Dunaway Gardens — Attraction in Georgia

I was very excited and enchanted by this beautiful venue. I am disappointed that we will not be having our wedding there anymore. We booked in August of 2019 for our date of September 13, 2020 and contacted them in March of 2020 when Covid-19 shut down the country. We could only connect with them via email. Any time I would call they never answered. If I left a voicemail, I never got a returning call. Prompt responses varied from several hours (which was unlikely) to almost 3 weeks. This was definitely frustrating as the nature of the emails were time sensitive due to payment arrangements or issues in regards to postponing. My biggest complaint, aside from poor communication, is the lack of compassion. I was not allowed to postpone my own wedding. When I first contacted them, I absolutely refused to postpone as we were going to get married while still complying with CDC and government guidelines. When we were told that they would not refund and said they could not sign anything stating that they would refund us if they cancelled our wedding, we proceeded with a new payment arrangement due to financial difficulties. As things progressed with Covid, financially and in regards to health and guidelines, we had to make a decision that we were dead set against. We did not want to lose any money since they wouldn't refund if things shut down again so we decided to postpone. We approached them again in May and asked to postpone due to financial strains related to covid. They told us "we don't foresee needing to reschedule your wedding." Nothing in their contract states that we cannot postpone our wedding. We felt trapped into our wedding date. We felt like they had all control over when we would have our wedding. We weren't okay with this. I was upset and stressed out. At this point we reached out to a lawyer and Dunaway never responded. They offered another payment arrangement but with 4 months before the wedding, no payment arrangement was going to alleviate the financial strain as the amount we were going to pay wasn't changing. It wasn't until after I told them that I would be leaving reviews for them that they began to try to accommodate us by allowing us to have a "ceremony only" for our September date and that we could put the money we have already paid towards the balance. They presented this option to us on June 3rd. We opted out of this option as it is 3 months before the wedding and we had to halt all planning when Covid hit. We couldn't even get the tuxedos picked out or fitted for, book a caterer, do engagement pictures, or buy decor/materials for the wedding. Everything was shut down.There is no way we can financially plan the rest of the wedding that we want in 3 months. We simply needed more time. Brides and grooms, find yourself a planner if you're going to use this venue and have a lawyer review the contract...

UPDATE- It’s been 5 days since my original review. They just informed us they will be opening 2021 dates up to the brides affected by the closure now. We are trying to work with them on a new date. =) I’ve added a star for the extra communication and willingness to accommodate and will continue to update as I continue to work with them

The property is beautiful and we really enjoyed Elizabeth’s cheery hospitality! But something must have changed when Elizabeth left because it’s been nothing but problems since then. After constant misinformation (telling us things were paid and then saying they weren’t, etc) they have really gone down a bad path with cancelling all the weddings this spring. While that would not have been an issue (we completely understand why) if they would let us rebook for next spring, they absolutely refuse and will only rebook our spring garden wedding in August, September, or December. I don’t know a bride on earth who has planned a spring wedding just being okay with settling for a fall/winter wedding last minute. Our wedding is completely paid off so it is not a money issue, all we want is to have the spring wedding we planned for even if it meant pushing it back and we originally booked a year in advance so it’s not like they wouldn’t let us schedule in May if we were new clients. We have received ZERO explanation for this, no transparency at all other than “it’s our objective to rebook 2020 brides in 2020” and they have refused to answer our lawyer’s calls or offer us a refund. I will update my rating when I have a development but if the owners don’t change from the current owner (Jennifer/Krystal) I would absolutely not book with them. The property is gorgeous, it’s just unfortunately...

Booking with Dunaway Gardens was the worst mistake I’ve made in regards to our wedding. We originally planned our wedding for the fall of 2020. When COVID-19 became a more serious issue as the year went on, we decided to postpone our wedding given that we would have several vulnerable family members in attendance. After explaining our situation on the phone to someone at Dunaway, we received an email from the owner telling us that they were not postponing weddings and adhering to CDC guidelines. I asked the owner if we could discuss the situation over the phone but she refused and I spent an hour writing a six paragraph email detailing why we felt more comfortable postponing. Her response: CDC guidelines. It simply deteriorated after this. We felt cheated and trapped by our contract. We pleaded many times to simply move our date but the owner wouldn’t allow it. We have decided to take our business elsewhere, despite losing all of the money we invested into this awful venue. I have never dealt with such unprofessionalism, such a lack of compassion in the midst of an unfortunate circumstance like the pandemic. While our other vendors have been amazing and supportive, the owner of this venue has vowed to put her business before the safety and wellbeing of her clients and their family members. She has done this to other brides as well. How shameful. The entire situation has been nothing much anxiety-inducing for my fiancé and I. Planning a wedding is now dreadful and I can’t even look at my dress hanging in the closet without feeling sick to my stomach. Thank you, Dunaway, for ruining...