Hey, you Pittsburgh folk. If you were going to have a nonreligious wedding ceremony and a reception at the same venue, let's say sometime in the fall, which venues immediately spring to mind as ideal locations?
If I had mine to do again, it would be at the aquarium at the zoo.
Phipps has some fairly restrictive catering rules, from what I remember, but would be amazing for photography. I believe you can rent out sections of the Natural History museum as well for private events, and think the Sculpture Hall would be awesome. As long as no one got drunk and knocked anything over.
The professional group I'm on the board of had an anniversary event at the History Center that was fantastic. I'm not sure how the pricing has changed since they went Smithsonian though, we were able to afford it as a nonprofit several years ago. The bonus of that is that there's a new hotel across the street for out of town guests.
I guess a lot of it would depend on the size of your group and your budget. As cheesy as it sounds, apparently the LeMont has a lower second floor that is exclusively used for weddings and receptions. But if you went smaller, I hear Isabella could accomodate as well.
Andrea and I toyed with the idea of getting married next to the Leafy Sea Dragons, but we couldn't figure out how there could possibly be enough room there for a ceremony and reception.
Have you been back to the 'burgh since they opened the Polar Bear tunnel? They've got rentable space in that section as well. (If you haven't been back, you enter through the polar bear tunnel, then there is a fairly large wall of water which I believe fronts to the sea otters, and then you exit through a large shark tunnel. The polar bears are the very next exhibit after you exit the aquarium.) I don't know your budget, but I'd bet they'd be down with you having the wedding in one and the reception/dancing in the other.
All that said, I have a colleague that did have both her ceremony and reception in the aquarium proper - so it's doable - she's where I got the idea from.
Thanks for all your help! Question - do you know when your colleague got married? We've read elsewhere that in 2006 the Aquarium did not allow ceremonies, just receptions.
Check out the Succop Conservancy, especially if you like outdoors. I shot a wedding there, ceremony/reception in the same place, it was lovely and well organized. Only disadvantage is being way out in Butler, but there's plenty of parking out there. Not sure about hotels nearby, might be able to arrange shuttle service if necessary.
This is where we did our nondenominational wedding & reception immediately afterward. It's BYOA, which saves a shitton of money. Also it's beautiful and awesome. But it books up quickly.
They have three caterers that you can use if you go there. Two are fairly traditional and one is a little more creative and will work with you to figure out some different options. We used one of the traditional ones, picked pretty much randomly - we had a big crowd, so while I would have loved a bit of variety, it wasn't really going to be an option financially.
My friends Ryan and Emily had their ceremony and reception at the Rivers Club on Grant Street downtown. The place was really nice, they apparently allowed a lot of leeway when it came to decorations and such, and I guess it wasn't terribly expensive.
I forgot about this yesterday, but there's also The Priory. I know someone who had a nontraditional, nondenominational ceremony there and spoke very highly of it. Bonus points for it also having hotel space. (Though right now it looks like the only weekend they have open in October is Halloween.)
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Phipps has some fairly restrictive catering rules, from what I remember, but would be amazing for photography. I believe you can rent out sections of the Natural History museum as well for private events, and think the Sculpture Hall would be awesome. As long as no one got drunk and knocked anything over.
The professional group I'm on the board of had an anniversary event at the History Center that was fantastic. I'm not sure how the pricing has changed since they went Smithsonian though, we were able to afford it as a nonprofit several years ago. The bonus of that is that there's a new hotel across the street for out of town guests.
I guess a lot of it would depend on the size of your group and your budget. As cheesy as it sounds, apparently the LeMont has a lower second floor that is exclusively used for weddings and receptions. But if you went smaller, I hear Isabella could accomodate as well.
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All that said, I have a colleague that did have both her ceremony and reception in the aquarium proper - so it's doable - she's where I got the idea from.
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http://www.weddingbee.com/2009/03/11/love-again-portraits/
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