We recently held our wedding ceremony and receptio...

We recently held our wedding ceremony and reception at Bathers, and would have loved to say that the experience was nothing but seamless. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

We had a small 50 person wedding at Bathers (upstairs function space), which included a ceremony on the terrace. We had chosen Bathers thinking that the level of service and experience would be no concern at all due to the smaller wedding size and known reputation of the restaurant itself. However, the lead up to the wedding and the wedding event itself proved to be a bit of a disappointment and did not meet our expectations considering the cost per person was not cheap.

Pre-Wedding
Event manager incorrectly advised that we couldn't use a pastor in a public venue which we then had to review the contract / deposit agreement before flagging that we were not advised of this. Had we not reviewed ourselves, we would have been left believing that we were unable to have a religious wedding.
Event manager repeatedly forgot and did not take note of confirmed details we advised (run sheets not updated with given information)
Was not given any notice when Event Manager was going on annual leave one week prior to our event, which was a crucial time for us to make final decisions and organize final payments with confirmation of details from Bathers needed to do so

Day of Wedding
Received an email from Event Manager on the afternoon of the wedding (after he had clarified some details with my husband on the phone) saying that he was confused about tables being delivered and asked when they were going to be picked up (even though this was already advised by my husband).
Were given a very limited time of an hour and a half time given to set up which caused everyone setting up to rush (set up by florist, stylist and husband was still happening when guests arrived on time even though they were already rushing), therefore making it impossible to do a thorough set up let alone time to fit in time for a sound system check (or even do anything about it if there was an issue)
Indoor sound system had significant issues especially during speeches + first dance / general portion of music (which resulted in a very apparent disjointed flow of the night)
No offered solution for sound system issue besides asking us to change device and not touch it due to a faulty wire (for example, no back up wires on hand even though the option of playing music using owned sound system is offered as an option)
Husband and I spent a lot of time running around looking for solutions (with assistance of guests) during our own event instead of being able to spend time with our guests. Ultimately, we felt like we were working our own wedding as there was not adequate amount of staff around to assist in addressing the issue
Wine & beer serving was extremely limited from 9pm onwards (drink package was to go until midnight). Guests had to repeatedly go to the kitchen themselves to ask for a drink top up after waiting a significant amount of time and even then, still had to wait a while. Beer selection also became limited (cheapest option was the only option being offered).

The food was excellent and the space / terrace view is beautiful but this was not enough to make up for the pain points above.

All of these points were expressed to Bathers post-wedding, but were met with disagreement that the service and experience offered was acceptable.

Planning a wedding is a stressful experience in itself, and unfortunately - I cannot say that Bathers made things any easier for us. In fact, at times - made it more difficult than necessary. As a restaurant, Bathers delivers - but as a wedding venue, they have a lot to work on.