Downtown Denver Artistic Wedding VenueWedding Details:

Our prediction from the engagement session was the wedding would be “laid back, mostly chill, personable, and fun loving.”  Aaron and Kristina delivered on that with a beer in hand at most times of day.   While I think there were some periods of stressfulness like not having warm water in the hotel and seeing much of your family run off before family photos overall the day was rather smooth from what we could see.

As a side note on the family photos if your reading this and getting married note that the most potential for delays in the schedule (particularly if you do not see each other pre-ceremony) is in family photos.  The reason is that family will run off almost always.  This is because they don’t know how extended you want to go in some photos.  Cousins and spouses of family members normally are the ones who fall off.  I guess this is definitely photographer slanted as really the most common areas of delay are from getting ready with makeup and hair or a caterer.

When we got there things were coming together well for the women.  Setup wasn’t really started till we got them out in Civic Center park for some couples photos.  Overall, they were there early per the schedule but it seems more time was needed than allocated.  As for some unique things they had an indoor corn hole set and for a videographer we notice they went the Go-Pro route.  If only their dog Tyson could have been invited and ran around with it strapped on his back but it certainly wouldn’t have worked well downtown so we get it why you strapped it to a couple wedding guests.  As for some other media they had a polaroid station with a huge photo of the sunset in the stadium.  There was a complementary Photo Booth provided by the DJ.  It was over in a far corner so it wasn’t getting as much attention as the corner with the bathrooms and the bar.

McNichols Civic Center Building Review:

If you are looking for a downtown wedding venue – get married at the McNichols Building.  It is one of those places you drive past and kinda overlook and not think much of due to all the other cool buildings around it.  The space is huge inside and has two large floors for a party up on floors 2 and 3.  There was a recent renovation of the building so at the time of writing this it hasn’t been used for many weddings.  There are little things that make you just appreciate the thought that went into it such as the bridal room over by the bathrooms or the Map room on the mezzanine level between floors 2 and 3.  In that room the women had tons of space to get their hair done and extend their eyelashes.

The guys got the shorter end of the stick and were given a small room in the back corner of the first floor.  As it felt like 100 in there they chilled in the front conference room area.  For getting equipment in and out there is a freight elevator.  The decor inside mixes this artistic exposed stone and flooring from before the remodel with this clean elegance.  It is this perfect space for being an art gallery.  The ceremony was performed out in front of the building.  They put chairs out on the recessed part.  You can shoot some photos up in the balcony which works well if you really wanted a photo of all guests at the end of the ceremony.

All that good stuff so what are the drawbacks?  Well one is you are right off of Colfax and could have some street noise like the guy  who intentionally rev’d his motorcycle mid ceremony.  Solution for that is to just laugh like they did or to use floor 3 for the ceremony.  My guess is that it may cost you more to do it inside but it was a wide open floor.  The other thing which the venue mitigated was the potential of people passing along the sidewalk during the ceremony.  They basically had venue staff surrounding the perimeter to keep people from coming that way.

When they tackled that kid on the skateboard that was pretty awesome . . . Okay – so it was more of a ‘hey – don’t go that way’ so more of a verbal tackle.  I am sure they also also there for the potential of any crazies that might want to wander in and make a scene.  The last drawback I guess you could add in is that the parking scenario is a standard downtown setup where you park elsewhere and take a short stroll over.  We parked on the weekend all day for $6 so really we think having a dedicated lot isn’t that important if your getting married there on the weekend.

Here is our other work Downtown Denver.