dne24's reviews

I wish that I had all the best things to say about this place to warrant how it touts it as “The number 2 best place to get married in the world, rated by the Travel Channel.” The only thing I can ask is why?

Yes this place is pretty and the historic elements of it impressive but ever since we signed the contract it has been nothing but worry after dropping the pen and sending in the deposit. First off, during negotiations they were, unlike other hotels, completely unwilling to negotiate on any terms to help defray the extremely expensive cost of holding a wedding there. This should have been our first sign. Since then they have nickel and dimed us at every turn.

1. Room Rates
We were hoping to be able to block a room for our guests to stay there. They required 30 rooms to be booked upon signing and even with the minimal discount the rooms were still well over $200 and near $300! Needless to say we were able to find a super accommodating and beautiful hotel for our guests at the Loews Coronado Bay.

2. Key Card for Dressing Room
We are supposed to have 2 dressing rooms for our wedding. The dressing rooms are these dingy conference rooms without mirrors or anything. We thought well if we don’t use them as dressing rooms, then we can at least use them to store our stuff so it is closer to the ballroom. To get a keycard for the room it would be $100.

3. Tasting
Even though we are hoping to offer choices for our guests, they only provided us 2 choices for the tasting. As well as only 1 type of wine to taste. In addition, they said that to taste extra it was $50 an entrée choice. We also were not given the option to taste any of the cocktail hour selections (would cost an additional $25) or even any signature cocktails. Given we are spending well over the tens of thousands at this place it seems absolutely absurd.

4. Resort Fee for “free rooms”
Even though we have 3 free rooms at this place we will have to pay a $25 resort fee. We’re not even going to stay there or use any of the resort facilities.

I am not sure how this place is run but probably very poorly since all these hidden costs are required to either keep it operationally viable or just feed their own wallets. The best place in the world to get married? I think not. I have yet to have my wedding there but if I could pull out I would. I just hope they don’t ruin it.

Was not too fond of this place, the staff was a bit brash and even though I had an appointment service was a bit slow and chaotic. They have a lot of dresses-- they especially have a lot of the sleeker evening gown styles-- but the condition of samples was not that great and the dressing rooms and mirrors also needed a bit of touch-up/upkeep. One cool thing about this place though is that they actually pin you in the dress instead of using clips so you can see what it would really look like (without all the chip-clips).

I had truly a great experience at Saks, although I had to wait a bit. Amelia was superhelpful and never rushed me throughout the process. Her and her team brought out so many more dresses for me to try, some of them were even better than the ones that I considered myself. They understood how big of a decision it was and let me spend as much time as possible in each dress. Everyone made it a relaxing and fun experience. Plus they have some great designers there from Vera to Kenneth Pool to Amsale. I even got to try on this amazing Oscar De La Renta dress that was on display! I'm still deciding on my dress but I would highly recommend going to this salon.

I wish that I had read these reviews before heading all the way there. I scheduled a few appointments in the area so it was okay that it was just a stop on the road. From the moment I entered I felt a bit uncomfortable. When I called they had made a big deal about scheduling a set time to come in, but then when I went in they looked super-confused when I said I had an appointment. The first thing I was told when they figured out my appointment was that they had a 5 dress limit. The person who helped me was nice enough but she continued to be confused by many things throughout the process. Compared to other salons I've been to it wasn't the best, but they do have a decent selection of dresses and condition of samples were good.

Brides of California was a small shop but had a pretty big selection of dresses. Compared to other salons I would say this one is more of the "self-service" type where you can browse, pick what you want to try on, then try it on yourself. The staff is pretty hands-off in that they don't help you try on the dress and they don't help you fit it. They will pin you though if you ask and they will help you with veils, you just have to ask for it. I didn't really find anything during my trip there but they did have a lot of bridesmaid samples so I might go back when I'm ready for that! Oh and they had really, almost shockingly, affordable prices.

We visited the South Coast Winery during a weekend bridal event in Temecula and it was by far the best winery in the region. Their main indoor ballroom was right off the entrance but really beautiful and a great space. But the inner courtyard with stairs leading down to the patio was by far our favorite-- in fact the picture of us in the profile pic was taken on those very stairs =o). The barrel room adjacent to the patio was too small for our party and we wanted sort of an indoor/outdoor so it didn't work out for us, but this was definitely our "temeculan" fave. We hope to include it as part of our wedding weekend...