When: 6 pm, Friday October 17th, 2025
Where: Como Conservatory, Sunken Garden (ceremony) and Ordway Gardens (reception) – more information on the venue
- 6 pm – 6:30 pm: Welcome reception (drinks and appetizers) in the Ordway Gardens room
- 6:45 pm: Ceremony begins in Sunken Garden (we anticipate the ceremony being about 15 minutes, followed by pictures)
- 7:30 pm: Dinner (salad, entree, dessert) in the Ordway Gardens room
- 12 am: Last call
Consider the schedule above as our best guess – things have already shifted slightly from when we printed the invitations with a 6 pm Welcome reception. We can enter the Ordway Gardens room starting at 6 pm, and have access to the Sunken Garden beginning at 6:30 pm for a two-hour window. Both locations are within the main Como Conservatory building, along with the Palm Dome which you will use to enter and exit the building.
We invite you to join us after 6 pm for a “cocktail half-hour” – grab a drink and some appetizers as you get settled and mingle. Around 6:30 pm we’ll begin moving to the Sunken Garden for the ceremony.
The non-denominational ceremony will begin around 6:45 pm officiated by Pastor Joanna Mitchell. While the Sunken Garden is indoors under a glass dome, and the ceremony will be after sundown, it may be warmer or more humid than you’re expecting in mid-October. Please note that you will be standing during the ceremony, but we plan to keep it brief (and absolutely no readings from 1 Corinthians 13). We encourage you to wear “cocktail” attire – feel free to google it, because we had to – but it may be worth considering a layer you can add/remove depending on the temperature.
Following the ceremony and pictures, we’ll return to the Ordway Gardens room. We won’t have the menu finalized until early September (we’ll reach out to get your preferences), but we’re expecting to serve a salad course, entree, and cupcakes. Additionally, we will provide an open bar with a selection of beer, wine, and non-alcohol beverages, including a mocktail option (Mixed drinks will be available for purchase).
We encourage you to get to know each other during the reception, and while we’ll have some background music courtesy of DJ Spotify, we don’t plan on a formal dance floor, speeches, or any “events” to interrupt the evening – the vibe we’re going for is hanging out chatting at a dinner party and less like a traditional wedding.
The Sunken Garden and Ordway Gardens have limited capacity, and in order to maximize the attendance of those closest to us, we respectfully ask that no children or those not named on the invitation, attend.
Please honor our request for no material gifts. We appreciate the thought, but we don’t need any more stuff, and we’d rather you make a monetary donation to a non-profit than give anything to us.
For more in-depth details, check out the other pages, especially the FAQ, and reach out if you have a question that we haven’t covered here.