The Williamsburg Winery

The Wessex Hall at the Williamsburg Winery is a wonderful space. We had a little trouble communicating with the event coordinator, but our reception still turned out wonderfully. The Winery was very understanding when our guest list shrank dramatically the day of the wedding due to inclement weather and adjusted the cost accordingly. We were required to serve their wine, but I didn't mind at all.

When we got engaged, we knew immediately that we wanted to get married at The Williamsburg Winery. It is our favorite winery and the Wessex Hall is just gorgeous. Unfortunately, the treatment and inflexibility left a bad taste in our mouths and our memories of the winery are now tainted. You have very little choice as to when your event can start and the event manager is not very friendly or responsive. When we had questions, we had to call/email several times before we could get an answer. This was especially difficult since we were planning the wedding from out of town and couldn't simply go over there. We had to rely on phone calls and email. She treated our wedding as if it were a burden to her. When we arrived for the rehearsal (which had been scheduled months before) we were made to feel as if we were not allowed to be there.The wedding itself was beautiful and everything went well in the end, but unless you have strong ties to the winery, I would recommend you look elsewhere for a venue.

Rebecca, the new coordinator, was really great and responsive. The larger hall which we had is expensive, but the smaller hall would have been too small, even for our 80 people. It was just the right size for food, tables, a band, and 2 bars. The wine service is required and really too expensive, but the guests enjoyed it. I would recommend doing beer and wine only. We served liquor, too, but very few people had it, opting for the wine since they were at a winery. We had lit trees brought in, which I'd also recommend since it's somewhat dark in there at night. We had no problems with temperature. The winery was great, but don't stay at the Wedmore Place hotel on site, which is beautiful but the service there is awful.

We were looking for a rustic location in Williamsburg for our Christmas wedding. Colonial Williamsburg did not offer a venue that fit our vision so we were so excited when we found the Winery. The main reception hall is beautiful and has fireplaces at both ends...exactly what we wanted. The fees associated with the hall are high but what really pushes it over the edge is the wine fees. The wine is not that great and they are charging way too much. When I first started working with the winery I was dealing with their event coordinator that quit the month before my wedding. She was not too happy working there and informed us of all the restrictions enforced by the owners and stopped being responsive to my few and far between emails. We had expressed our plans to bring Christmas trees to the previous and new event coordinators and neither had said a word about that being a problem. The day before the wedding we showed up with 4 big trees that we needed to store in their warehouse. Not one word had been said to me that it would be a problem...the story quickly became that the trees were a problem and that we probably wouldn't be able to put them all in the hall because they may be a fire hazard. The hall is 4600 sq ft and we had about 80 guests....ultimately they fit just fine but we were definitely made to feel that we had overstepped our limits and were treated like criminals having to hide in the warehouse with the doors shut in case the owners walked by. Ridiculous. Also we had counted on having fires lit in the fireplaces since that was a huge selling point on the place. The restriction is that the temperature must fall below a certain degree for them to light...a restriction we met that evening but for some reason they could not light the fires and the only thing they could offer were candles on foil in front of the fireplace. Classy. Also they have several candles on pillars that went unlit all evening and bulbs that were requested to be changed were left unlit as well. I think the winery has a great deal of turnover, they do not maintain the facility that well for what you are paying for, and most any question or you request will be met with a sour faced "no". Ultimately we had a beautiful wedding there and everyone had a great time but I think you can find a better value elsewhere.

This was such a great place to have a bridal shower. They give you and your party a private tour and tasting. Then they had us sit down to a delicious lunch complete with warm cookies for dessert. Great menu, very flexible about letting my bridal party decorate the table and set up gifts. They also had a great selection of wines available for purchase. Very elegant and different, a really great location to host a luncheon bridal shower and the pictures also turned out beautifully.

My husband proposed here which made it perfect for the reception. We love the rustic look of the winery. We did not love the temperature. It was so HOT that it was almost unbareable. If you are set on having your reception here I would recomend having a late fall or winter wedding. We also did not realize how expensive it was going to be to have the reception here. Although the rental fees are afforable, the price of wine per person, secruity, dance floor, and extra time make this a costly choice for a reception.

The Winery was pretty responsive when I was looking for a venue a year before the wedding. But when it got closer to the date they weren't that responsive to my planner. The place is beautiful, but they need to do something about temperature control. The room that the girls got ready in was so hot. We're all sweaty by the time of the ceremony. The Susan Constant and Wessex Halls were hot too. My planner was afraid that someone might faint because of the heat. When my planner asked the staff about the temperature, one person told her that it's at the lowest setting and another person told her that the owner locked up the thermostate and they couldn't change it.

When choosing a location we knew we wanted something different, after our first visit to the Winery I was sold. The location is beautiful – so romantic. Our reception was in Wessex Hall (the largest of the rooms). Although the room is certainly no ornate ballroom it has a beautiful, rustic appeal. The layout of the room worked perfectly for us and since it was a beautiful day we were able to keep the balcony doors open and create a more open welcoming space. The appeal for the Winery to me is in it’s simple but rustic elegance, it also seemed to work great for the historical feel of our wedding weekend (the ceremony was on Jamestown Settlement). Our guests were blown away by the venue and found it to be very charming. Michelle was the planner at the Winery, we did not have to have too much contact with her but she was always quick to respond and everything went smoothly the day of. All the staff we encountered during our trips planning, at the wine tasting, and the day of the event were very pleasant and accommodating.