Venue Spotlight: Uncommon Elegance at Scioto Reserve Country Club

For decades, the country club wedding has dominated the scene for couples wanting an exclusive and elegant feel to their big day. But modern clubs have had to compete with market saturation. From ballrooms to barns, couples now have a wide range of choices for their venue. Scioto Reserve Country Club offers a host of amenities to set it apart.

The club's sense of exclusivity starts with the day itself. “We only do one wedding a day,” says Ann Marie Orren, director of catering at the venue. “So couples really have access to the space for the whole day in terms of coming in and getting ready.” Orren oversees all of Scioto Reserve's special events; she's handled the venue's weddings since it began hosting them in 2010.

When brides, grooms and attendants first arrive to prepare for the day, they are taken to an impressive bridal suite and groom's quarters. Both include lockers to stow street clothes and bags, as well as keypad locks to ensure the security of everything inside. The rooms connect to the men's and women's restrooms, respectively, and the keypads prevent guests from accidentally wandering into the suites later in the evening.

Country club members have a separate entrance, so there's no common traffic before or during the big event.

For the ceremony, Scioto Reserve offers an indoor and an outdoor space, each beautiful in its own right. The outdoor location features an arbor and a waterfall cascading down a rock face, which serves as a backdrop. Indoors, couples say, “I do” in front of floor-to-ceiling windows with what Orren calls a “200-degree view” of the golf course—they wrap around the room, flooding the space with natural light.

Both spaces can accommodate up to 270 people. The indoor option also serves as the reception location and can comfortably seat the same number of guests with a dance floor. For cocktail hour, there's a separate lounge with soft seating, cabaret tables and a baby grand piano, which couples can use if they wish.

Chiavari chairs and audio-visual components—including a sound system for outdoor weddings—come standard. “All of our lighting in the venue, it's all dimmable,” adds Orren. “So as the night progresses, all the lighting is adjusted to match the mood of the event.”

Couples may use the golf course for photos, as well as a golf cart to transport the newlyweds and their photographer. The icing on the cake—literally—is a wedding cake from The Cake Studio, part of all packages at Scioto Reserve.

Add-on amenities include a house DJ and photo booth, a spa day, makeup application, a golf outing, specialty linens, uplighting, valet services, personalized favors and ice sculptures.

“We really just try to do as much from a venue side as we can, so that their day is just as stress-free as possible,” says Orren. “I always joke around that wedding planning should be fun. It shouldn't be stressful. … So we have a lot of packages—whether it's linens, a DJ, a photo booth—that we can offer our couples.”