July 21, 2020

Engaged couples looking for a more modern venue for their weddings have a new option west of Sioux Falls.

The owners of Blue Haven Barn and Gardens have opened The Atrium at Blue Haven.

“We went for a kind of Tuscan modern look over here, very timeless with the brick, and we did very all-inclusive,” said Amanda Nelson, who started Blue Haven with her husband, Josh, in 2016. “I’ve noticed there’s a huge market for people who want us to do more and more.”

Rental of The Atrium, which is just south of Wild Water West, includes items such as plates, silverware, napkins and linens.

The building seats 500 guests and features a four-sided bar staffed with trained bartenders and a full kitchen with in-house executive chef Tyler Honke of Catering by Cleavers. For other services, couples can choose their own vendors.

Rental includes access to the venue from 8 a.m. to midnight. It’s also available for other celebrations and nonprofit events and corporate gatherings.

Ceremonies can be indoors or outside on the terraced grounds that overlook a pond with a fountain.

“You’d be surprised – a lot of people around here even in the summertime want to do it (the ceremony) inside, which is fine with us,” Nelson said.

There’s a patio and yard area for cocktail hours in the summer.

Inside, both the bridal suite and groom’s den feature seating areas for the wedding parties and private bathrooms.

The new building offers twice as much space as the original venue on the west side of the property, which seats 300 guests.

The first wedding scheduled for the new venue would have been July 10, but the couple changed plans because of the COVID-19 pandemic. A postponed wedding from the spring that would have been in Blue Haven took advantage of open dates and used The Atrium instead, Nelson said.

“We’ve had some smaller weddings; we’ve had a couple (larger) weddings,” Nelson said of the venues. “We just let the couples decide what to do with the pandemic. We let it be their decision.

“I would say 90 percent of people did postpone in March, April, May, lots of June, some July, and August is kind of coming back.”

She said there was a lot of fear beginning in mid-March, but people are beginning to feel safer in South Dakota.

“I’ve watched the big events that are happening and not too much is going around, so I feel confident about doing weddings, just being a little bit safer than we were before – lots more sanitizers, we’ve got big foggers, we’ve got the mini (sanitizing) stations. Lots of people I’ve noticed want to be a little bit more outside right now – we’ve got beautiful areas outside.”

The outlook is good with only a few Saturdays open for 2021 at both venues.

“This year has been delayed on bookings, but now we’re caught up pretty well of what we normally are on pace for,” Nelson said. “Something happened in the last three weeks that just made people feel better about booking a wedding.”