From the traffic of the blog, I have a sneaking suspicion that a lot of people are looking for more information on outdoor wedding venues. I try my best to provide that, but I think I will provide more opinions instead of info.
We went to several locations, and one of the places we heard people raving about would be One Rochester and One Twenty-Six. They are under the same management, with the former located in Rochester Park (near Buena Vista MRT) and the other located in East Coast (near the big Carl’s Junior building, formerly Big Splash, I think).
For me personally, I wanted to have it at One Rochester initially. But when we first arranged a meetup with the person-in-charge, Janet, she was at One-26 for another wedding on the day we wanted. So we went to One-26 instead. Below are some pictures I found from the One-26 Wedding Fair (credits to Outdoor Wedding Specialist.com).
Dinner / Banquet set-up for One-26
Notice the One-26 sign on the right? If I am not wrong, this is a tent set-up on the grass field near One-26. The One-26 restaurant / chillout place is actually on the elevated ground on the right. I got to say, if you have lots of guests… maybe One-26 is not an ideal place. Below 100, it is still pretty ideal. They will basically set-up the tentage required, and round tables may not be that good of an idea here. With the long tables above, it looks more like an American wedding, which is a good thing.
The wedding altar by the beach near One-26.
Since we are planning to do our Holy Matrimony outdoors, the altar is important. Hellen and I walked on the sand and although I did not sound out then, I am particular about sand. And no sand in Singapore can compare to Redang sand (from a prior experience). The weather plays a factor here and the backdrop of the container ships is not that nice. But then again, if you do not mind that and your photographer can do a good job, this can be done.
Another altar set-up with benches instead.
This is the tentage set-up during the evening
So we met Janet in the evening, and she was rather busy with the wedding preparation earlier. Although my mind was not on a beach wedding, I did walk along the beach with Hellen, contemplating the possibility of having our wedding by the beach while waiting for Janet. I always felt that if you want a beach wedding, there are better alternatives than East Coast and even Sentosa. So I was personally not too high up on the idea. During the night time, while we were talking to Janet, I do find the surrounding too dark. And as ours will be a Holy Matrimony, I was thinking that an open HM such as the beach altar setting is not that conducive for Pastor. Decisions, decisions, decisions..
To be fair, Janet is a good coordinator and attentive to our questions. She’s frank and does not hard-sell the product but instead willing to cater to your needs. The drawback for me is that for One-26: it is not exactly ‘by the beach’. The East Coast sea backdrop is not that nice with the container ships. A beach wedding is not what we were looking for. The place itself is not as big as I thought it will be though. Lastly, it is above my personal budget.