Since the time you have been dreaming about your dream wedding, involuntarily, you must also have been dreaming of the venue where you want your dream wedding to play out. This is the exact reason why some wedding locations reach out to you with a more urgent liking than the others. You might have visited 7 venues already, but might be none that you like, or the second one still calls out to you. When you know, you know. Just like a perfect match between two hearts, the perfect match between a wedding and the venue is just as intimate. This is why finding the right venue for the dream wedding is of paramount importance for an engaged couple. 

If you and your partner are walking through the magical journey of wedding planning and are based in Minneapolis, we are off to a great start! Minneapolis is a beautiful city that is home to endless streams of parks, museums, farms, hotels, and more, each more charming than the other. Etched by the Mississippi River, the city is known for its gorgeous parks and abundant lakes. Home to many cultural landmarks, Minneapolis contains in its lap the city trademarks like the Walker Art Center,  Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, Minnehaha Falls, to name just a few.  A picture-perfect city with photo opportunities by the bunch, the city offers plenty of backdrops for not only your pre-wedding photography but also a beautiful post-wedding photo session. A gorgeous city that also happens to be half of the Twin Cities, Minnesota is the quintessence of an urban American city and will be the perfect host for your special day.

Nestled in Minnesota, Van Dusen Mansion is a wedding venue that will add the ‘dream’ to your dream wedding. Award-winning venue and catering voted Best Unique Venue by Minnesota Bride and Best of Weddings by The Knot, Van Dusen Mansion with its enchanting castle-like structure and breathtaking views, promises of the most magical day of your life and an unforgettable celebration to follow. Built with a vision to impress, it is no surprise that this beauty will take you and your guests’ breath away every time they glance at this majestic structure. Built with stunning stone exteriors and the majestic interiors is dipped in class and elegance. A gorgeous property bearing the message of the old-world prosperity, this piece of treasure from the bygone years is bound to add boundless charm to your wedding.

In 1888, Mr. Van Dusen, the entrepreneur who founded the first and most prosperous grain firm in 1883, was the president and general manager of both his eponymous company and in control of more than 90 elevators stretching from Winona to Pierre, South Dakota, and the Star Elevator Company. That year, the stocks of the two companies were sold to English investors in London, and merged by 1889 with Charles M. Harrington's Minneapolis company to become Van Dusen-Harrington. Constructed in 1892, this grand “castle-like” Mansion remained with his family for decades. After being abandoned around 1940, a heroic investor saved the Mansion from being demolished and restored it back to its original splendor. This eventually became part of the Peavey Company, acquired by ConAgra in 1982.

The Van Dusen Mansion is anything but ordinary and will provide you and your sweetheart with the most unforgettable wedding experience in Minneapolis. A gorgeous Minneapolis wedding venue to host up to 200 seated guests, this progressive-style ceremony site takes your guest through a bewildering journey through its diverse ever-changing scenery across four event spaces of its precisely restored Mansion. From fairytale-esque indoors to the grand interiors filled with hardwood floors, awe-inspiring Victorian furniture, sparkling chandeliers, and lush woodwork, each event space is more captivating than the last. Trust us when we say that your guests are in for a treat, and you will have a wedding that will never fade in your mind.

The Mansion itself is aesthetic beauty from all around and promises of an enchanting evening to last you a lifetime's worth of memories. As soon as you step in, you will be instantly immersed in lavish interiors adorned with prolific woodwork, plush Persian rugs, artistic stained glass windows, and sparkling chandeliers. Complete with a bridal suite for those quick touch-ups and getting-ready photo sessions with bridesmaids, a separate makeup room, a secure gift room, and a groom's club room for the groomsmen to hang out while they get ready for the ceremony. From historic antiques adding to the splendor of the interiors to surround sound speakers so that the music spreads evenly to all your guests, the grand Mansion is fully equipped to promise an entertaining evening to the Minneapolis couples and their guests.

Another event space is the romantic courtyard which is perfect as a ceremony space. With an abundant front lawn area adorned with a gazebo, fountain, and garden furniture, the courtyard is what dreams are made of! The ivy-covered walls add a heavy helping of romance to the look, making every photograph of your wedding album almost ethereal. The twinkle lights hanging above add to the magic and the romance of the area, giving your special day an enchanting facelift. The place comes dressed in cafe string lights to light up the evenings and comes complete with white garden chairs and the arbor which is perfect for your courtyard ceremony. This beautiful brick paver courtyard is wrapped up in lush gardens and trees, a peek of an oasis right in the middle of the city. Whether you want to host your ceremony here or want to open up the space for the cocktail hour so that the guests can mingle, this is the perfect spot for candid wedding portraits of your bridal party and golden hour photography of you two later at sunset.

The stunning newly renovated ballroom accommodates 50 to 200 seated guests and 250 standing cocktail style guests. Just steps away from the Mansion, this space is supremely elegant and is adorned with beautiful chandeliers, delicately hand-beaded wall coverings and beautiful terrazzo floorings. Classy round dining tables which seat up to ten guests, along with gold Chiavari chairs, the ballroom dresses up perfectly for your wedding reception. Complete with on-site catering for perfect entertainment and gorgeous overhead lighting for stunning photography opportunities, the place packs it all. Let our Minneapolis wedding photographer capture the eloquent setting in the most classy frames. 

The Carriage House is another event space within the Van Dusen Mansion which brings the night to the perfect finish! Let your guests wrap up the evening with flair in this gorgeous setting and it will surely be a night they wouldn't forget. The Carriage House has been restored to bring in a swanky club-like feel, it still retains some original elements of the ceremony space with its rich wooden flooring and second-floor mezzanine with custom New York-style lounge furniture. Complete with a generous bar, a wooden dance floor, string lights, and spotlights, event space is optimized for a night of dancing and fun. The uplighting can be chosen as per your lighting so that it does not clash with your wedding theme. 

With each event space communicating a whole different mood of its own, the four different event spaces of Van Dusen Mansion are a delight to explore and surely something which has something for everyone. Whether you want a garden wedding or a more somber opulent vent, the wedding venue delivers in abundance. The location is filled with perfect little nooks and crannies to add gems to your Minneapolis wedding photography. Whether it is the castle-like exterior, the ivy-covered courtyard, or the rich and groovy carriage house, the ceremony space has photo opportunities in abundance.  Let our Minneapolis wedding photographers capture the magic within the lenses so that you can flip through the wedding album for decades to come and relive it all whenever you want!

This historic estate is an architectural masterpiece that will provide you all the feels for your wedding. Its striking building and rich interiors are nothing short of a fairytale come true. But what really makes this place extra special is the people who are there to take care of the couples and their wedding party and ensure that their event runs smoothly. Van Dusen Mansion’s well-trained and professional staff employ precision and ingenuity when producing your wedding day or wedding-related events. They are there to take care of every little thing, leaving you and your guests with a wedding day which is truly unforgettable. Standing strong as your wedding entourage, the staff will be right there for you at every step of the way. They are passionate about delivering just the wedding that newly engaged couples in Minneapolis dream of, ensuring they get a customized wedding planning experience, and their expectations are not only met but exceeded. With diverse facilities like easy handicap accessibility, dressing area, and wireless internet and more, this Mansion goes above and beyond to make your wedding truly the best day of your life. The bar and catering services ensure that your guests will leave the venue well satiated.

Everyone has a fairytale with their name on it. This larger-than-life gorgeous Van Dusen Mansion provides the perfect setting for yours. From its stunning stone castle-like mansion to the romantic ivy-covered walls and pointy Hogwarts-meets-Rapunzel tower, everything seems to have jumped out of an enchanting storybook. Every element seems designed to make your dream weddings come true or even much better than you imagined. We say, if a wedding venue in Minneapolis manages to make you feel like you are floating through the events, without having to worry about a thing, you have struck gold. With Van Dusen Mansion, a combined effect of the vibe that the place has with the staff for your every need, you will for sure feel like you are waltzing through one event to the other throughout the day without a single bump in the road. As you leave the venue amidst confetti and sparklers, with your brand new spouse holding hand in hand to ride into your happily-ever-after, you will feel like a princess.