New to the boards: Looking for help with Venue ideas :)

Kjeff001

Hey Ladies! (and gents)

I'm sort of kind of recently engaged (we bought my ring and our bands last weekend, but I'm giving him time to plan a proper proposal), and we plan to have small wedding and reception in Las Vegas in April 2015. We're from the Ventura area, so I'm not too familiar with all the venues Vegas has to offer, and was just wondering if you guys could help me with ideas for ceremony, reception, and all the other fun things that come with having a destination wedding. Our budget is about $6000 if that helps idea wise. Thanks lots!!

Valeriecruz82

Ventura California?
Well first you can get tons of info and ideas from vegasgroom.com what kind of venue are you.looking for indoors or outdoors? Any idea how many guests you will be having? If not too many you can have an in suite reception, that's what I have planned unless you wanted something more formal. There's lots of options! Congratulations!

Rosebubbly

Congrats and welcome! Lots of choices here! You should check out vegasgroom.com and littlevegaswedding.com as a starting point.

Kjeff001

Thanks ladies! Umm I'm thinking about 40 ppl and I'm open to both indoor and outdoor venues. Oh, and yep, Ventura Ca. My family is coming from Los Angeles and his is coming from Santa Barbara. Thanks for the website suggestions!

Valeriecruz82

Nice! I'm from California too Los Angeles. Well I'm going to recommend my venue for an outdoor location at Flamingo They also have a really nice indoors chapel that they recently upgraded!

Kjeff001

Ok! I will definitely look into Flamingo! Thanks.

Rosebubbly

I booked aria chapel who has been FAB! But that's all I know so far!

Kjeff001

Are you doing some sort of reception @Rosebubbly ?

ssteele04

another Flamingo bride here! We are doing the indoor chapel at the Flamingo!

Rosebubbly

@kjeff001 yes...dinner and reception but am paralyzed by indecision so haven't finalized! Too many choices! Just want it to be fun!

Lisax4156

I'm getting married June 7th at the Excalibur and having a reception near the South Point Hotel. The place is called Together Forever Receptions. www.togetherforeverreceptions.com . My reception is about $2800, and includes open bar and buffet meal. You can design your own reception there. The coordinater is named Heather and she's very nice. Check out the website.  

kazzy

I think a great place to start is to think about what kind of wedding you are after. Outside of the standard "Vegas style" wedding packages at chapels, there are SO many options for all budgets and guestlist sizes. Formal country clubs, banquet halls and ballroom weddings, modern chapel weddings, rustic ranches, art galleries, outdoor nature weddings in the desert, vintage, the fun and offbeat including children's museums and aquariums, weddings with incredible views, private estates for rent, intimate insuite weddings, restaurant receptions and more. Overwhelmed yet?  

That's okay: VegasGroom has a great resource here [click for link] and I have a directory of wedding and reception venues sorted by style, capacity and budget on my site [click to go there.]

Kjeff001

Thank you guys! Thanks for the wedding anxiety @kazzy lol. Oh gosh, I think I want modern. Idk! I'll keep stalking both sites until my wedding vision is clear.

PrincessMich425

@Kjeff001 I'm in the same boat and attempting the not freak out at all of the options!!!

gladyscf

It can be overwhelming for sure!

We chose Always and Forever. They are on a lake and it's one-stop shopping for us. We felt the price was reasonable with what we could get with our package. So far they've been great to work with too.

Good luck!

Dropveter

The experiences of other brides helped me a lot making the decision as to where we'd have the ceremony. What do you envision your ceremony to be? Indoors or outdoors? In Vegas or just outside Vegas?

Another thing to keep in mind is whether you want to move around on your wedding day. If you want your ceremony and reception/dinner in one place it's worth researching the options at the bigger hotels. As PP statet Vegasgroom.com has a wealth of good info!

ps. We're getting married at the Valley of Fire

CaliRed

@Kjeff001 hey. I am doing mine at the stratosphere 12-13-14. Unforgettable views and it is very affordable!!!

a13049

I agree with PP getting more info on what you are looking for would help us in making recomendations for you.  I looked at alot of the vegas groom stuff and other online resources before maing our choice. I created a PP with embedded excel docs to compare prices, images and revews for each of our senarios/choices.  Yes, I'm kinda nerdy like that.  FI and I then sat down once we had all of the information gathered and went through and nixed each item one by one until we had our top choice.  We are having our wedding at Aria, dinner at Wickedspoon and then a party bus along the strip for some pictures.  Depedning on group size and who is interested we have bottle service reserved for us as well. My girls want to dance and his friends want to "pick up chicks" but I am not sure about some our older guests, so if a majority of our guests is our older family members we wont do that.  RIght now it looks like our younger guests are the ones who are excited about coming out, and those who don't want to hopefully wouldn't fell obligated to go?

Kjeff001

Thanks ladies for all of the feedback. For those who wanted to know more of what I'm looking for, we are a biracial couple (I'm african american and he is white) and this will be the first time our families will be meeting...ever. Kind of ridiculous since we've been together 5 1/2 years. I want to do some things over the time we're there that will be ice breakers and allow the families to mix together. There'll be about 40-50 people and our budget is $10,000 max. I'm open to weekends and weekdays and we'll have guest ages 1- 61 so family friendly activities are needed. I kind of want to have a night activity for the guest 21 and up for partying. Also, I'm interested in some form of reception after the ceremony. Thanks again!

cirena166

If you can, try to book anything that requires reserving space (ballrooms, etc) during the week, as prices are usually lower then, and food & beverage minimums may be lower. You might want to use the LVCVA's RFP (request for proposal) tool to get room blocks + wedding + meeting space here: http://www.vegasmeansbusiness.com/request-for-proposal/submit-your-own-rfp/ 

I got quotes from at least 15 different venues for my wedding, some of which were really competitive. I was also looking at 50 people, and most of the F&B minimums were around $3500-$4000 on a Saturday, which is a big chunk of the budget. 

You might want to think about Downtown over the Strip. While it's a little seedier, there's more museums (Neon Boneyard, Mob Museum, Mormon Fort, Children's Discovery Museum, closer to Springs Preserve), more walkability and lower prices. Also, the Golden Nugget's pool is the bomb - water slide through a shark tank! However, there is a strip club under the canopy, along with a jumble of performers, costumed characters, and beggars. 

If you're focused on the Strip, the Excalibur has an arcade and the jousting show (fun for kids and adults). Town Square, south of Mandalay Bay, has a new GameWorks arcade, movie theater, playground and park space. Mid-Strip you'll find both the Coca-Cola Store and M&Ms World for the kids.

More great spots for kids: Hoover Dam; Ethel M's Catcus Garden - see how chocolate is made and get a sample if you're lucky; Children's Interpretive Trail at Red Rock Canyon (not the casino); SkyZone, a huge indoor trampoline park. 

ssteele04

we chose the Flamingo Hotel to stay at b/c of the pool which is good for kids and the wildlife they have there