Weddingbee Blog

So we’ve got our anniversary date and our wedding city picked out. How about some actual decisions that involve vendors? Indeed. A good place to start. Let’s start with some of the biggest and most expensive, shall we?

Dun dun dun (hear the musical notes?)

Venue! Wait, no! VenueS, with an “s”. At least it became Venues, in the end. (Now there’s a little foreshadowing for you. Onward, shall we?)

We knew what we wanted, the trick was to find it within a reasonable price point.

Location Criteria

1. We wanted something close to the beach. The whole point of having a San Diego wedding was to give our out of town guests a vacation.
2. We really wanted a location where guests could stay and we could have our civil ceremony. FSIL had her wedding at a hotel in Phoenix years ago and everyone loved it because it felt like a family reunion weekend. We really wanted to recreate this feeling.
3. Cost effective. A difficult task during peak summer months in a vacation hot spot.
4. Not too far from airport (and later, our reception location).

Knowing these criteria, I did what any good modern day bride does. I hit the internet and scoured it for ideas. And I created Excel sheet after Excel sheet to break down the costs and compare across different locations.

A total side note: Remember the Vietnamese thing? Yeah, this is when all the fighting began between Mama Hot Wings and I. She, the traditionalist, HAD to have a Chinese reception at Jasmine Seafood Restaurant for her closest 350 friends and family. And I do mean HAD TO HAVE! Even if I suggested a different Chinese restaurant, it was unacceptable. Papa Hot Wings, on the other hand, thought it was neat and interesting to have something “different” and not typical for a Vietnamese bride. One thing both Mama and Papa Hot Wings were concerned about were food options. They really felt that it was important to provide “good” food and not just a slab of chicken and some vegetables. This was merely the start to the cultural battles that ensued.

OK, let’s get back on track. So I explored options around San Diego befitting of a large wedding within budget. HA! I laugh remembering my naïveté about wedding planning. With our prior criteria and now the addition of having a large wedding with good food, we started looking at hotels. O - M - G. Not a good idea if you want to have any kind of budget-friendly wedding.

Mama and Papa Hot Wings suggested we look into the Hyatt Regency La Jolla because they had attended a beautiful wedding there that served yummy food. Beautiful, indeed! It fits 600 people, but the price per person was way too high! C’est la vie. Beauty comes with a price, my friends.

At this point in our internet searching, we realized that we would likely need to have a Chinese banquet reception in order to accommodate the number of guests my parents desired for the reception and still have a reasonable cost per person. So we quickly decided to have the reception Mama Hot Wings had in mind and a civil ceremony more to our tastes. Then I came upon some great sites. A light bulb went off with this discovery!

Vacation Rentals by Owners and Beachfront Only Vacation Rentals. YES! Talk about scoring. We could try to rent a large house (like a mansion… hello… sweet!). Our out of town guests could stay there, and we could have a small civil ceremony there. It was a brilliant idea. Using just the internet, we narrowed it down to 2 choices.

Option 1: The Grand Beachfront Rooftop Wedding that sleeps 60 in 4 condo units with 20 bedrooms and 16 bathrooms. The only major glitch with this site was its location. It’s pretty far from the airport and north of the city. It’s also across the street from the beach!

source

Option 2: Ocean View Villas which sleeps 30 in 5 condo units. Each condo unit has a full kitchen, 2 bedrooms, and a pull out sofa bed. This group also owns a house across the street that sleeps an additional 16. The glitch here is the fewer number of beds. This site boosts its own private beach!

source

We actually only ended up looking at one of these, fell in love, and booked it.

Which one do you think we chose?

Option 2!! Ocean View Villas!

When we drove down to see Ocean View Villas (OVV), we realized it was actually very close to the San Diego Airport and about a mile from the main strip of bars and restaurants. It also sits right next to the Sunset Cliffs Natural Reserve. Hellloooo! Those are unobstructed views on one side of the property. Perfect, right?

** All personal pictures unless noted otherwise.

The outside might not look like much, but when you walk through the doors, you see this!

Look at that ocean! You can hear the crashing of the waves. It’s just stunning. OK OK, I know the crashing waves is going to be a problem for the ceremony, but that’s what speakers are for.

And here are some pictures I’ve found from previous weddings!

source

source

source

And check out this Wedding Video by Christina Ramirez!

We were sold as soon as we walked through the front door and saw the view. Ah OVV, you had me at “first site”. So that is the story of how we looked at one site, were sold, and booked it!

Did anyone else only look at one place for their wedding reception? How did you know it was the place for you?