Annette Hartery, Married on 19/05/2018

Art Deco Weddding at The Windsor Arms

We were absolutely thrilled with everything the WA did for us on our wedding day. The Banquet Manager took over once we arrived and really acted like a wedding planner for us as we did not have one. The guests raved about everything from the ambience to the food,to the service . It was great. This was a second wedding for the both of us and we had no complaints.

Luke Kremer, Married on 09/08/2017

We had our wedding reception at the Windsor Arms. Food was great, service was better.

Going in we were a little nervous about throwing a party and getting everything done. Sharon MacLeod made the whole experience fun, easy and most importantly stress free. I would recommend working with her to anyone!

[Private User]

Our wedding at this venue was perfect. We dealt with Sharon and from start to finish she was great. Everything I requested was handled with ease and professionalism. All the staff made us feel like we were at home and so welcome. We checked into the honeymoon sweet the day before our wedding and were treated with so much love and care. The staff on the night were so friendly and helpful. Food was good and kept on coming! I used the Spa for all my pre wedding treatments and just fell in love with the team their too. I would highly recommend this venue.

Olivia Ho, Married on 19/02/2017

I am so happy we decided to book our wedding at the Windsor Arms Hotel. We were looking for a venue that was more unique and cozy than a banquet hall, and Windsor Arms definitely has that vintage charm! We received so many compliments on our venue of choice because of the sheer beauty of the venue. The aesthetics was a huge deciding factor, and the fact that they have an in-house kosher kitchen.

I loved the fact that George, the owner, worked with us along the way, and made the time to meet with us and the catering manager (Sharon). Made us feel like VIP patrons throughout. I read other reviews online prior to booking this venue, and I have to give George credit—he may be “rough around the edges” (mind you, so am I), but we brought some of the bad reviews online (which you’ll always find) and asked him to address the issues, and he was very straight forward and open about it, and made us feel assured that we would not experience any issues. Everything is laid out in your contract, and he allowed me to personalize aspects of the contract to better suit our needs. That was one of the elements that I appreciated most, the fact that everything was customized to our requirements.

Sharon went above and beyond to address every concern we had, and met with us on multiple occasions throughout the year we were planning. Right down to making sure the size of the strawberries on the plated dessert were proportional. This attention to detail was amazing! We also got a lot of compliments on the food!

For me, one of the best parts about the wedding venue was that they really let us have the run of the hotel on our day. We had a rather large wedding for the venue (180 people), and our guests were all over—in the restaurant, in the bar, upstairs, in the main hall….and they did not give us a hard time at all. In fact, they even allowed us to take some wedding photos in the restaurant, which we really appreciated. The wedding suite is gorgeous, and they let us check out the next day very late in the afternoon. All in all, we felt like royalty.

For the cons, there aren’t many. First, while we knew this when booking the venue, the venue is really much better for weddings under 150 people (seated dinner with dance floor). It got pretty crowded during cocktail hour, which also lasted a little longer than I would have preferred (though not sure if this was the venue’s fault or my other vendors). So I would say just be prepared for 2 hours of cocktails and get extra hors d’oeuvres. The other thing to note is that this is not a cheap venue….if you are looking for a budget venue, this is not an option. We didn’t do flowers or fancy décor, or super expensive wedding dress, etc. We chose to allocate majority of our budget to the venue because it was so important to us. So be prepared to pay a premium for a historical landmark 5-star venue. Parking is only valet, so we did not cover this for our guests (we also had open bar and didn’t want people driving anyway).

All in all, we are very happy with our choice, and we really felt special on our day. The food was great, the venue looked amazing, and working with Sharon was such a pleasure. We look forward to staying at the hotel in the future, and reliving our memories!

[Private User]

The venue is a beautiful setting. The management is a nightmare to deal with. Take away message: Rot in this case starts from the top.
Dealing with the Windsor Arms difficult. Here are some key issues we had:
- High turnover of catering managers (dealt with 3). Responses were often lacking unless it was related to payment. The Catering Manager we had was personable -- however, two weeks before our wedding, we found out ONLY through calling (they didn’t call us), that she was no longer with the organization. We had to ask/take initiative ourselves since much of the info was not forthcoming. We asked for a meeting (2 weeks prior to our wedding) with the new co-ordinator (the sales manager) which included the owner.
- The owner was rude and unhelpful at the meeting. Most of the answers to our questions were along the lines of "we can't accommodate that". Basically, our reasonable requests (which we had already discussed in detail and agreed with the previous coordinator in writing) were all shot down by the owner.
- Furthermore, we had been told because they could not produce our "cake substitute" for a reasonable price, that our "cake substitute" (Donuts) could be purchased outside and delivered in. Not only did the owner tell us that we could NOT have outside food brought in and that they would NOT allow the baker to set up (again, this was previously discussed and agreed upon with the previous coordinator), but he also had the nerve to (two weeks before the wedding) tell us that we were being charged a 5.00/person cake cutting fee! (the previous coordinator had promised this fee would be waived, considering we had no cake, and there was no cutting involved).
I would not recommend the Windsor Arms hotel as you may have to deal with last minute changes that are not small. You will be forced to deal with prolonged non-transparent communication. The whole experience has left a sour taste.