Lake Johnson Waterfront Center

After looking at nearly every venue in Wake County, we opted to go with Lake Johnson. It was well priced (just over $1k for 10 hours rental), a blank canvas as far as decorating it to our tastes went, a natural but pretty area, a perfect sized meeting room and an easily found location.

They were easy enough to work with as far as booking the venue and reserving the date, however when I got home I found we'd been heavily overcharged for our rental- The events coordinator, Clay, seemed to be quite ignorant of the rules, regulations and charges for the venue. I ended up speaking with Coley, the park manager about the situation who knocked nearly $2k off the price of the rental.

Clay was terrible to work with. Every question I asked him couldn't be answered without umming and ahhing for 5 minutes trying to find the answer, he seemed baffled by a lot of things I requested from him (ie- room dimensions & layouts, what could and couldn't be done to the venue, etc.) and most of their contracts were vaguely written. It's sad when the bride knows more about the rules and regulations of the venue than the events coordinator.

The day of the wedding nothing had been set up correctly, if it had been set up at all. We understood that it was our responsibility to set up the decorations etc. and the groomsmen were out there early in the morning getting lights and decorations strung. however, the venue were supposed to set up the seating for the ceremony & the tables for the reception. The caterer & DJ ended up forcing them to get things sorted out as there was no where for them to set up when the tables weren't properly done. They also ended up rearranging the room and the ceremony site so that it was correctly laid out as they didn't follow the layout drawings I'd given them.

Once everything was set up right, the place looked amazing, especially as it was a cloudless, sunny day and our guests loved the scenery. It made for some lovely photos and the juxtaposition of our sleek, modern theme against the natural scenery was breathtaking. I'd recommend the venue, but only if you're planning on having a smaller wedding (less than 70) and you have immense patience with people as it can get rather irritating having to deal with a bunch of men who barely understand what you're asking and don't have any interest in weddings. We're actually considering renting the space again for our 1-year anniversary and hosting a smaller party there to celebrate.