Months ago, when we were still looking for our venue, we fell in love – no, make that lust – with the Board of Trade, exclusively catered by O&B. You may remember? I never gave you the scoop on what happened with Mr. Oliver and Mr. Bonacini.

J and I visited the BOT a good 3-4 times (once was for Eight Chefs, one of the more delicious foodical events of ’09), which I would say makes us pretty good candidates for booking a venue. The final meeting with Lisa, the event co-ordinator, was to talk about what kind of menu we were looking at. Going back through my emails, that was on May 1. After we discussed all our wants, Lisa was going to have a chat with the chef, and see what he could come up with in our budget. On May 11, I followed up with an email, and was told it had been very hectic but she was going to sit down “with the chef tomorrow morning”.

On May 12, the next day, she emailed me with a few questions, to which I promptly replied. And then we waited. Loads. Believe it or not, I received a final menu from Lisa on the 26th of June. By this time we had already signed a contract and paid the first deposit to the Westin. I couldn’t believe how long it took for them to get us a menu to just take a look at!

We had pretty much forgotten about the BOT after our first visit to the Westin, because we fell in love, not lust, at first sight. But we still wondered where on earth Lisa went with our menus to take 6 weeks to get back to us?! As delicious as their food is, I’m totally disappointed in the way Oliver & Bonacini handled this. Damn them for making yummy brunch that keeps me going back!

Last weekend J and I dropped in on Chicago, US of A, and spent an afternoon at Navy Pier. Enjoy some of the moments I captured!

It was a long day!

August was a busy month for this Miss here, because I had 3 weddings to attend to! Today’s Real Wedding belongs to my good friend Evan, who I survived my four years of fashion university with. Her and her now-husband Danny started dating while we were in second year, and after a very long engagement, they finally tied the knot.

The Italia-inspired wedding took place at Brassaii, a trendy downtown restaurant on King West. The ceremony was outdoors in the courtyard in front of the restaurant, which led into the cocktail hour. The reception then moved inside to the main restaurant, where an intimate group of 140 enjoyed the most delicious wedding dinner I had ever had.

Signage directing guests to the location

Acoustic musician entertaining the cocktail hour

Bringing the greenery inside the industrial style restaurant

The scrumptious menu

Escort tags indicating our seats by Italian provinces

Our table card, in the decorative "stamp" found throughout the wedding

The wedding cake, with the adorable birdie cake topper by our friend Curtis

The cozy ambiance

If it were up to me, and if we could cut our guest list down to double digits, I would totally have our wedding at a restaurant. The food was amazing, the atmosphere was intimate and warm, and did I mention the food was so very delicious??

Last week I blogged about a few of our venue selections with much glee and vigor. In the past week or so, I’ve spoken to some friends and brides (in real life and online) and they decided to completely bring my desires crashing down – I’m going to go over budget with these selections. Well, I don’t actually have a budget yet, but that shows you how much money we are talking here.

More specifically The Carlu and The Fermenting Cellar. The Carlu I can accept – I’ve developed no actual feelings for it, but The Fermenting Cellar? Really?

When I first heard “$250-300 a head” I thought it was an exaggeration, but now I have 2 other sources confirming this is what they were given as an estimate. At the rate of 225 guests that would bring it to… $56,250 – $67,500. ARE YOU SERIOUS??? And that’s if we can even cut the list down to 225!

I haven’t written it off, as I am working with my wonderful friend and colleague Peach, who is bringing in her guy Q, and they are the pros when it comes to events. In the meantime, I’ve added a few more potentials to the shortlist, which is now becoming a longerlist.

5. Steam Whistle Brewery

photo belongs to steamwhistle.ca

This unique spot in the ever-desirable Distillery was on my original shortlist. It’s got loads of things going for it – and if it looks as cool in person as it does on their website, then we may be close to striking gold. It’s again a bare space, that’s a brewery and retail store by day, but can turn into a really hip party at night. The best part is that they actually provide (some) tables, chairs and linens for you to use! If they work for our design and theme, it will be incredible.

Another big bonus – you can bring your own booze! Oh my god! A distillery that lets you bring your own booze. Amazing.

Price: Eeee – the rental of this space is not that much cheaper than The Carlu. It’s $4200 +GST for The Hall and The Gallery, which could be used as the cocktail area. There’s also a huge patio – which may be perfect for the ceremony. $$$

Location: The Distillery – and parking shouldn’t be a problem.

Overall rating for far: Well, the BYOB just brought it up to 9.5/10, but the expensive rental fee knocked off a point. So 8.5/10.

6. The Design Exchange

photo belongs to dx.org

The DX was actually my second lightbulb when it came to venue ideas, after the Art Gallery of Ontario. I loved the idea of it being Toronto’s premier design educational outlet, and I loved going there in my university years. It’s called the Design Exchange because it’s housed in the original TSX building – the room where the reception would take place is the actual Trading Floor. How perfect would that be if J was a trader? Hoho.

I’ve had some ok-mediocre comments about the DX from a few people, so we’ll have to see for ourselves when we visit it.

Price: $3600 +GST for quite a bit of stuff (tables, chairs, access to 2 rooms and the main reception area). $$$

Location: Bay and Adelaide – there is parking at the TD Centre – at a cost, of course.

Rating so far: I’ll give it a 7.5/10, for the fact that its name has the word “design” in it.

7. Suites at 1 King West – The Grand Banking Hall

photo belongs to onekingwest.com

I’ve never been here, but what’s more chic than the Suites at 1 King West? Apparently they have a big hall in there, with n-foot ceilings AND it’s attached to a hotel. There’s nothing I’d love more than to plop into a comfy hotel bed upstairs after the party’s over.

Weird thing is – according to a Knottie (ahem, that’s someone from a theknot.com forum), this place is going through administration right now. Wonder if that will affect anything in the near future?

Price: Again, from the Knottie, it will be at least $120 per person. Doesn’t sound too bad? $$

Location: 1 King West. As for parking, not sure about this one; it’s in the financial district, so it sounds unpromising.

Rating so far: 7/10.

8. Copper Creek Golf Club

photo belongs to bostonimages.com

All right, to everyone’s shock, I’m throwing in a golf club. Years ago, I was all about the golf club. J is such a big golfer, and I thought it was romantic… but as the years passed, my likes really changed. The great thing about GCs is that they often are much cheaper than the other venues I’ve listed previously. J said we should check them out anyway, so…

I just saw that Veronica Di Santo, daughter (and partner) of the amazing Ines Di Santo, got married at Copper Creek in the current issue of Wedluxe. If it’s good enough for Di Santo, it must be good enough for me!

Price: According to Tiff’s spreadsheet, we’re looking at $155-192 +tax per head. Maybe it’s not that much cheaper at the GC. $$$

Location: It’s in Kleinberg – so all you downtowners, good luck getting a ride. It is a lovely little town though, just north of Toronto, still in York region.

Rating so far: 6/10. The food needs to be incredible, and the ballroom needs to blow me away for me to be swayed.

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I can’t wait to actually step foot in these places. The search continues!