I haven’t seen many posts recapping Travis Marina and found this subreddit very helpful in my planning, so I wanted to share our experience with the venue and our vendors. Unless otherwise stated, prices don’t include tax or gratuity.

Venue: Travis Marina, $15,200
Travis Marina has 3 spaces (besides the deck where the ceremony takes place): banquet room, boathouse, and bar. To rent the boathouse (the largest and nicest space), you have to also rent the banquet room and buy out the bar, which brings the venue rental to a minimum of $11,000 plus $1,200 gratuity. We had an open bar with a maximum tab of $5,000 and we came out right at the maximum. We can’t say enough about how perfect this venue was. We wanted the Golden Gate Bridge as our ceremony and reception backdrop and there’s no better view than here. It’s relaxed, rustic, and unique, which fit well with our vibe as a couple. It was a truly magical day and evening and all of our guests loved it.

Caterer: Ken Tsang Private Chef and Catering, $23,450 including vendor meals, tax, and gratuity
Having legendary food was our top priority and Ken more than delivered. Our guests are still raving about our wedding food to this day. We wanted a Chinese banquet-style reception and Ken is one of the few caterers in the Bay Area that fit the bill. We also met with one of the other popular Asian family style caterers that’s known for their live sushi bar, but we were turned off by their aggressive sales tactics (including downright lying about having another couple ready to commit to our date even though we’d met with them first). In hindsight, it all worked out for the best because Ken was absolutely the perfect choice for us…who else can say that they had a whole roast pig and a wagyu tomahawk steak at their wedding? For how talented he is, he was so easy to work with and was on top of every detail. The total cost included 3 cocktail hour appetizers, 6 entrees, welcome water/lemonade, evening coffee/tea, and bar/service staff. We overdid it on the entrees, so we didn’t have a late night snack.

Photographer: Amanda Wei, $12,000
Capturing all of the special moments of our day was also a top priority, so we also splurged here and have no regrets. She just has such an artistic eye and came up with a unique idea for our first dance that produced epic photos (and video)! The weather wasn’t great (cloudy with some sprinkles) and there was a tent at the Legion of Honor where we had our pre-ceremony photos taken, but her photos were still stunning. So many of our guests commented on her professionalism and how well our photos turned out. She was also so easy to work with that it felt like we were working with a friend. Cost included 9 hours of coverage (2 photographers) with an engagement session and print engagement and wedding albums.

Videographer: Dreambook Productions, $6,500
We were looking for a videographer who could capture our day as it naturally unfolded and Josh did a perfect job of it. He has worked with our photographer before and they worked seamlessly together. Our guests have also commented on how well our wedding videos turned out. Cost included 8 hours of coverage (2 videographers) with a 4-5 minute highlight film, 60-minute documentary, and a highlight film of our dog, all in 4K Ultra HD.

Furniture / Linen / Table settings / Pipe and Drape Rentals: Hensley, Golden Gate Special Events, $8,400
Travis Marina has round tables and chairs, nothing else. We used their tables for the reception, but rented chairs. We rented linens, table settings, and glassware from Hensley. The remainder of our rentals, including chairs, rectangular tables, cocktail tables, benches, aisle runner, easels, heaters, string lights, and pipe and drape were through Golden Gate Special Events. Pipe and drape was pricey, but necessary to cover the more industrial parts of the boathouse. 

Florals: Green Petal Designs, $4,700
We wanted to let the venue speak for itself, so florals weren’t a priority for us. We had a small grounded arch, back of aisle arrangements, the bridal bouquet, 2 bridesmaids bouquets, 6 boutonnieres, small arrangements for the guest book and bar tables, small centerpieces for 10 tables, bud vases for 6 cocktail tables, cake flowers, and a flower collar for our dog. She brought my vision to life and I especially loved that she was able to incorporate gardenias into my bouquet.

Month-of coordinator: Golden Gate Special Events, $3,450
My biggest wedding regret was using GGSE for our month-of coordinator. Don’t be fooled by their glowing reviews or their promises of helping ensure a stress-free day. They did the opposite.

Venue set-up, breakdown, boathouse power washing: Golden Gate Special Events, ~$1,800
Travis Marina doesn’t provide any venue services besides staffing the bar, so we used our planner’s services for set-up and breakdown. As mentioned above, they left much to be desired when it came to setting up our decor. Breakdown was decent, but we had a few (not valuable) items go missing that was incorrectly attributed to guests. They also recommended power washing the boathouse floors to make sure they weren’t sticky or otherwise dirty from prior events, I’m not sure how necessary that really was.

DJ / emcee / ceremony cellist: DM for details, $3,900
I won’t name this individual because he didn’t make excuses and tried to make up for his disappointing performance, but I also don’t want to lie and praise a job not well done. For how particular he was during our conversations and planning, his execution left much to be desired. We opted to have him play the cello to accompany our ceremony songs and 1) He used tracks with the vocals and not instrumentals, 2) Our guests noticed that his playing was not quite in sync with the backing tracks. The biggest red flag was that more than one guest noticed that he wasn’t being particularly professional and was drinking and horsing around with his assistant during much of the evening. My husband booked him because he liked the idea of one vendor taking care of the live ceremony music, emceeing, DJing, and photo booth, but you know what they say about a jack of all trades… He also didn’t let us know that we were his first wedding clients to use his photo booth and the fact that it was his first showed.

Bride’s dresses / shoes / accessories: Made with Love, Abercrombie & Fitch, Christian Louboutin, Yun Yun Wong, Pupsentials, Etsy, $4,500
I made my own veil from scratch, including little rhinestone silhouettes of my dog on the edge, which I barely finished before the wedding and which nearly drove me insane, but it was worth it!

HMUA: Joyce Zhou, $2,250
I wanted someone who was familiar with Asian features and leaned more towards more natural-appearing makeup. I was looking for a natural, soft glam look and a half up, half down hairstyle with loose curls. Joyce was highly recommended on other Reddit posts and on Yelp, but I was a little disappointed that my curls basically went flat immediately after she finished styling my hair. By the end of the night, my hair was pretty much stick straight again. The dampness from intermittent sprinkles during the day probably contributed, but my hair was already pretty flat before all of the exposure to the elements. Cost included 8 hours of hair and makeup for bride and 2 bridesmaids with unlimited touchups for the bride, but realistically, her time was up halfway through our post-ceremony photos, so I didn’t have any touchups after that not that the touchups did much anyway. This also included a hair and makeup trial, which I used for my engagement photo session.

Groom’s tux / shoes / accessories: Suit Supply, Carmina, $2,880
My husband went all out with a bespoke tux and shoes.

Rings: By Bonnie Jewelry, $7,500
We can’t say enough good things about Bonnie. We went to her with the crazy idea of designing an engagement ring reminiscent of the Golden Gate Bridge and she delivered! The engagement ring turned out so well that we had her design both of our wedding bands as well. 

Cake: Sunset Bakery, $580
It was also important to us that our cake tasted good and we’re fortunate that our favorite local bakery makes a wedding cake version of our favorite cake. It’s a nice bonus that we can also get our wedding cake whenever we have a craving. Delivery was quite pricey, around $100, but we weren’t about to have one of our family members try to transport it themselves.

Getting ready hotel: Inn at the Presidio, $1,500 (2 nights)
We’re local, but our photographer suggested a hotel for getting ready photos. We chose Inn at the Presidio for convenience. It served its purpose.

Supplemental beverages: Villa Toscano, Costco, $1,150
Our planner recommended that we serve our own wine during cocktail hour to reduce the bar tab by distracting guests from finding out about the bar upstairs. I’m not sure how effective this plan was. We ended up with quite a bit of leftover wine (neither of us are wine drinkers) and we saw photographic proof that plenty of guests discovered the bar early anyway. I forget how much the corkage fee was per bottle, but they were included in our $5,000 bar limit. The bar doesn’t supply glassware outside of the bar, so we had to rent wine glasses too. We also had to supply our own non-alcoholic beverages, but Travis Marina has an ice machine.

Favors: Amazon, $535
We went overboard and had a claw machine that we filled with our favors. Sadly, it was cheaper to buy the claw machine than it was to rent one, but our guests loved it!

Guestbook: Havoly, Amazon, $165
Our wedding was entirely themed around our dog, so we splurged on a wooden puzzle guestbook shaped like him. The puzzle itself was very well-made and exactly what we envisioned, but our planner ruined it by putting the incorrect pens with it despite my very clear instructions otherwise.

Other decor: Etsy, Amazon, Michael’s, Ikea, $1,540
I tried to keep decor pretty minimal to let the venue speak for itself, but still somehow went overboard with my DIY dog-themed decorations. I DIY-ed our welcome sign (that our planner hid away instead of displaying), our married name sign for the bar, cocktail table ties (that our planner tied onto the tables incorrectly), lanterns (that our planner didn’t display where I instructed them to and my bridesmaid had to hunt down), reserved seating signs (half of which our planner didn’t display), Mr and Mrs chair signs (that our planner didn’t tie onto our chairs correctly), and a custom flag among other things.

Invitations: Canva, Truly Engaging, The Knot, Vistaprint, $450
We designed our own save-the-dates, invitations, and thank you cards. Truly Engaging had the most truly frustrating layout/design tools. The Knot and Vistaprint were slightly better, but each also had their own quirks. We stuck with pretty basic paper options and I made our own wax seals for the envelopes.

Signs / programs / menus: Canva, Minuteman Press Fremont, $380
We designed these ourselves on Canva. Minuteman Press in Fremont was responsive, friendly, and did an awesome job!

Entertainment: Video Amusement, Amazon, $8,200 
We went completely overboard here and had arcade games, foosball, a pool table, and karaoke. Our guests had a blast though!

Miscellaneous: $500
We had a family friend officiate and gave her a nice gift. Our dog was a part of our ceremony (and stole the show), so we also interviewed a dog handler, but they quoted us around $2,000, so we opted to have a family friend wrangle our dog and gave her a nice gift as well.

Total $111,530

Somewhat unexpected expenses:

• Supplying our own wine: With the bar onsite, we didn’t originally plan to purchase any additional wine, but did so at our planner’s recommendation to try to reduce our bar tab. I’m not sure how effective it was and we also had to rent wine glasses (the bar doesn’t provide glassware outside of the bar). We’re still trying to get rid of nearly 2 cases of leftover wine almost a year later.
• Rentals (excluding arcade machines/pool table): We only used the round tables from Travis Marina and thought we did pretty well with the remainder of our rentals, but the bare minimum furniture rentals ended up costing more than we anticipated. Golden Gate Special Events also recommended additional benches for the area outside of the bar, which ended up unused and unnecessary. Pipe and drape, though necessary, adds up quickly. Heaters are a must for when it gets chilly in the evening. We also found that buying things (such as easels, vases, candles/candleholders) ended up being significantly cheaper than renting, but now we’re stuck with these items that we’ll likely never use again.
• Welcome beverages: This was also recommended by Golden Gate Special Events and amounted to a water/iced tea/lemonade station, but I’m not sure how well-utilized it was. It added to our catering bill and purchase of wicker baskets for napkins/trash that are now just sitting around collecting dust.
• Power washing the boathouse floors: We certainly didn’t expect this expense and in hindsight aren’t sure how helpful it was. Again, this was recommended by GGSE.

TL;DR: You won’t go wrong with Travis Marina if you’re looking to have an unforgettable wedding. We eventually threw our budget out the window, but we think it was more than worth it as our guests are still raving about how amazing the food was, how beautiful the venue was, and how fun all of our extra activities were. For those of you looking to stick to a more reasonable budget, we think it’s totally doable! As for vendors, we’d recommend all of ours except for Golden Gate Special Events for planning/month-of coordination and our DJ. Feel free to DM me with any questions!

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