Choosing Your Wedding Party
Recently I was having a conversation with one of the brides getting married here this year at Bonaventura Vineyards about choosing members of the wedding party. I thought I would share some of our conversation as I thought it may resonate with others trying to determine who they want standing by their side on their wedding day. How many is too many, when it comes to the number of people in your wedding party? This decision is completely up to you and thankfully couples today vary widely on this decision. There are elopements with no wedding party at all, some
Meet the Vendors, Volume III
Strange Events Chad and I welcomed, Renee Strange-Farnham and Carrie Erickson of Strange Events to Bonaventura Vineyards this past Saturday. It was a little chilly and the heaps of snow we just received prevent us from touring the whole property (without snow shoes anyway), but the sun was shining so we threw open one of the big barn doors to show Renee and Carrie our barn venue space including the view from the deck, which made for the perfect backdrop to our vendor selfie! It was great to to talk business, share ideas and learn what we all have to
Story Behind the Logo
If you are searching for an authentic New England barn for your wedding or event, we think you might enjoy reading about the vision behind our newly finished logo. Hopefully you have had a chance to read our earlier “Before & After” blog posts, if you have, you know we have been cleaning, repairing, and renovating the barn over the past several years. Throughout that time we have found lots of interesting “treasures”, some we have chosen to keep and others not, but one of the fun things we have found over and over are signatures of the prior owners
Where is Hartford, Maine?
We feel lucky to live in a State with so many stunning bodies of water, even luckier that we have property with water frontage and a beautiful water view. Even though we weren’t looking for it, water is what led us to this property. We had been looking for land in the hopes of having our own vineyard and I came across a friend’s post on FaceBook, mentioning a water front piece of land they had just purchased. I wasn’t familiar with the area so I looked it up and in doing so I came across 355 Berry Road. I
5 Reasons to do an Engagement Session
One of the couples getting married here at Bonaventura Vineyards this Fall was considering whether or not to take advantage of the engagement photo session their photographer included in their wedding package. Sharing our experience with them brought back the memories of our engagement session and why we found it valuable. #1Gave us a chance to get to know our photographer better. We spent time talking during our session, learning her style and sharing our wedding plans. We found the time invested by both our photographer and us invaluable and we believe this resulted in better photographs from this shoot
Meet the Vendors, Volume II
Meraki Portrait This past Saturday, I was so excited to sit down with photographer, Alicia Rackley, owner of Meraki Portrait. We have been corresponding electronically since she learned Chad and I were pursuing a wedding venue on our property. To say she has welcomed us in to the Maine wedding industry with open arms is an understatement. Her enthusiasm, inclusiveness and authenticity are so inspiring! We cannot wait to work with her this spring on a wedding project here at Bonaventura Vineyards and hopefully for many years to come! You may be wondering the meaning behind the name Meraki? This
Fall barn wedding with a vineyard ceremony…..
This past fall we had the honor of hosting Amanda and Shawn for a quintessential Maine barn wedding complete with hay bales for their ceremony seating. Shawn proposed to Amanda right down the road from us on the dock at her parent’s home making Bonaventura Vineyards the perfect location for their wedding day! Shawn made this beautiful arbor for Amanda and we loved the drapery and greenery accents Amanda added. The arbor was the perfect compliment at the top of the vineyard. Amanda’s Aunt was their wedding photographer. Their wedding officiant was Senior Pastor, Roger Cousineau from the East Auburn
Before & After, Part II
Interior Barn Renovations This is a continuation of our before and after series illustrating how we transformed an authentic New England barn into an event venue. In Part I we showed you many of the renovations we have completed on the exterior of the barn, Part II will focus on the interior changes we have made over the past several years. If you are searching for a Maine barn for your wedding or next event, please take a look, Bonaventura Vineyards may be the location for you! The beginning…. Before we closed on the property we had an inspection completed;
Before & After, Part I
Exterior Barn Renovations If you are searching for an authentic New England barn for your wedding or event, you may be interested in seeing how we have transformed one Maine barn from a building that once held cows, chickens and tons of hay to one for people, complete with a built-in bar and plenty of space for dining and dancing. The beginning…… Chad and I closed on our 86 acre property at 355 Berry Road on tax day, April 15, 2015. The property consisted of an 1800’s house, a small garage, an old workshop and a beautiful old barn (also
Vineyard Progress
Dechaunac, Marechal Foch, Seyval Blanc and Leon Millot are now all connected to trellis wire. It’s a long tedious process, digging a hole for the posts, putting up the wire, putting a pole for each individual vine to climb, then attaching the vine to the pole (I like bread ties). In all it’s probably around 350 vines that have been set up. And it only took two and a half years to get those done! No hurry though, you can’t rush wine….