I found the St. John Event Center on Wedding Wire and I will forever be grateful. In the early stages of wedding planning, I had originally hired another venue. But they had so many restrictions like what vendors we could hire, licenses, hours, and guest counts. When I saw that this venue could accommodate our guest count and let us party till whatever time we wanted I cancelled my other venue and booked this one. I immediately got into contact with Andrea. She is so nice and even gave us a big hug when she first met us in person. She helped us through the planning process and gave us ideas, maps of the venue layout for our vendors, and she was super helpful. We ended up adding a considerable amount of hours and had access to the venue from 10am till 3am. We hired my aunt to make our food because in my culture the family usually makes the food at weddings, and she is not licensed. The only vendor they require to have a license is the bartenders. We live out of state and she accommodated for us, allowing zoom calls when we had meetings and such. The day of the wedding, when I finally got there it was so beautiful. The venue is on the grounds of a Greek Orthodox Church and the infrastructure is gorgeous with the tall archways and stairs. We had the ceremony in their courtyard (I will attach photos) in front of their fountain and it turned out amazing. All the guests were swooning about how beautiful everything was. I even saved about 2,000 on flowers because it was so gorgeous we didn’t need the amount of flowers as we did at the other venue. We then had our reception inside and the banquet hall was large enough for 250 guests(25 large tables), a large dance floor, a large buffet style dinner, a DJ, and a band. We set up a Photo Booth in their cafe area and that where we also held cocktail hour. We had a lot of kids at our wedding but the didn’t not bother at all because they played the whole night in the cafe area.
I saw some bad reviews of this venue and Andrea on google, do not listen to them. We had a lot of guests and many of whom smoke, and they respected that there was no smoking on the property and we had no problems. Andrea was nothing but nice and professional the whole 9 months we planned together. We even got complements about her from the vendors that were in contact with her directly. This venue charges a base price but we paid much more because all the hours we added so don’t be scared when you see the 9,000 below.
I would 100% recommend this venue if you want to party the whole night, not be restricted, and if you want a beautiful venue.

I am excited to leave the first review for this new gem of an event venue!

We recently held my daughter's wedding at St. John Event Center. The day prior, St. John's was very accommodating enabling us to use the outside ceremony area for rehearsal and escape the heat into the Kafenio – we were lucky that there was not another event that day which would have prevented that.

The following day, we spent the morning having the girls' hair and makeup done in the Kafenio and made full use of the bridal and groom suites.

After a beautiful ceremony in the courtyard, where the bride and groom stood in front of the fountain, we returned to the Kafenio for the cocktail hour. We setup the bar in the bright, airy space on the beautiful, enormous granite/marble island. We put up static food stations adjacent to the bar and we also had roving servers offering hors d'oeuvres to our guests. The stations were beautiful as we used the raw-edge wood tables onsite.

Following, the reception was held in the ballroom. As fine if not better than any ballroom in the area, the space was beautiful, bright during the day and well-lit in the evening. Lighting was able to be dimmed as needed for dancing. The full-kitchen provided ample prep and clean up space for our caterer. And notably, the bathrooms are very spacious and beautifully maintained. Overall, the space provided the perfect backdrop for the day's events.

Moreover, the service was impeccable. From booking just several months ago, to follow up the day after the wedding, St. John's staff was helpful, friendly, and willing to work with us to meet our needs. Sharon filled in while an event manager was being secured, and she was very communicative and helpful during the early planning stages.

Being a bit nervous because the onsite event manager was hired just a couple weeks before our event, we can not say enough about Serena's attention to detail, her pleasant demeanor, her ability to be available when needed but willingness to allow the space to be ours for the night. She was unobtrusive, but ready to lend a hand. Peter, likewise, was knowledgeable about the space and also nearby for assistance if needed. But truth-be-told, we really did not need anything. The venue was just perfect from ease of access to climate-controlled spaces.

The only downside was that we needed to provide sound for the outdoor ceremony (I believe they are planning to make that available in the future) and our DJ decided not to use the onsite sound system in the ballroom thinking it wasn't quite adequate for our needs. But for others it may be just fine. Neither of these were issues that a coordinator or DJ won't be able to help with for future clients. One other small downside is that the areas for outdoor photography are somewhat limited, but creative photographers will figure out how to make it work.

I HIGHLY recommend St. Johns for your upcoming event! I am sure they will become a KEY, sought-after Jacksonville venue and I wish them great success because they were FABULOUS!