Stardance is an amazing and beautiful wedding venue! If you want amazing breathtaking scenic pictures in the desert then this is the place to be!!!! I still can not get over how magical the whole evening felt, I didn't want it to end! While the scenery and vibe of the venue is perfect there were a few factors that prevented me from giving it the five-star rating would have preferred to give. The venue offers catering, bartenders, DJ, photography, officiant services, decorator (Theresa) and baker. We paid for the catering, bartenders, DJ, photographer (Wilson & Henry Photography), decorator (Theresa), and baker (Cakes by Genevieve).
The best advice I can give brides interested in the venue is to find an outside DJ for reception music. Overall the Dj played good music the whole time and even clarified with me if was okay to play a rap song since we had mentioned that we did not enjoy it. However there was one disappointment that practically negated all of this, and this was that the DJ started playing out wedding song while we were eating our dinner!!!! I literally stopped chewing my food, had to ask my husband to run to the DJ to stop before it was too late. It makes for a memorable moment during the evening...but it is not a positive memory. Also we planned everything with the owner of the DJ company (who also owns the photography company) but then the DJ ended up being a completely different person who we never met. I personally would have felt more comfortable if we had met with the actual DJ before hand... maybe then he would not have played our song wedding song during dinner.
The second suggestion I would make is to sit down and really plans things out with the photographer, have a pan A and B (back up plan) - NO MATTER WHO YOU CHOOSE TO DO YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY. This is something that mostly occurred through emails for me and the photographer's assistant (who is super nice btw). I say this for two reasons, 1) it will make you and the photographer both feel better and prepared for how the big day will go and 2) on the big day there is a possibility that your perfectly planned out hour-by-hour and minute-by-minute schedule will get behind. This happened to me and I was not ready in time which appeared to really annoy the photographers and they didn't hide very well... My morning was delayed by many different things that were 100% out of my hands. I could have spent the whole day upset about it, pouting, and being angry at the contributing factors, but instead I decided to roll with the punches. As a result I was not ready at 2:30/3:00pm to begin taking pictures with my bridesmaids, instead I was ready closer to 4:00pm and the wedding was beginning at 5:00 - YIKES, I know!
The owner of the photography company asked me multiple times if I was ready when my hair wasn't complete and I had no make up on...Needless to say this is not only rude but stressful to do to any bride on their wedding day...It is the one day I feel I should have been allowed to say you're ready when I am ready, and not the other way around. And yes I had tons of picture ideas that I wanted and found on Pinterest and life would have been splendid had my day not being behind, but it was. Plus my thing was that getting ready, staying calm, and making sure I was comfortable, was more important to me on my wedding day. Much more important than getting snapshots of every single picture idea I had found on the internet. With that said, the pictures we received were wonderful and overall we were pleased. However they were not ready in 21 as promised on a card passed out at the wedding... Instead they were ready 30 days after the wedding, which was also disappointing. Also we never met one of the photographers and we would have preferred to have met him prior to the big day. Lastly the owner of the photography company did not stay for the whole wedding, which resulted in the venue team almost forgetting the bouquet toss, garter toss and the photobooth (which only resulting in 39 pictures).
Also I was told by friends, that there were some unnecessary comments heard by what sounds like unhappy employees...but I certainly did not experience this at any point. The only other down fall was that it appears our table settings got a bit messed up.
The food was decent quality and we loved that it all came from Rincon Market; the owners own Rincon Market, Stardance and Park Avenue. I would definitely recommend working with the Decorator and Cakes by Genevieve. Also Kelly the owner of Stardance was nice to work with, such a sweet person! The decorator, was great and helped us with center pieces and picking out the shabby chic flatware, which I would also recommend! Also Genevieve made us four amazing cakes!!! She even met with us a week before the wedding to sort everything out since we met with her husband at our original food tasting eight months before the wedding. I as in awe of the final out come of our cake and her commitment to clients. read more