Cylburn Arboretum

tected from the rain on our wedding day. (Keep in mind the staff here are only there to keep an eye on the building; they are not wedding coordinators.)

. The issues I had were not with the venue itself, but the staff. I attended one of the wedding information sessions with Laurie Boswell. We were informed that we had to email Laurie one year in advance to book, while competing with others vying for the same date. The day came and I emailed her, and then waited for a response. I was unable to book my photographer until I made sure I had the venue. I left a message and waited more. I finally got a response back claiming she emailed me days ago saying that I had the date, although I got no email. When I received the bill, it was incorrect. She charged me for the price of Saturday rather than the lower price for a Friday wedding. I addressed this and waited two weeks to get a new invoice…and it was wrong again. She charged me $1000 for the use of the gardens for the ceremony. She claimed that to have the ceremony in the garden (a standing ceremony, mind you), it would be $1000. During the walk-through, she did not mention anything about an additional cost. I addressed my concerns and she was very unprofessional and would not admit that she gave me false information. After this, I stopped getting responses. Finally, a man emailed that Laurie was out due to medical issues. I understand that situation was unavoidable, but it was very unprofessional for no one to respond in her absence.I can only imagine how the brides whose weddings were during that time felt when their calls and emails were going unanswered. A few weeks later, I emailed about some additional questions and did not hear anything again. Phone calls, messages, nothing. In order to book my other vendors, I needed communication from my venue site. My food vendor even tried to contact them on my behalf with no success. I finally got a response from Anna. She was taking over Laurie’s position (no idea who that random man was). She seemed professional and I started to think “maybe things will turn around.” When it came time to send out the remaining balance, I asked for the address, which she emailed. After a week, I emailed to see if she received it, which she had not. A week later, the letter returned with a stamp stating “undeliverable.” I sent a photo of the letter and confirmed the address. She responded stating that the address I had was wrong. Let me remind you that she emailed me the address herself. She did not acknowledge her error or apologize. I didn’t trust mailing it, so I had to have my husband take time off of work to hand deliver it to her to prevent any further confusion. Finally, we’re having the rehearsal. I mentioned that we’re having photos taken prior to the wedding in the venue, and expressed concern that guests would be wandering around and see us. Anna said that she could stand by the doors and direct guests to stay in the one room. I was planning on asking a close friend to do it, but instead I took Anna up on her offer. Lo and behold, prior to the wedding, she was not directing guests and several people were wandering around the venue while we were trying to take photos. I would recommend this venue only to someone with a wedding planner or someone who is willing to spend the time and effort harassing the employees to do their jobs. Be prepared to do EVERYTHING yourself, and double check their work at all times.

pecial, helping us connect with other vendors and staying on site all day helping with directions and offering congratulations.

both the reservation process and the former event coordinator that we worked with at the beginning of our planning. The reservation process is at best, annoying. To make a reservation, you need to email the event coordinator one year and one day in advance of the date that you would like and it is first come first serve, though we were told if multiple people emailed, that might increase our chances. So, we had all of our friends set scheduled emails to be sent at the strike of midnight. We didn’t end up getting our first date as apparently someone beat us, though they ended up giving us our second choice. This process may very well have changed with the new event coordinator. After a few months of disorganized communication and a hassle of trying to get in touch with our event coordinator, she ended up moving on from the position and Anna Perry stepped into the role. What a difference! Anna jumped right into her role and made the remainder of the planning process and the actual day of our wedding a complete breeze, especially in being new to the arboretum! We also had a particularly difficult caterer (Chowhound food truck) which added additional stress and frustration to our wedding day, and Anna was such a blessing to have as she did all that she could to take some of the work and anxiety off of our plate. We held our ceremony on the east lawn outside of the mansion and it was absolutely beautiful. We then had our reception in the Vollmer Center with 165 guests. It was so wonderful! We used the tables and chairs available at the Vollmer Center and it looked wonderful. We highly recommend this space for it’s beauty, cost, dedication to environmental preservation and sustainability, and supportive staff. Our guests loved it and so did we! We were thrilled to be able to support a city park through our wedding day.

Hampden neighborhood of Baltimore (on the other side of 83 from the Conservatory). Everything worked out perfectly and it was a beautiful day. Now back to the Conservatory. We booked the Conservatory a year ago. Due to the Spring flower show the only date they could give us in the late spring was April 29th. So we took it and sent them our $1000 deposit. Now, the process getting ahold of the event coordinator (Laurie Boswell) was painstaking. She hardly ever responded to emails and I would call multiple times a day for multiple days in a row trying to get ahold of her. And this was just to try to book the venue! So I eventually got ahold of her for the paperwork, sent her the deposit, got a confirmation that she had received it, and thought we were all set to have our wedding. I get a call in early/mid August 2016 from Mrs. Boswell informing me that our wedding had been double booked with the Charm City Bluegrass festival (which she swore was not her fault as they have multiple calendars at the office she works). How could you not know there is a 5000+ person festival going on at the venue you run events for? And apparently this was not the first year of the festival. Although they did say we could still have our wedding on that day, obviously we decided against it given the security/parking/noise nightmare it would have created. Mrs. Boswell was apologetic and did offer us the conservatory or arboretum for 1/2 price on any other day, but given the unprofessionalism and mistrust that the whole situation had caused, we decided against it. ALSO, we had already booked all of our vender (which I loved!). Luckily we were having a small wedding (~75 people), so we were able to find another venue, however we did not have many options. Bottomline: if you want piece of mind, hire professionals, not the City of Baltimore.

de the mansion is a great place for pictures and to wait with wedding party before ceremony. The Vollmer center is great, but recommend draping for reception room as it is a little meeting roomesque, so include in budget! My only complaint would be getting the lighting right in the reception room right. Was either too bright or too low.

n before our ceremony it started to rain. They help moved the cocktail tables around so we could have our wedding inside. Laurie was great to work with front start to finish super helpful and full of information. Even the ground staff were just the best. Love this place!!!!!

ne year out, so you should probably have a few dates in mind just in case your not the first person to request a date. That was about the only down side to this venue. The Garden next to the Mansion was perfect for our ceremony (150 guests) and the weather even cooperated. The trees and flowers were just perfect, the groundskeepers had everything perfectly trimmed and mowed and the flower beds were in full bloom. The Mansion served as our ceremony backdrop and was beautiful both inside and out. After the ceremony our guests walked down the scenic Mansion Drive to the Vollmer Center. The mansion is a Victorian era house, while the Vollmer Center is a very contemporary "green" building. It was pleasantly surprising to our guests. The venue staff were extremely helpful and attentive. Our Event Coordinator for the venue, Laurie, was terrific. She couldn't have been nicer to work with and gave us great advise on planning, scheduling, vendors, etc. and was always very responsive, although we did have to wait a few days sometimes for an email response to some questions. All of our wedding vendors, caterer, etc. also raved about the service and accomodations at Cylburn. The best parts-they only have one wedding per day at the Arboretum, you can rent time in the Mansion as a bridal suite for as long as you want, they allowed us to leave items overnight to pick up the next day and the prices were extremely reasonable! I would highly reccomend Cylburn Arboretum for any kind of event, but for a wedding it was just perfect!

use it enabled us to bring the outdoors in and offered a beautiful backdrop for our ceremony and reception. I think it is fantastic that they only do one wedding a day, so you get a full 8 hour. They were kind enough to allow us an extra hour for free to allow vendors to set up before the wedding. Another bonus is that chairs and tables are available for use for free = more cost savings for us. That being said, the service at the venue was a bit lacking. The reservation system at the venue is a bit strange. You have to email the venue a year and a day in advance (they will not reserve the site any sooner than that) for a particular date and there is no guarantee that you will get it. I stayed up and started sending emails at 11:58 through 12:02 in hopes that I could secure our desired October date. Myself and another bride both lost out on that date. I know this because Laurie copied us BOTH in on the reply email. I thought that the person copied in was another employee at the venue so I replied all with my responses until the other bride stated that she was in the same boat as me and didn't work there. Poor business practice in my opinion. Long story short we were able to get a date in September since it was available. Luckily we started working with a wedding planner at this point who handled communication with the venue. Even she had difficulty getting the information we/she needed to plan the day. Do not expect quick responses to emails or phone calls. I would definitely recommend Cylburn Arboretum as it is a gorgeous venue, just beware of staff.

no longer works at the venue. However, Ms. Boswell became involved in our wedding process and brought nothing but complications. We arranged for a date in July for our wedding for our wedding in October of the same year, and were told about almost a month into planning that they had double booked our wedding date and we had to change our date to a date in November. Then, after securing another date for our wedding, Laurie emails A WEEK before the wedding requiring information. This is when I found out that she had double booked us AGAIN on our wedding date with an event in the morning. Even though she specifically told her that she only schedules 1 event per day and that we could start decorating in the morning at our original meeting. Plans were already in place with multiple companies involved in setting up drapes, linens, food, decorations, etc. and what was an anticipated eventful day in a beautiful setting became rather stressful. And the employees at Cylburn reported that it was extremely unusual for 2 events to be scheduled on one day. Unfortunately once Ms. Boswell became involved, in my opinion she was bitter that I didn’t chose to work with her (which was confirmed by an employer there) and she is also racist. I am a Caucasian woman, and my husband is African American. My husband and his father work for a big news company, and even though we experienced a stressful wedding day, we are not spiteful to take this event to the news. I have also spoken to two white couples who have gotten married at the venue, and they had received no complications for their wedding day, no double bookings, and also were accommodated throughout the whole day with being able to set up early in the morning. On the day of the wedding, Laurie had told us (in emails and texts), that she would communicate with the event that was happening in the morning that she double booked with our wedding, however there was NO communication with them. They were unaware that there was a wedding that day, and the fact that they had other grounds to have their event at that day, but Ms. Boswell specifically had them use our reception room. And at 11:55 am, the event that was happening that morning was still using the reception room and the room NOT READY for our 12 pm contract. The room was NOT cleaned, tables/chairs cleared out, people cleared out and the room was not ready for our 5 pm reception. It is inexcusable to pay for a service and led to believe after 2 meetings with Ms. Boswell, the events coordinator, that what she verbally tells us, is in fact what will happen. And of course Ms. Bowell was NOT on the grounds to help that day, luckily we had Jammal, our wedding planners, and my parents there, as well as the very sweet grounds helpers, to help set up my wedding. While I was getting ready in my wedding dress in the mansion, there were random people exploring the RENTED mansion that we paid for. The people were opening the doors to our rooms we were dressing in, and there was no organization, sign outside, or respecting for the event occurring. Again it was a beautiful setting (which is why I gave it two stars), but with difficulties involving the personnel working for Cyllburn, it was not only a stressful day, but a stressful wedding process.

more impressed! I am giving service 4 of 5 starts as the conservatory's event coordinator was often difficult to reach, but on the day of everything went smoothly, which is all that matters I suppose. The conservatory is made up of two larger open rooms and then several smaller rooms that are climate controlled and contain plants and flowers specific to such room's particular theme. Very little decorating was needed because of how spectacular the ambiance of the plants and lighting were. There is also a lovely garden next tot he building which was perfect for our formal pictures. We had our tables set up in the two larger rooms and then cocktail tables and dinner stations scattered among the themed rooms. When it was time for dancing we removed some of the tables in one of the larger rooms to make room for dancing. Because of the way this venue is laid out it is unlikely you will fit everyone in one room all night unless you are having a very small wedding (less than 50 people). We actually wanted more of a cocktail style wedding so we preferred this type of set up. Even still, the entire place can only hold about 120 people. We had 90 comfortably. I am so happy we chose this venue. We received so many compliments and it truly was the perfect venue for the style of wedding we were seeking. It is definitely a venue to remember!

t of the other venues in the area, but the rental is for 8 hours (most are for only 4), and there is not restriction on which caterer you use. Laurie and Jamal were very helpful and everything turned out wonderfully!

cy plans for just about everything. They are extremely generous and accommodating when it comes to how the rental system works. For example, if you rent the use of a garden, that gives you 1 hour. If you rent the mansion house, that gives you 2 hours. Renting the Volmer center gives you 10 hours or so. Since we rented all 3 of those for the wedding, they treated our time as one thing - 13 hours to use wherever and however we wanted. Meaning, the wedding party was able to access the Mansion to get dressed and ready at 11:00 a.m. and we were in there until the ceremony began at 3:30 pm. Laurie specifically was amazing. She answered all of our questions and provided us with tons of information over the months leading up to the wedding day, offered really helpful advice when we were selecting our vendors and figuring out where to set everything up, and generally made herself available to help. On the wedding day, she even took a broom and swept as things were winding down, then gave my sister a ride up to the mansion to get her stuff. She very much went above and beyond any expectation that I had. I'm so so so grateful for her help. For any bride considering this location, I can only tell you that I have absolutely no regrets about choosing Cylburn. The only word of caution is that you have to be willing to do some work - every vendor, every detail of your wedding you have to be willing to put together yourself. If you want a venue that has a caterer, cake baker, DJ, etc. that comes with it, then this might not be for you. But for a custom wedding, you can't go wrong here!

their drinks out onto the patio) and the downstairs auditorium for dinner and dancing. The auditorium has giant picture windows looking out onto the grounds - so it's perfect if, like me, you love the idea of having an outdoor wedding without the stress of worrying about tent rentals and weather. Everyone kept saying how beautiful it was! Cylburn staff were lovely to work with, though not always super-responsive to e-mails. And there isn't much in the ways of a kitchen there (not a big deal for us, our caterer cooked on grills outside). Overall though, a really exceptional venue for a comparatively low price!

rations for the garden because of the natural beauty. You don't need alot of decorations for the Vollmer Center because there is a beautiful wall of windows so once again the Arboretum is enough. There is a gazebo. We had a horse and carriage take us from the garden to the Vollmer Center. There are plenty of beautiful places for pictures. Ciara Willis was wonderful to work with. She was there every time we were on site. She was there the entire wedding day making sure we were happy. If you want an outside wedding with a beautiful inside place for the reception then the Cylburn Arboretum (and Vollmer Center) is the place for you.

when we asked for a changing room to use for the bride and bridesmaids to change clothes in. The venue was beautiful and we had fantastic weather without too many bugs. We had our ceremony in the space between the Rose Garden and the Formal Garden. The hallway in the Vollmer Center was the perfect place for a cocktail hour, and our guests enjoyed sitting out at the tables just behind the Vollmer Center during that time. Inside, we had our reception, and got a lot of natural lighting as the sun set slowly during the evening. If I had to choose again, I would most definitely choose Cylburn.