Wedding Venues Reviews - The Coeur d'Alene Resort
Wedding Venue Review - The Coeur d’Alene Resort
There are many factors at play in great wedding venues when it comes to photography. Note, there are many factors beyond photography that I cannot speak to - such as the price of a venue, how easy they are to work with from a couples perspective, and how responsive they are. That said, being that I've been to well over 400 weddings, I do know what a great venue looks like - and the Coeur d’Alene Resort is one of them.
One of the main factors that separates a great venue from a good one is flexibility. What are the choices a couple has when they are getting married? How many getting ready locations are there? What happens when it rains? What if there is snow or super high winds? It’s the flexibility to handle hard situations that can make a wedding venue better or worse. It is then on the photographer to make those different situations still look amazing.
Resort Wedding Day Prep
Getting Ready
What kind of options do you have to get ready on your wedding day?
The getting ready portion of the day is an area the Coeur d’Alene Resort really excels. That is to say, while the Hagadone Event Center may only have a room for the bride to get ready, and a very small room for the groom, they also have available to them their hotel and board rooms - for brides that want to utilize those. Both of those options are beautiful, with big windows, a view of the lake, and a more “cozy” feeling that being at the HEC center. The other advantage is that the hotel is not far from the Event Center, being a mere 5 minute drive away. It really makes the whole experience feel like there is more flexibility
Strengths of the Hagadone Event Center
Inside Options
The Event Center has 180 degree windows, which not only look beautiful, but they also provide excellent light for things like getting into a dress, or a ceremony moved inside because it’s pouring rain.
It’s worth noting that the Hagadone Event Center’s main room is not only large, but flexible. With it’s large windows, it’s a spot I use regularly to get photos of the bride getting into her dress, or a bridal party if the wind and rain outside are coming down sideways in a torrential downpour. Here are some examples of just how this window can really change the light and situation around the early part of your day. You don’t need to be looking for great shade outside, you’re in an air-conditioned (or heated, depending on your season) room and all the while it still looks beautiful.
Below is a good example of the flexibility. The photo on the right was taken when there was so much wind and rain it was not really an option to go outside. If you are a wedding venue with no other options, you end up getting wet, uncomfortable, or not taking photos at all. That said, that same wedding maybe an hour later, the rain stopped (although the wind did not - look at the bridesmaids dress and hair on the far left) and it allowed us to get some photos outside for a different feel and a little more movement. The point here though, is that even when the weather seems really bad, there are options.
Outdoor Options
Just because the inside is beautiful doesn’t mean you have a lot of flexibility outside. Sometimes a venue may have “the” spot, and nothing else. This is not true of the resort, and one reason it’s one of the best.
Just because you have an indoor option doesn’t mean you have great outdoor options. And even if you do have a beautiful view outside, is that all there is? There are several venues in the Coeur d’Alene area that are in an absolute beautiful location, but that one thing - that one view - is all there is. It offers no variety or flexibility to the couple. One thing I genuinely appreciate about the Coeur d’Alene Resort is that it has many options for photography. You can go for a forest vibe, lake views, mountains or gardens. Each one is fairly unique and are better or worse at different times of the day.
All the photos above are taken in the area I think of as the “forest” location. Typically beautiful even in mid-day, with great depth and a lot of flexibility. At this time of the day the lake can often be washed out, and doesn’t look all that great (better to save that for sunset) so getting the bride and groom some photos that don’t look like their sunset photos - just with worse light - is always a great thing. This extends to the bridal party as well.
I included three different locations for the bridal party photos here on purpose. One is inside the “garden” with the red flowers behind them. This is beautiful and still adds a different look than “pretty lake”. That said, there is still an option to do bridal party photos where the ceremony often takes place. In all honesty, I avoid this spot for that reason - there are already so many photos of this spot at the ceremony - it makes a ton of sense But then there are still more “forest” like vibes available, and offer a little less “manicured” look. Either way, it’s the very fact there are options that make a venue a good one.
The Wedding Ceremony
The vast majority of wedding venues have only one ceremony location. There are a couple very notable exceptions (Looking at you Arbor Crest and Settlers Creek) that are top tier venues in their own right. The Resort is a little different in that it has one incredible ceremony location, and one that works very well if the weather is everything you never wanted. In other words, I don’t know of another wedding venue that has an indoor location that works as well as the Coeur d’Alene Resort. Below I'll give some examples of their outdoor and indoor locations.
While the indoor location can be a challenge with all the people being backlit, it’s one reason you want to have a photographer than knows and understands lighting well. In those indoor photos, note that there isn’t a “super bright side” and a “super dark side”. Instead, by adding light I was able to make the outside beautiful while also still capturing the smiles and expressions of the people who got married there. Either way, the flexibility in the ceremony location is top notch. As a bride, it is always good to know that even if the weather turns sour on your wedding day, you and your guests can still be dry, happy, and in a beautiful spot.
The Reception
The Event Center has one spot for a reception, but it beats out almost all other locations with the exception of Settlers Creek. Settlers has multiple options that are all beautiful, with one backup option (inside the tent). The Coeur d’Alene Resort has one option, but it’s flexible in all situations and is notably not a tent. This means regardless of the temperature outside, too hot or too cold, you end up with a very constant and beautiful reception. Further, the windows are all on sliders, so in the event it’s absolutely beautiful outside, you can open those up to let that fresh air in.
The Reception is the one area I see many photographers fail (at least, in my very bias opinion). There is a lot of direct flash use which makes the room feel dark and unwelcoming. But the vibe of the room I think is actually great, especially when filled with beautiful decor. To combat this, I use a set of four different lights and I light up the whole room while still trying to get a direction to the light - mimicking window light. This gives us a great even light across the whole thing, that isn’t flat, but still very flattering. It’s this kind of light that I think will be timeless.
Wedding Sunset Photos at the Coeur d’Alene Resort’s Hagadone Event Center
Another important aspect to a wedding day from the photographers perspective is the sunset photos. How many location for options do we have for a great sunset? Are they different options from the spots we went earlier in the day? And how good are the locations we can go t0? In this case, the CDA Resort shines. We have the reflection pond in the garden that always looks beautiful at sunset (where the ceremony normally takes place), but there are some great paths, the pool, the beach and the dock that all look excellent. What this means is that I very rarely can go to all the good places with one couple. Variety is always a great thing, and allows me as a photographer pick spots that work best for the couple I'm with.
Sunset Options
Sunset options and locations are many at the Coeur d’Alene Resort
The Party
There is a reason I said the Coeur d’Alene resort was one of the best wedding venues in the area. It has a lot of really amazing things. It’s a great place to tell the full story of your day, from makeup to mixing it up. The experience for me - and what I've seen from the people I've photographed - has been very positive. But what are the negative aspects to the resort?
The Weakness of Hagadone Event Center
It is worth noting that not every wedding venue has all the things you’d need. So what are the weaknesses of the Event Center? There are several.
Because it is owned by a corporation, it can feel less personal - It is noteworthy that the wedding planner that the Event Center provides is a hired employee. They do not have the same amount of by in as an owner of a property would. It can make the experience feel less personal, and it also means their rules tend to be “the rules”. There is less room to change things based on what a couple wants or needs. Notably, the Resort had a single planner for 30 years until just a couple years ago when she retired. Since then the position has been revolving around bit.
It’s expensive - To be clear, I actually have no real idea how much it costs to get married at the Coeur d’Alene Resort. I only know what my couples say, and the comments they make. And over the last 14 years, no one has ever said “this is such a great deal”. There have been comments on price though, and I know that outside food is also not allowed. So the total amount of money to get married at the Event Center is not going to be even close to the cheapest location you look at.
It’s huge - This is probably a weird “con” but really, the Event Center is quite large, so it doesn’t fit smaller weddings as well. 30 or 40 people in a space this size feels a little off. And filling that space becomes even more of a challenge (although people will use couches and other sets to fill the zone). Either way, hitting the 150 or 200 guest mark fills the room out much better.
I hope this is helpful to anyone looking to get married at the Coeur d’Alene Resort. Noteably, they have other locations for weddings as well, from the Terrace at the hotel, to their cruise boats. This review, however, was focused on their main location; the Hagadone Event Center.