It's hard to put into words just how incredible Julia and her team were throughout all of the planning and entire weekend of our wedding in May this year. This review won't do it justice but we'll try!
From the minute we went to visit Garthmyl Hall we knew it was the right venue for us. We knew we wanted a venue where loads of our friends and family could stay for the weekend, everyone would feel at home and we had flexibility to choose the suppliers we wanted. Garthmyl Hall offers all of this with their stunning accommodation - all of the rooms in the main hall are gorgeous with en suite bathrooms and individually decorated, and the stables accommodation is just beautiful. All of the downstairs rooms in the hall are designed gorgeously and the grounds are incredible.
Julia was always on hand in the planning of the wedding, helping to avert any crisis, answering any random questions and can recommend so many amazing suppliers or you can choose your own - for local suppliers we used Tipples for table and crockery hire, Pheasant Botanica for flowers, ESL for lighting and speakers, Pedal and Push for pizzas, Helena Restall makeup and Tallulah's for catering - and we would recommend all of them a million times over, as well as all the suppliers that travelled slightly further afield for us!
We had a pizza night on the Friday (provided by Pedal and Push - also thoroughly recommend!!) with big firepits and the summerhouse bar open for drinks for everyone staying in the hall and stables. Such an amazing night to get excited with everyone and catch up with people the night before the big day. On the morning of the wedding I got ready with the bridesmaids and my mum and mother in law in the bridal suite and there was more than enough room for 7 of us plus videographer, photographer, 2 hair stylists and a makeup artist. I felt so calm getting ready on the morning of the wedding, knowing Julia and her amazing team were coordinating everything behind the scenes and I didn't have to worry about a thing - we also had a stylist (One Splendid Day) who did all of the styling of the ballroom and marquee etc - very much recommend doing this/seeing if your florist will provide this service for tables. It is worth every penny of the extra cost for you to be able to relax and enjoy. the weekend with your friends and family and not having to worry about setting up anything! The rest of our family had a breakfast in the dining room provided by Garthmyl Hall and the staff brought us up bacon sandwiches and orange juice/coffees while we were getting ready.
Before my husband/groomsmen/dads etc left for the church they met in the bar and had a pint and put on their buttonholes. We got married at the church in Berriew which is a 5 minutes drive from the hall and is a beautiful church with a gorgeous church yard.
We had our reception drinks in the walled garden/on the back lawn, followed by our meal in the marquee - we were so lucky with the weather and had all of the sides open which was just gorgeous. After the meal Julia and her team turned the marquee around for the evening while our guests went outside for cocktails around the firepits. We used the ballroom as a lounge area with the Garthmyl Hall sofas and Geoff the Giraffe (had to be done), a photobooth corner and a cheese table. We had the band and DJ set up in the marquee with the dance floor laid out by the hall which worked perfectly. The staff were amazing all day of the wedding moving flowers around to make sure they were still used beautifully, making sure there was enough wine on the tables, toast glasses topped up and if there was any crisis I can't say we heard about it or if we did there was already a solution so we didn't need to worry. Holly even gave two of my friends a lift back to their hotel at 3 in the morning when they had no idea of the time all night and totally missed their taxi lol. (Legend - we love you Holly.)
On Sunday morning the hall set up the marquee again for a buffet brunch, again making use of the flowers from the weekend which were gorgeous. We then had a chilled day and BBQ in the evening with friends and family - some who weren't staying with us still came back for it too. The food was INCREDIBLE - best bbq we'd ever eaten and SO MANY TYPES OF CHICKEN KEBAB. Andy is the BBQ king. It started to rain so we moved into the marquee, then optimistically moved outside to the firepits again for a singsong, to then be forced into the summerhouse due to downpours. We stayed in the summerhouse until midnight singing and dancing then moved to the ballroom where we had another party until 3am - the hall is so big that no one who went to bed earlier even realised we were up so late! The staff were amazing the whole time, running the bar, putting out our leftover cheeseboard from the wedding then helping us move it all in to the ballroom and leaving us to it when it was time for them to go home.
If you want the kind of wedding where you can make it truly your own, feeling like you've just got all of your friends and family together at a big house for an EPIC weekend with the most attentive, fun and chilled out staff, then Garthmyl Hall is the place for you. Even if everyone has to travel and stay in the area like our friends and family did for it, they will all say it was worth it. Julia, and all of the staff at Garthmyl hall we cannot thank you enough. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. You are absolutely incredible and deserve a million awards for how you run your weddings and events. We wish we could do our wedding all over again and would pick you all to run it for us all over again.