I worked a wedding show today. I would guess 8/10 brides we saw plan on getting married in a barn. Burlap and lace are here to stay. Until 2-3 years from now when all of the people who renovated barns to rent out for event space go bankrupt when the trend dies. But I'm afraid that won't be in 2016 and 2017 my friends.
Re: Barns: A PSA
I was born and raised on the fringe of the suburbs/country where barns are either full of cows or full of horses and most are from the early 1900s and barely standing. It would never, ever occur to me that one of those structures could be wedding appropriate. Weddings occurred in a church with a reception at a banquet hall or country club. That was it. If you wanted outdoors you went to a public park.
Is Pinterest solely to blame? Who got married in a barn before cute country-chic pictures were published on Pinterest?
I DID know I didn't want a wedding in a hotel or anything that resembled a ballroom. We also didn't want a church wedding. I grew up very Christian and while I'm not now, I didn't feel right having a church wedding if we didn't believe what was included in the ceremony. H's family (from Wyoming) are all very blue collar country people and I didn't want them to feel out of place, having to wear suits etc. But, I also didn't want to go completely low end and have it in the VFW hall or something like that. So, this space worked for us.
As for my venue, they've been there about 10 years. The barn was built in the 1880s and moved to the site when the city wanted to tear it down to build affordable housing. So the now-owner paid to have it moved to their property, which they live on in an 1880s house (they've lived there 25 years). There's stables on the property as well, but not next to the barn. The barn itself was retrofitted to be ADA compliant and is a straight up event venue... has a sound system, real bathrooms, a small kitchen, and HVAC (heating/air).
In chatting with the owner (who is an old cowboy looking guy), he said this barn popularity is helping his business out quite a bit, he said in 2015 they had 72 events there (not just weddings).
And, I completely acknowledge it was trendy as fuck to have my wedding in a barn. My dress was super trendy too. And, I pretty much don't care. We had an awesome wedding.
I live in Metro Detroit. Yes, there are real farms all over the state, but there aren't barns in Detroit! People in the outskirt suburbs are literally building barns just for weddings.
Something for everyone, right?) A friend of mine got married at an old Southern Plantation which I thought was so cool (she was on the front end of vintage chic trend). I like the concept of a barn so long as it's not one just vacated by cows; just, like I said, no idea who first thought of that.
I laughed at this national paper article about non-traditional wedding venues. It suggested your local library or museum as a way to save money. Um, those are among the most expensive venues in Chicago...
I think I looked it up once and it would be like 15 grand.
And yeah, the cheapest options around here are the traditional "wedding factory" type venues.
Our venue is a converted industrial warehouse space, and the manager told me that a lot of the couples booking it say they're trying to depart from the rustic look to do something different. So that may become a thing at some point.
It wasn't my thing, but I still think they can be very pretty
"Love is the one thing we're capable of perceiving that transcends time and space."
Someone else just mentioned warehouse weddings; my friend got married in the warehouse of a brewery. It was a great atmosphere, if not a little rough on the acoustics for speeches and loud dance music.
And I don't understand what it is about that theme that has so many city brides clamoring for event spaces, that people are literally building barns just for weddings.
I really wanted a warehouse for our wedding! I sell industrial equipment so I'm in at least 10 plants a week, and Detroit has 2 really cool historical car plants that are now event spaces that I would have loved to use, but FI didn't love them as much as I did.
Most barn venues don't actually have HORSES in them, are you kidding me?
Horses = ticks
Horses =/= event venue (that I've ever seen, or would actually attend)
There are a few Barn Venues in my area that actually are working barns. So for me, I would not have my wedding there, or at a couple of the state parks in my area either, because I hate port-a-pottys, ticks, snakes, coyote poop, etc.