to a bridal suite area, which was spacious and had windows, work tables/chairs, a hook for my dress, and a full-length mirror. Having the natural light (in addition to the indoor lighting) was great so that we could see how my makeup looked in the daylight as I was getting my hair/makeup done.
Venue Space: We did formal photos outside prior to the ceremony. There is a willow tree nearby which has Lake Union in the background--we did my first look photos there and got some gorgeous photos! We held the ceremony indoors with the chairs facing the boats/water, and Blue Ribbon decorated the space with sheer draping to form an archway for our ceremony. I already had flowers/centerpieces from another vendor, but appreciated how Blue Ribbon arranged my decorations. After the ceremony, the guests moved to another room for the cocktail hour while the main room was converted to the dining area. My guests stated they thought the venue was cozy and charming. Since the building is older, the main room did get warm towards sunset because there were many windows and it was a sunny day, although opening the doors did help cool the room. Another photo tip--ask Blue Ribbon staff for access to the dock area--we got some great artistic photos by the water that are among my favorites.
Food: Given the last-minute nature of my wedding, my menu options were somewhat limited to the food that Blue Ribbon had already ordered for the week. Nevertheless, they were able to accommodate and include a substantial vegetarian entree option (pesto ravioli) and starch (polenta) for my vegetarian guests, and salmon and meat appetizers for the non-vegetarians. We got many compliments from our guests on the food. Although I already had an outside dessert vendor, I did like the artful way my dessert table was set up.
Overall, the Blue Ribbon Cooking team was communicative and willing to work with me to accommodate my requests. I’m very grateful to the Blue Ribbon Cooking team for pulling everything together for my wedding with such short notice, and I have many wonderful photos and memories from my wedding day!
Sent on 12/29/2019
User6527483
· 2+ years ago
5.0
Quality of service:
5.0
Responsiveness:
5.0
Value:
5.0
Flexibility:
5.0
Professionalism:
5.0
Wow. This was a spectacularly good choice for our wedding. My wife is a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, so the whole idea of getting married at a culinary center was already a win, but when you add the gorgeous setting, the all-inclusive pricing, the flexibility, the wedding planning services provided, the phenomenal job on decor (whose idea was it to put our favors, a spice rub in little tins, ON each plate at dinner? BRILLIANT, and looked amazing), and the out-of-this-world food (got loads of comments from family & friends) , this was THE place for our wedding. We had a first-class event, not cheaply but a great value for what we got. Highly recommend.
Sent on 08/02/2016
Michelle
· Married on 07/03/2017
5.0
Quality of service:
5.0
Responsiveness:
5.0
Value:
5.0
Flexibility:
5.0
Professionalism:
5.0
My husband and I could go on forever about how INCREDIBLE it was to work with Blue Ribbon. They were with us every step of the way, bringing to life the most perfect, beautiful day of our lives. Their entire culinary and beverage team -- Vanessa, Adam, Melissa, the list goes on – were ABSOLUTEY ESSENTIAL to every unique and special detail of our big day.
We know that our vision was no easy feat and the team continued to exceed our expectations by leaps and bounds. From the mouth-watering Paellas (beautifully presented in giant cast iron pots), to our HOT SAUCE bar, to our summer sangria and smoked-old fashioned specialty cocktails his & her drinks, where they actually LIT smoke boards on fire to make each drink (our guests LOVED the theater of it), to the beautiful tablescapes (there were these amazing glasses and "sunburst" plates), to the dessert station presentation...everything was perfectly executed. Blue Ribbon had an amazing creative, can-do attitude when it came to all of our extravagant ideas, AND had the ability made our ideas even BETTER with their own special touches while staying within our budget.
Not only is the team incredibly talented and the BEST to work with, they are also just GREAT people. My husband and I are truly so grateful to have gotten the opportunity to work with Blue Ribbon. THANK YOU to the team for being such an incredible partner to us! We can't wait to find other reasons to see and work with you again!
