Riverside Landings Event Center — Attraction in Oakmont

The biggest mistake that the Board at the Greek Orthodox Church/Riverside Landings did was let Katelyn (the previous wedding coordinator) go and bring in "Elegant Catering".

I got married in August 2015 and worked with Katelyn. She was amazing - very attentive, very responsive, and full of ideas. She made the wedding planning process easier. We had a choice between two caterers (Phaturos and Veltre's). Our wedding food was delicious. In fact, our wedding guests still talk about the food more than two years later.

Because of our amazing experience, it only made sense that when my sister got engaged, she wanted to use the same venue. What a disappointment.

After signing the contact, the bride and groom found out that Katelyn was leaving and Elegant Catering was taking over. They were first told that they would still have a choice between the two previous caterers since the contract was already signed, but of course that did not happen.

Elegant Catering was difficult to work with from the beginning and it did not get any better.

The bride and groom chose a buffet with four meats and two sides. Elegant Catering didn't even get half of the food correct. Of the four meats, only ONE was correct in what the bride and groom chose. Of the two side dishes, only ONE of those was correct. How do you get all of that wrong? The wait staff didn't start letting guests go to the buffet line for an hour after serving the salad, and that was only because the bride went and asked what the hold up was. The bride and groom were served their food - it was cold and they obviously realized it was the wrong food. The food in the buffet line was also cold, so not only did guests have to wait forever to eat, but their food was cold.

Their cake was also a disaster. The bride and groom ordered a beautiful and delicious cake from Oakmont Bakery. Elegant Catering originally wanted to charge an additional $2.00 per person to cut and serve the cake. The bride explained that this was not in their contract and they never agreed to it. Elegant Catering eventually agreed to cut and serve the cake without the fee. However, instead of cutting and serving the wedding cake, the wait staff only cut the extra sheet cake that was in the back - which was only to be cut if they ran out of the other cake. The wait staff also did not go around to every table, they stopped once they ran out of the sheet cake. They never cut and served the actual wedding cake - except to completely BUTCHER it to pieces and throw it in containers for the bride and groom to take home. Nobody wants to pay for a beautiful wedding cake for it to never be cut and served. When the bride and groom asked about the cake, they were told that the bakery should have stayed and cut the cake. I've never heard of anything so absurd in my life. A bakery is not going to stay at every wedding to cut and serve the cake - not to mention that Elegant Catering agreed to cut and serve it.

The bride and groom also did not receive their leftover food that they paid for. First of all, one of the wedding guests who is in the restaurant business had to go and tell the wait staff to put the food away because it had been setting out for a couple of hours after dinner at room temperature. Because he had to go and tell them to put the food away, he and my husband saw trays of leftover food setting there. The bride and groom were to get that food and they did not. They did not pay thousands of dollars for someone else to take their food (which again, wasn't even the correct food).

I will give credit where credit is due and the bartenders were great. They were friendly, attentive, and on top of things.

The owner of Elegant Catering is now not returning their phone calls or their emails.

I would NEVER recommend this venue to anyone if Elegant Catering is still there, which is a real shame considering my own wedding was so perfect. If this review does not deter you from booking this venue, please go to The Knot and read very similar...

Pt 1, I chose this venue because of the location on the water, and also because my brother had his wedding in the corresponding hall across the parking lot. When I first booked it after I got engaged, I worked with Katelyn, who was a delight and I trusted her at once with my big day. I had a long engagement, so the next time I had a meeting at Riverside, I saw that Katelyn had left and Elegant Catering took over, which I considered fine, but quickly turned into a nightmare. All of the tastings went great, and the first small red flag I noticed was the EXTREMELY limited bar menu provided by Elegant Catering. Some options included a choice of 2 wines, 4 beers, and 4 liquors. Now, imagine your guests only having a choice of 4 drinks the entire night. That was something I didn't even consider until the alcohol package was taken over by an outside vendor from the Greek orthodox Church, who were extremely professional and knowledgeable - with an actual full bar package. The next red flag was a meeting I had with Elegant Catering's manager. At the next meeting, I came to see that all of the beautiful organza drapery from the ceilings, and the hutch and other nice details were gutted out and the whole room had been remodeled to compensate for those who wanted to have "business meetings". I booked the place because of these beautiful details and once again had to plan on the fly for buying more decorations, as Riverside just kept taking them away. I was told many women cancelled their booking because they booked it for those very decorations! Did anyone tell us about this? No, of course not, we showed up to our meeting and were shocked to see the change. We asked the Elegant Catering Manager why she didn't alert us to this so maybe we could have started to buy more decor sooner, but she talked around the question. Also, at this meeting she forgot her laptop, and brought someone else's folder, thinking I was another girl who was hosting a bridal shower there. I am very prepared, so I allowed her to use MY laptop and MY folder with my information since she made a mistake - she finally logged on to her account after forgetting her password and having to call someone at the office to find it for her. I understand that this is a very busy job, but it helps to be completely organized so these mistakes don't happen and hinder your trustworthiness. By then, we were discussing linens, and how I was interested in having black lace overlays on the tables, which I was assured could be provided. At the last minute, I was told there were no table overlays that were small enough to fit, so I ended up having to add an extra expense and purchase all of the overlays myself. Keep in mind what you want because not ALL LINENS are provided. Definitely second guess if you want something that is not a basic primary color. I was told IN WRITING several times that I was able to arrive the day before the wedding from 9-12pm to set up the reception hall. I was setting it up on a Friday morning, however I received an email, not a phone call, just an email, on Thursday saying there was an event and the place wasn't going to be cleaned up and ready in time for me to come on Friday morning at 9am, but instead I had to come at 11am. As you can understand if you've ever had a wedding, this messed up most of my plans that had scheduled times that Friday, as it was rehearsal day after all. There was nothing they could do, and for some reason the building couldn't be cleaned up Thursday night after the event in preparation for the wedding. We arrived at Riverside on Friday and the Elegant Catering manager met us there to help us - however, all of the tables were different sizes. I came to expect that all tables could hold 8-10. But some could hold only 8. So keep that in mind, because we needed more, and they "were out." It was something that we had to deal with, and we had a few of our helpers move tables around the room several times before we could no longer do...

Is it a nice place? Yes.

Does it have good views? Yes

Has Elegant Catering made Riverside Landings a shell of what it used to be? Absolutely.

My wife and I booked our wedding reception here before elegant catering took over and everything seemed great. They had a good bar package and in-house catering that was high quality at a reasonable price. I believe Katelyn was the old coordinator who originally worked with us before Elegant Catering took over. Needless to say, the turnover was not smooth, and Elegant Catering made a lot of changes that were not for the best.

For starters, the hall itself was beautiful and had a lot of nice accents in it for a wedding reception. Upon the Elegant takeover the hall was painted mostly white and a lot of the small details that made us select Riverside Landings were gone, to cater to a more business/corporate clientele.

In regards to the food and drink menu, they did keep us locked in to our old prices upon booking which was nice, but communication between coordinators of the hall and bar package was poor and they seemed unsure of what they were and were not able to provide. On the wedding night there were a few missing appetizers and dips that we selected, and the "Wait staff" had a very rude demeanor in telling our guests who could and could not get food in no specified or particular order.

In setting up for the wedding there were many glass centerpieces that were broken, and the outdoor table cloths were nowhere to be found. They stated the hall could comfortably fit 175 max, yet they did not have enough tables for all of our guests, and not enough large tables to accommodate our seating arrangements.

TLDR: My wife and I had a truly magical and wonderful wedding night last September. HOWEVER, none if it was due to the services and arrangements provided by Elegant Catering, but due to the work and decorations that our family put into the event. The hall is very nice, but used to be a lot nicer, and in a beautiful location, and I would have highly recommended having a reception here before Elegant Catering took over.

Today, I would highly recommend that you look...