The Cookery Reviews

We recently celebrated our wedding at The Cookery, and we couldn't be more thrilled with our choice. From the moment we laid eyes on the historic building with its ties to the city of Durham, we knew it was the perfect setting for our special day. The ambiance created by the venue's historic significance added a touch of magic to our wedding day.

What truly sets The Cookery apart is the exceptional staff. From the initial stages of planning to the big day itself, the staff went above and beyond to make sure every detail was perfect. Their warmth and friendliness made us feel like we were among friends, and they extended the same hospitality to our guests. Communication was seamless, and their attention to our needs was commendable.

The flexibility of the multiple spaces within the venue allowed us to create the wedding of our dreams. Our guests were equally enamored with the versatility of the venue, praising its unique charm and inviting atmosphere.

We are grateful to the entire team at The Cookery for their dedication and commitment to making our day truly special. It exceeded our expectations in every way, and we wholeheartedly recommend it to couples seeking a one-of-a-kind wedding experience.

My husband and I had our wedding at The Cookery and could not be happier with our choice! We were truly blessed to have found such an amazing venue that fit our style, had the most helpful staff, and had the best bar, catering and any add on options you could want! The venue is beautiful and has so many spaces, which makes it versatile and fit for any wedding vision! We cannot thank The Cookery (especially Katie and Virginia) enough for making our day perfect! 10/10 recommend!

We hosted our daughter's wedding reception at the Cookery. It was a pleasure to work with the staff. Everything was ready to go and flowed beautifully. The guests had space to play games or dance the night away; the Cookery was the perfect venue for our daughter's wedding reception!

When we looked at the Cookery we knew right away that it was the perfect venue for us. Having multiple indoor and outdoor areas is ideal, and not easy to find. There is plenty of space throughout the venue, so your guests dont feel overcrowded, and it's gorgeous even before any additional decor. Not to mention everyone we worked with at the Cookery was great, and extremely responsive & professional. The night of the wedding so many of our guests complimented the amazing bar service & how nice all of the staff was as well. I would highly recommend The Cookery!

The Cookery was an excellent wedding venue. The manager (Katie) was very responsive to all of our questions and the preferred vendors were all wonderful to work with. We could not have picked a better place for our special day and many of our wedding guests commented on how intimate and unique the space is as well as how well the wedding went. Having multiple spaces to use really helped with the flow. The Cookery was great for our wedding but also would be great for other events.

We loved our experience with The Cookery for our wedding this fall! We original selected The Cookery because of the ambiance and the many different spaces it offers - and it was even better than expected when we saw each of the distinct spaces (the Garden, the Reception Hall, the Front Room, and Upstairs) come to life on our wedding day. The interior is moody, yet inviting and the exposed brick really shine in candlelight. More than the ambiance, our experience working with the staff at The Cookery and their preferred vendors was incredible. We would highly recommend The Cookery to anyone planning a wedding in the area. It was amazing!

The Cookery provided the perfect venue for our wedding celebration!! We really appreciated the opportunity to have four distinct spaces to flow through for different parts of the evening. We absolutely loved the Durham history that lives in many of the details throughout the building. The space is gorgeous on its own and doesn’t require much additional decoration. It provided a beautiful backdrop for our industrial-chic, fall wedding and we have received so many compliments about how unique the venue was. Furthermore, the staff at The Cookery was wonderful to work with. They were very communicative, flexible, and accommodating. We would absolutely recommend this venue for those looking to get married in Durham!

The Cookery was an incredible venue to have our wedding at! The space is beautiful and versatile - it was awesome to have indoor and outdoor spaces for our guests to spend time in. The planning process was super easy and we had plenty of options to choose from for catering (we went with Durham Catering Co.). Rentals were super easy as well with American Party Rentals. Juli was incredible to work with, and the staff the day of were so professional (shout out to the bartender who gave me straws for my champagne!). 11/10 for our experience here :)

The Cookery had everything we wanted for our wedding. The main thing we loved about the venue was that there was a separate space for the ceremony, the cocktail hour, and the reception. While the venue was a dream come true, it really was the staff that made our night turn out so perfectly. Starting with Tammy, I felt like I could reach out to her about anything, big or small, without feeling like I was inconveniencing her. This was huge for me. Planning a wedding when you have not planned any large event before can be a bit scary and I felt very comfortable with the whole process knowing I had her support.
On the actual wedding day, the staff were amazing and so friendly. I felt like they went above and beyond. We really appreciated all that the staff did to keep things moving seamlessly. We had so many compliments about the space, it was a huge hit with the guests. I can honestly say that The Cookery as a venue coupled with the amazing staff, made all of our wedding dreams come true.
Photo Credit: Copper Key Photos
https://www.facebook.com/copperkeyphoto/

The Cookery was absolutely the most amazing venue! People could not stop complimenting us on how beautiful the venue was. Love that we had options to be inside and outside with multiple bars. The bridal suite was amazing and had ample space for us to get ready. Juli was amazing throughout the whole process with answering all of our million questions and was very prompt in response. The biggest aspect that we loved about the Cookery was the staff. All of our guests kept complimenting us on their service. They were prompt and polite and helped add to the amazing atmosphere of the venue. We hope we have friends that get married there one day cause we would love to experience this amazing venue again! Thank you so much The Cookery!!

We had our wedding at the Cookery June 15, 2019 and it was the PERFECT day. The Cookery and their staff played such a big roll in making the day perfect. For the past year and half Juli answered my thousands of questions with quickly and kindly. I am event planner myself so my questions were very detailed and frequent and seriously Juli was so great dealing my with constant inquiries. She made sure my rental order matched the layout, helped navigate parking issues, recommended vendors, and so much more!

The venue itself is also amazing. We loved being able to have our ceremony in the garden area. We did decide to have a tent due to the heat and sun around 4:00 p.m. The ceremony still looked beautiful. Our guests loved just being able to go right to the cocktail area after the ceremony. We got so many compliments on the flow of the wedding, the beauty of the space, and the location.

BOOK THE COOKERY!

Definitely go see the venue in person first if the location is a potential concern, once you're inside it's private and inviting. Having four distinct spaces gave us plenty of flexibility to deal with potential weather issues, while being able to create comfortable areas for all of our guests. The entire venue was beautiful and did not require much additional decoration to make it special. The team did a great job taking care of us and our guests, even incorporating small details from our design without prompting to make everything feel more cohesive. Tammy was on top of things from start to finish, communicating everything we needed to know during the planning process and being quick to answer any questions we had.

We had a Sunday wedding at the Cookery, and rented the full grounds. Leading up to the wedding, we were in touch with Juli (pre-contract signing) and Tammy (post-contract signing) about once or twice a week, and they were always responsive, helpful, and thorough when faced with our many questions. We had a few in-person meetings also, which sold us on the venue; it's a unique and beautiful space, it doesn't require too much additional decoration, and the different rooms give you flexibility. (The bridal suite is especially beautiful and classy, not the usual pink-and-white space I'd seen at other venues.) On the day of the wedding, the staff was extremely friendly and accommodating. Regarding payment/cost, the Cookery rolls many of the vendor payments into their contract, which we found convenient. It's definitely a pricier venue, but if it's in your budget, it's worth it. We really enjoyed working with Tammy, and our guests loved the space. We wouldn't have changed anything about our wedding.

BOOK THIS VENUE!!! Leading up to our wedding, everyone we know warned us “something on your wedding day will go wrong”.... This is not true at the Cookery. The Cookery is truly a standout and unique location for a wedding reception, and Juli made sure that everything went off without a hitch! Not only did she answer the 1,000,000,000 questions I had in the months leading up to our event, she took the time and care day of to make sure we were happy, having fun, and enjoying our reception. The Cookery itself is like no other. The exposed brick and iron work captures the spirit of Durham,the bridal suite is beautifully furnished, and their preferred vendors capture the foodie city that Durham is. What a talented group! Thank you Juli!

We absolutely LOVED working with Juli at the Cookery. She was professional, kind, supportive, and super super helpful. I can’t tell you how many times my fiancé and I said “how would we ever have done this without Juli?”! The Cookery makes the very daunting task of planning a wedding feel easy, and we are forever grateful for the role they played in ours. On the day of, the space worked out perfectly and the bartenders and drinks were amazing. Our guests had so much fun and felt totally taken care of, which is all we could’ve hoped for. Thank you to the whole Cookery team for everything!!!

The Cookery was the only venue we saw and we booked it immediately and I’m so glad we did! We wanted something that strayed from the traditional, and the exposed brick walls and industrial feeling of The Cookery gave us all we wanted. We actually booked before the expansion, and we loved the venue even more after the expansion was finished. We actually worked closely with Juli first before transitioning over to Tammy so that Juli could focus on her own wedding. They were both very kind and responsive and easy to work with. We rented on a Tuesday afternoon which cut the cost substantially. I will say, others have said that the rental included dinnerware, but we didn’t have dinnerware included, we were referred to American Party Rentals. Tables, chairs, and glassware was included, though! We were also able to have our ceremony and reception in the same place, which was nice since our families drove 2 1/2 hours to come. We received many compliments on how gorgeous the venue is and there was ample space for our 50 guests. We had a dance floor and photobooth along with eight tables in the front room where we had our reception. Most ceremonies face the windows in the ballroom, but we opted to have ours facing the gorgeous archways and I loved it so much more. The bridal suite was also AMAZING — we had six bridesmaids, myself, a makeup artist, my mom, several friends moms, and more all in there at once at one point. There’s tons of room and gorgeous light and they actually gave us a complimentary bottle of champagne! Another perk is that the venue is so stunning that minimal decoration makes everything pop. We used beakers and flasks for flowers and it was simple and stunning. We adored The Cookery and would absolutely choose them again.

My husband and I chose the Cookery for our wedding because of the beautiful atmosphere, flexible event space, great food and bar options, and amazing staff. We could not have been happier with how our event turned out. The Cookery staff helped us plan every detail of our wedding day, were quick to answer any and all questions that we had, and accommodated our special requests and timeline changes. I highly recommend them to anyone planning a special event.

Choosing the Cookery was a pretty easy decision - we were thrilled to have such an elegant venue in such a central location. We loved the glow of the market lights and immediately I could picture the reception in the Front Room. Since we booked, the added space (and especially the bridal suite) was a huge bonus and I can't imagine my day without that now. Tammy, the venue manager, is just incredible. She knows her stuff and is extremely high energy and from day one she was on top of our event process. I felt very safe in her hands. The venue looked like a dream on the day of and the intimacy of the Front Room made for a lively party. I am so thrilled with our choice and would recommend it to anyone looking for a downtown Durham venue!

The Cookery could only be described as a dream venue. Tammy made the process so simple, kept me up to date on what was needed, and was always responsive to my e-mails. Our day went off without a hitch (or at least we didn't notice any!). The space is absolutely beautiful and though we had out of this world flowers, the space doesn't need a lot of decoration! The staff were amazing. Wedding planning can be very stressful but Tammy and the staff at the Cookery take a lot of that stress away. It is helpful that a lot is included when you book the space, and that they have fantastic vendors that you can book through them. Thank you!

We just had our November wedding at The Cookery and it was amazing! We were able to use the entire grounds for our ceremony and reception. The new Ballroom is beautiful and I couldn't imagine having our ceremony anywhere else. Juli worked with us from the beginning and was extremely accommodation. She was quick to respond and was super easy to work with. She was able to make sure all of the venue details were handled in advance so during our wedding we didn't worry about a thing! Also, their bartending staff were incredible! I hope they received as many compliments about their service as I did! The Cookery is a phenomenal venue and it was perfect for our wedding!

We hosted our wedding at the cookery just this weekend and it was the best decision we made in the planning process. Especially with the new expansion, the cookery is the absolutely perfect venue. We hosted a wedding of 125 people there and it was the right amount of space for a 7-piece band, a dance floor and buffet dinner, all held in the new expanded space). There was a really nice flow between the front room, the patio and the larger banquet hall.

As a Durham native planning from out of town, the Cookery felt like a warm and homey place to host our wedding. The venue has amazing historical elements from Durham, the bar was fantastic (complete with signature cocktails and local beer), and the combination of indoor and outdoor space was ideal for every guest. The event staff is extremely responsive and accommodating; Tammy went above and beyond, even re-doing our event layout days before the wedding. Plus, their inventory of items is extensive, including glassware, plates, chairs, etc. They have close ties with American party rentals which made the rental process very easy, and Tammy reviewed our layout to make sure that we weren't missing anything. Their list of preferred vendors makes it almost like a one-stop shop for your wedding, but also allows a great deal of customization and unique touches. Plus, the space is so well designed that you really don't need much in the way of decor. I can't recommend this place enough!! It felt like just about the most "Durham" venue we could have found.

Tammy and her team at the Cookery were wonderful. Super organized, professional and accommodating -- which I think are the most important qualities to have in any venue! I had my wedding at the newly renovated space and it was perfect, spacious and beautiful. Thank you Tammy!

The Cookery was the PERFECT venue for our wedding ceremony and reception! I really liked that we could hold both in one place, so that we (and our guests) didn't waste time driving around between the ceremony and reception. It is a beautiful place, full of Durham history, and the staff, especially Tammy (the on-site coordinator) is wonderful. They couldn't have made planning any easier, or been any friendlier or more accommodating! We got so many compliments on the lovely space and delicious cocktails made by the bartenders. It was the perfect setting for our big day and I wish we could do it again! Maybe a 10-year vow renewal... Seriously, book The Cookery and you will not be disappointed. I especially loved how much inventory they had on hand (silverware, chairs, tables, etc.) that kept us from having to rent all of that stuff. Highly recommend!

The Cookery is a beautiful venue with lovely staff. We had our wedding ceremony and reception here for 100 guests. Some of the perks for the venue are they provide tables, chairs, silverware and glassware but the biggest perk is the venue coordinator Tammy. Tammy is wonderful to work with, kind, excited, and incredibly detail oriented. She is an expert and made sure everything went off without a hitch. The bar staff was also wonderful. The venue itself looks beautiful during the day or at night and is steeped in rich Durham history (which sold us on it!).

I cannot imagine a more perfect place for our wedding reception than The Cookery! It was a perfect backdrop for our event and all of our guests were raving about how beautiful it was. Tammy was incredibly helpful through the planning process and we could not have done it without her. She came with us to our appointment for linens and took care of the bar, tables, tent, and valet and was crucial for setting the room layout and timeline. The bartenders were great and drinks delicious! In the Cookery we were able to have the intimate event that we wanted while still having quite a lot of guests. We loved every moment of working with the team there and having our reception at this venue!!