Hilton Garden Inn

About 3 weeks before our wedding date, the catering manager, Doree, with whom we'd been working informed us that she would no longer be working for the Hilton, which could have been a nightmarish experience. She, however, made sure that she got all of our information squared away and passed us on to the new catering manager, Christian, who took great care of us in the weeks leading up to our wedding.

Both of them were really good about answering our questions and making sure they had all the information they needed so that we didn't have to worry on the day of the wedding.

Through Doree, we were able to reserve the venue, select our hors d'oeuvres, view a wedding setup and take pictures and to have a complimentary food tasting (we decided to go buffet style with salmon and prime rib).

A couple days before the wedding, Christian met with us to tie up loose ends - including helping us with our reception timeline - and made sure we met with the banquet leader, Lissa. Because he saw were going to change for a surprise dance, he had a room across from the ballroom made available to us for the day to also use as storage and as a "break room." They helped us figure out the best way to set things up. Christian and Lissa did an excellent job of calming my nerves, and they took great care of us on the day of. Lissa even made sure to pack up the top tier of our wedding cake and put it in the fridge for us to take home and have the front desk hold some of our arrangements.

I took a star off for two reasons:

1) the champagne wasn't out for the toasts, but I think it may just have been off timing, since everything else went so well. Maybe I should have asked everyone to sync their watches ;). They did start pouring not long after the first toast ^_^.

2) sometimes it would take a while for Doree to respond to my emails, and because it took Christian a while to get our correct numbers - once he did, though, he was very good at calling us back and responding to all our questions.

Overall, though, I think this a great venue, and we are really happy that we decided to have our reception here. The people were great and really took care of us.