This week’s Featured Venue post was written by Disneymooner Carrie.  To read more about her wedding please join our private forums.

A Bride in the China (shop) 

To be honest, we wanted the American Adventure Rotunda.  We got engaged back by the waterfalls at the Canada pavilion and in the time it took to walk over to America, we had decided.  No ifs, ands, or buts.  Jacob’s degree is in history and he has always loved that pavilion.  I loved the wide open space, the columns, the marble floors.  We were set.  And then fate stepped in to see us through…

Turns out, the American Adventure Rotunda was booked for our date, so we had some choices to make.  We had no idea China was even an option, so when we found out, we were definitely intrigued.  The China pavilion has always been impressive.  The space is elaborately themed and it just has a great awe factor.  We talked it over and decided it would be perfect.

Since the space is so colorful on its own, we were able to save a significant amount on our floral budget.  We decided to forego elaborate floral centerpieces in favor of more subdued, low , wide vases with river rocks and a single flower in each.  We went with standard white tablecloths and added black napkins (our colors were black and white with the occasional pop of red).

Our cocktail hour was in the “temple” part of the pavilion – the big domed rotunda.  The ceiling in there is incredible; I could stand there all day gazing up at it.  Two bars were set up in that space for the cocktail hour and once the reception started, one was moved into the main “ballroom.”  The cocktail hour and reception spaces were separated by a line of trees.  Our reception was held in the pre-show part of the pavilion.  The benches were moved to line the walls, which gave our guests a place to rest in between songs.  The dj was set up on the stage where there is normally a musician entertaining guests before the movie.  The dance floor area was set up right in front of the dj and the tables were set up like a regular ballroom.

We had a wonderful plated dinner but I know you can also have buffet dinners in China.  I believe the space will hold 120 people; we had 92 guests.  They can do amazing things with gongs and smoke and gobos, but that just wasn’t in our budget.  Honestly, I can’t say enough good things about China.  We loved it.  It was different, it was breathtaking, it was (and still is) a conversation starter.  It gave us such great opportunities for theming.  We had little chinese take out boxes filled with M&Ms as our favors.  Our cake had the Chinese symbol for happiness.  Our thank you notes had little fortune cookies with “thank you” fortunes.  It was such a fun theme to work with.  If I had it to do over again, we’d absolutely choose China without hesitation.  Basically, I would recommend China to anyone.

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