Madison Museum of Contemporary Art Reviews

Reviews

• Brian Sent on 12/28/2020
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  MMoCA saved our wedding!

  We had planned to have an outdoor wedding in a park and use the park's pavilion in case it rained. But we weren't prepared for a once in a century flood to swamp the park under feet of water just weeks before our wedding.
  
  It was a desperate situation to be in during wedding season, so we couldn't have been more thankful to MMoCA for being over backwards to make space for us on such short notice. The building itself is gorgeous, and the glass stairs in particular sparkled and shone with the DJ's lighting while our guests danced the night away. It was the most beautiful venue I've ever been to, and I'm so happy we were able to celebrate there. It also ended up being much less expensive than other less-appealing venues. Our guests mentioned enjoyed the art, as well. Overall this was definitely the best experience I've ever had with a venue of any kind, and I would recommend it as my first choice for anyone looking to have a wedding in Madison.
  
• Amanda Sent on 06/26/2019
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  Absolutely Amazing!

  I cannot even begin to describe how amazing the entire staff at MMoCA is! Kelli, the event manager, one of the nicest, hardest working people there is. She worked so hard with my wedding planner to give us the most amazing day! Their whole team was incredibly accommodating and super flexible. We had thunderstorm threats and everyone was ready with 4-5 different back-up plans to give us the most perfect day I could have imagined! We also rented out Fresco for our dinner and all of our guests raved about the food! The chef is amazing!!! I could go on for days about how easy they were to work with. 100% would recommend this location to anyone looking for a downtown Madison venue!
• Caryn Sent on 11/29/2018
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  Best Wedding Ever

  Amazed and still in awe with how elegant, gorgeous and unforgettable it was experiencing our wedding day at this marvelous place. You have a choice of outdoor and indoor back-up which is always a MUST! On our wedding day there was a fluctuating chance of rain from 30-60%, talk about stressful. You can make the call the day-of and we are extremely happy to go with indoors at the end. It just felt grander, warmer, and more accomodating. The museum is open to the public which created a nice ambiance (wasn't stale or distracting). For the food, even though you have to use Fresco as your caterer, you will not regret it. It was absolutely delicious and our guests loved it. We had a choice between the salmon, chicken, and vegetarian. There were even compliments on the salad! Not to be biased but I thought it was the best wedding food I have ever had and I'm usually not a fan of it. Nice portions too. The drinks and bar service was awesome too. The had Spotted Cow which a lot of our out of town guests were looking forward to. We were living in Oregon at that time for graduate school and they had a "Deschutes" beer which was incredibly appropriate as well. In addition, they had a "Douglass Hill" wine which is also the name of my husband "Doug". Other highlights, service was impeccable (no problems there). Loved the glass building and our guests ended up having fun interacting with others when they were dancing. It was a perfect space for around 80 guests. Felt initimate but spacious. We at first had Amanda as our planner but she ended up leaving her positon in the middle of planning but made us feel secure in the transition to Alison. Alison was just as great and sat down with us to help us make our dreams come true to a tee. She had this wonderful 3-D blueprint program on her laptop to help us visualize and crystalize our ideas. It was detailed to the point of where to the tables are facing, bar placement, gift table, and even plants. I highly recommend MMoCA for a stylish and timeless wedding that will leave you & your guests impressed for life.
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• Kira Sent on 10/02/2018
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  Everything was amazing! Communication was good to great throughout the planning process between Bob of MMoCA, Ali the event coordinator at Fresco, and our vendors when necessary. Pricing is extremely reasonable for what you are getting - the biggest cost is exclusive catering through Fresco, however, the presentation and coordination of the food and drink that they provide is well worth it. Our set up was a little crazy but the team rolled with the punches and made it feel easy for my husband and me, which was such a gift. Everyone in attendance said it was the best wedding, venue, and food selection they had ever been to. The evening ran smoothly and was nicely coordinated without us having to worry about our timeline. The bartenders did a great job keeping up with the pace, recommending drinks, and keeping up with the pace of the evening. Ali made everything run so seamlessly and the transitions were flawless. I could not be happier we had the opportunity to work with her and this venue.
• Jenny Sent on 10/02/2018
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  My husband and I could not be happier with our experience having our ceremony at the Museum of Contemporary Art! While we were lucky enough to have good weather and utilize the rooftop, the indoor backup option is also very nice and made things way less stressful as rain began to appear on the radar the week of the wedding. The staff was incredibly responsive, and answered all of our questions. Overall, it was a very easy planning experience and we are thrilled about how everything turned out.
• Izzy Sent on 09/06/2018
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  I can not overstate how wonderful it was planning and celebrating our wedding at MMoCA. Our two points of contact, Bob (from the museum) and Ali (from Fresco) were truly great to work with. Everything was smooth and easy from start to finish. The venue was gorgeous and unique. Guests loved that they could roam the galleries, too! I highly recommend booking your wedding at MMoCA + Fresco!
• Lydia Sent on 10/27/2015
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  We had our ceremony and reception on the rooftop of the museum. I think it was a huge plus that you get to rent out the whole building in case of rain, as the museum is closed to public by 4 or 5pm anyway. It was the perfect venue for an urban-rooftop-party vibe, and we absolutely loved dancing under some string lights out in the open. The fees were pretty reasonable too. For food, you do have to use Fresco for catering, but they were a pleasure to work with and very accommodating to our food requests - we wanted 3 different food stations and specific menu items, and their chef was able to come up with all of it. It was really nice to have that flexibility and do something a little more special instead of ordering from a menu. They also helped coordinate everything on the day of the wedding and were instrumental in making sure things went smoothly. Lastly, the view from the rooftop is pretty solid.. you get state street, the capitol building.. and previously the orpheum sign, but now it has been taken down :-( It also provides great access to all the bars downtown for the after-party. We had a blast and absolutely loved our venue.
• Nate Sent on 10/04/2015
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  This is an amazing venue to host your wedding at! The team you work with to go through all the logistics and planning is top notch, helping you with every step along the way. They created an entire vegan menu for us and it was out of this world! We had rave reviews from our carnivorous family :) The rooftop garden is beautiful, which saves a lot of decoration planning and money. The staff they provided were wonderful too. They really made us feel like we were their top priority through every step of the planning and wedding day.
• User4782083 Sent on 06/08/2014
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  We loved this location. They were cooperative and took care of everything. It was a perfect reception for our wedding.
• Sarah Sent on 08/12/2015
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  Adrienne was fantastic! she was very helpful leading up to the wedding and was running around all night making sure things were going smoothly. the food was definitely on the pricey side, but everyone absolutely adored it. they did a great job of flipping our ceremony space into the reception space in a short time (it poured rain for 30 mins of our 1-hour cocktail hour). the space was beautiful and having everything all in one place really made things easy on our guests. the staff was friendly and professional and even helped us load all our presents into my parents' car at the end of the night. we ended up having 170ish guests, and only had seating for about half at a time during the reception, which i would highly recommend since that meant everyone was up and dancing. all in all, a great venue and a fantastic night. i would definitely book again.
• Kim S. Sent on 08/09/2016
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  We were married at MMoCA in June of this year and could not have been happier with it! During college, I worked across the street and always knew that I wanted my wedding to be on the rooftop. The views and beautiful space is worth every penny. We enjoyed attending the tasting a few months before to choose our food and Emily was very helpful and responsive to our questions. There were a few times when it took a while for her to get back to us, but, in hindsight, it didn't matter because she knows what she is doing! Going into the day I felt completely confident that she and the rest of the team would take care of everything, and they did. The food and drink is definitely a bit pricey, but I think it was absolutely worth it. People kept telling me that it was the best wedding food they have ever had. Lots of variety and the ability to customize the menu was great as well. On the day of the wedding, between the ceremony and reception, the museum staff actually let us take some photos in one of the galleries (you can see them above). That was very special and not something that many people get to do. Overall, we had an amazing wedding in a beautiful place.
• Christine Sent on 09/04/2015
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  We had our wedding cocktail hour and reception at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art this past weekend, and the events ran so much more smoothly than I ever thought possible. The set up and decorating were exactly the way we had envisioned it, and all the food was delicious! We were thoroughly impressed with the way Adrienne, the manager at Fresco, handled all the planning and setup. We would definitely recommend the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art for couples looking for a gorgeous and classy wedding venue.
• User1343738 Sent on 08/29/2013
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  We had our wedding ceremony and reception in the rooftop garden, with a cocktail hour downstairs in the museum lobby in between. Logistically it was really nice having the whole event in one place, and it's a beautiful venue to work with. We fit 125 guests plus a 13 piece band comfortably, although we opted for a more casual reception with passed apps and food stations. Thankfully the weather was beautiful, but they do provide a backup space (auditorium and lobby) in case of rain. You are required to use the in-house restaurant Fresco for catering, and we received rave reviews from our guests on the food and service.
• Danielle Sent on 08/23/2013
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  We had our ceremony on the rooftop which made for a beautiful venue! The restaurant and the museum have different organizers, and they schedule many weddings, so if your event is later in the summer, like mine was, you won't really get to the gritty of planning until a few weeks before your event. However, when we began working on the details, they were very flexible, helpful, and easy to work with. Getting married here was everything I'd dreamed of and more!
• Kris Sent on 05/11/2023
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  Veronica was not an easy nor pleasant person to work with.

  Veronica negated several previous arrangements we had made with Bob - and did not tell us until the wedding (such as setup time). She was disrespectful in conversations with several older women in our family. She hovered. Outmr wedding attendants were all 30 years or older - with the only two childre being the grooms children, who were with their grandparents the entire time.
  
  She made unpleasant and unfounded remarks throughout the evening. She really was an unpmeasant person.
• Ellie Sent on 03/01/2024
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  Can't recommend

  First I want to say that our wedding day was wonderful! MMoCA is a beautiful venue and we worked with incredible outside vendors to have a fantastic day, however our experience with MMoCA specifically was really unfortunate. When we first booked the venue we had known someone who had gotten married there and heard good things. Our initial communications with their coordinator were positive. After a couple months from booking we reached out with a couple questions to no response. Our question was related to guest capacity because our contract said 175 limit, but our caterer was shocked to hear that and said they'd never done a group that large in the space, which really made us nervous as we invited 170 (157 came and it was tight). We followed up several weeks later and were told that person left the position and we would be contacted by a new individual closer to the wedding. We didn't have a point of contact for many months in between booking and our wedding, but were hopeful that once the new staff came in that it would be okay. Unfortunately, the team that took over were new and seemed to have not worked in the wedding industry before. We totally understand staff turnover and tried to give them the benefit of the doubt when we had trouble getting questions answered during our walk through 2 months prior to the wedding as the new person had only worked there 2 weeks. We have been new at jobs too! However, while our interactions remained cordial, the communication was slow, uncertain, contradictory at times and we never got the sense that they were trying to make a positive experience for us, but rather that we should be lucky we are allowed to use the space. I will spare the details, but our outside wedding coordinator we hired ran into dozens of communication difficulties with the venue and had trouble accessing basic needs in the building due to lack of knowledge or training with staff. We were shielded from many of the issues, but prior to the wedding we asked for the lights to be set to dim, which they were not (fine, not a big deal), but the staff member there didn't know how to turn them down and then the system froze. Another staff member came in on his day off to fix the system, which was nice, but he rather rudely blew me off when I approached him to say thank you. Keep in mind we didn't ask him to arrive, he just showed up. We had also paid for the museum to stay open 1 hour later for our guests, which it was not. Not huge deals, the wedding was great. However, after the wedding, we received a very off-putting email with essentially a pdf report card with ~20 bullet points including minute to minute updates of the weekend. They said we would not receive our deposit back, citing us for so many normal aspects of an event such sa vendors arriving 30 minutes earlier than estimated, a small vase of ours breaking on the dance floor and most notably for having food and drink in the lecture hall, which is the path to the bathroom. They said they were not going to return our security deposit because of these issues (and more). We have email confirmation of them telling us we can use the lecture hall freely even suggesting we put cocktail tables in there. This also contradicts the contract, which included other outdated information such as using their caterer Fresco, which doesn't exist. I have never sent an email to a business refuting a claim like this before, but I took an hour of my honeymoon to respond to these claims with our concerns. Luckily, they apologized and returned our security deposit. Overall, we understand staff turnover, but were really disappointed with the lack of training/tools for new staff, all of the communication errors and overall lack of warmth in our communication. We had a great day overall, but unfortunately can't recommend.

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