Atlanta and Marietta Venue Spotlight - Marlow House

I had a chance to visit the Marlow House yesterday and chatted with Ms. Rebecca who is in charge.

If you had not been to Marlow House since its most recent renovation, it's time to take a look.

While the outside of the house is still painted blue and maintains the Victorian look, the inside of the house has been transformed into a contemporary venue.

In my opinion, this venue is perfect if your guest list is 100 or below. It is intimate and the neutral palette allows you to do whatever color combination you want for your wedding.

If your guest list is above 100, be prepared to have guests seated in the garden and front porch area.

Bay window that overlooks the garden

Ceremony is either indoor near the bay window or outdoor in the garden area. For those who prefer a chapel wedding, Rebecca told me there are 2 nearby chapels who rent the space for weddings.

Compared to a lot of other venues, Marlow House is considerably flexible with the use of your vendors. The only requirement is to use the in-house caterer, Carriage House Catering. They even include some floral budget for the guest tables, buffet table and cake table.

I was also excited to see a grand piano in the house. The area can easily be used as a lounge area and you can have your own pianist play some music during the cocktail hour while guests hang out.

I would love to bring a wedding here. If you are looking for an intimate venue, this is a good choice to consider.

Morrow Center Open House

Yesterday I had a chance to attend a special open house at Morrow Center with catering by Contemporary Catering, Inc.

This was my first time visiting this venue and it took me a while to find the place before figuring out that it was actually right next door to the Macy’s at Southlake Mall.

Morrow Center has a very large and nice ballroom with a maximum capacity of 320 people for banquet seating. It was totally different from what I expected when I was driving around the mall’s parking lot. While Morrow Center does have a few preferred caterers including Contemporary Catering, they also allow outside caterers with an extra fee and background investigations.

The food by Contemporary Catering was pretty good. They brought their favorites to share with us and I really enjoyed my dinner. The décor they supplied for the buffet tables was also very beautiful. I had a good chat with their manager about their catering services and I like the fact that they use their own employees instead of temporary agency for their service staff.

It is always nice to check out new venues and meet with new vendors! I would never have known about such a venue right next to Southlake Mall if I had not gone to the open house last night!

09/12/2010: 173 Carlyle House Open House

Source of Image: http://www.173carlylehouse.com/

I had a chance to go to the Open House at 173 Carlyle House yesterday.

While I had driven past this event venue in Historic Norcross several times before, this is the first time I was able to check it out.

173 Carlyle House has an elegant ballroom that can accommodate up to 200 people as well as several cozy rooms available for pre reception event. The courtyard space is also available for couples who want to get married outside. For larger events, the courtyard space allows outdoor dining as well.

One thing I like about this venue is definitely the food. Owned by Chef William Janousek (who was actually serving the meat at the chef station yesterday!), I can see that he pays a great deal of attention to the food quality at 173 Carlyle House. We especially love the various canapes! They were yummy and I could see the guests eating a lot of them during cocktail hour!

173 Carlyle House also serves various wedding cake samples that were baked in house yesterday and they were delicious! The pricing for the wedding cake is very reasonable as well. I will highly recommend brides who are getting married here to get the wedding cake in house to save on the cake cutting fee.

I also like the relatively neutral ballroom as it offers a lot of opportunities for brides to choose various color combinations that will work well to personalize their own event. For brides who want to bring in ethnic food to compliment Chef Janousek's tasty creations, I was informed that as long as the minimum on food and beverage has been met, 173 Carlyle House welcomes the couple to bring in some outside dishes that reflect their cultures or to show off that proud family traditional recipe! This is a flexibility that not many venues allow and in my mind, it is definitely a big huge plus!

If you are looking for a historic house to host your event in Atlanta, definitely consider 173 Carlyle House. Besides weddings, they also host other events such as holiday parties and one can choose between the ballroom or the other private rooms depending on the group size.

Have fun planning!