Jedediah Hawkins Inn Wedding Venue | Photographer’s Guide

The Jedediah Hawkins Inn wedding venue is an 1863 house on the North Fork. It is also a restaurant, a small hotel and a speakeasy.

Most guides to a venue will tell you it is beautiful. That part is not in dispute and you can see it from the photographs.

What I can tell you, having worked there, is something the brochure does not get around to.

The property is compact. Everything a wedding needs sits within a short walk of everything else.

That is the single most useful thing about it. Short distances are what let a couple spend their evening on their guests instead of on walking, and most couples never find out they had that to spend.

At a Glance

• Where: 400 South Jamesport Avenue, Jamesport, on Long Island’s North Fork
• The building: an Italianate house built in 1863, now a hotel, restaurant and wedding venue
• Reception: a barn, seating up to 125
• Ceremonies: on the lawn in front of the barn, in the wisteria breezeway, in the fountain garden, or inside the barn
• Cocktail hour: a stone terrace with an outdoor bar
• Getting ready: a solarium and an upstairs bridal suite, with the speakeasy downstairs
• Staying over: five guest rooms and the Belvedere Suite
• Catering: from the Inn’s own kitchen

Capacity, inclusions and availability all change, so take every figure here to the Inn for your own date.

Where It Is

The Inn is at 400 South Jamesport Avenue in Jamesport, out on the North Fork.

That is far enough east to matter. For guests coming from the city or from western Long Island it is a real drive. The North Fork also gets busy in summer and autumn. The wineries, the beaches and the farm stands all pull people on the same weekends.

If any part of your day happens off the property, build more time into the drive than a map suggests. I have had traffic out there add a meaningful amount to a journey in both directions on the same wedding day.

If the whole day stays on the property, none of that matters after your guests arrive. In the end they park once.

The Inn also appears on our list of Long Island wedding venues, which is the place to see how it sits against everything else on the island.

Getting Ready

At the weddings we have photographed here, brides have started in the solarium and then moved upstairs to the bridal suite.

That suite is one of my favorite rooms to work in on Long Island. The light is good and there is space for everyone who wants to be in there. Nobody ends up waiting in a hallway in their dress. Plenty of venues give you a room that technically fits the people and functionally does not.

Grooms have got ready downstairs in the speakeasy, which is a better room for it than the name suggests.

The practical point is that both of those rooms are in the same building as everything else. For one thing, nobody is driving in. Nobody is getting ready at a hotel down the road and arriving as a guest. The morning is part of the wedding rather than a thing that happens before it.

Arrangements vary by wedding, so confirm which rooms you have and for how long.

Where Ceremonies Happen

The Inn offers ceremonies outdoors and inside the barn.

Outdoors, there is the lawn directly in front of the barn, the wisteria breezeway, and the fountain garden. The breezeway is the one the Inn talks about most, and reasonably so. It is a covered walk of vines that guests pass through on the way to the ceremony or the reception.

For instance, the lawn is where Martyna and Jesse were married. Rows of white chairs, flowers down the length of the aisle, and an arch at the far end of it. It sits a few steps from the barn, which is the whole argument for it.

Ceremonies also happen inside the barn, lit with candles and string lights, and that doubles as the wet weather plan. In any case, settle which ceremony space you have and what the indoor alternative is when you book. An outdoor ceremony is a decision you make twice.

One more question worth asking early: which way your ceremony faces, and at what hour. The direction of the sun does more to the look of an outdoor ceremony than almost anything else you choose. It is also easier to plan around than to fix.

Cocktail Hour

Cocktail hour happens on the stone terrace, with an outdoor bar and string lights overhead.

The terrace connects to the ceremony space on one side and the barn on the other, which sounds like a detail and is not. It is the reason a couple at this venue has options that take more effort elsewhere.

Emily and Corbin stood at the way out of their ceremony and had a photograph taken with every guest who passed. A hundred of them, and then they walked into cocktail hour themselves.

Martyna and Jesse went the other way round. They used twenty minutes of their cocktail hour for portraits, with the families photographed in the same stretch. We set up beside the terrace rather than walking anyone across the grounds.

Both of those are easier here than they would be on a larger property, because nobody has to be retrieved from anywhere.

The Barn

The reception happens in the barn. Soaring ceilings, exposed timber, and lights strung overhead.

Above all it is a good room to photograph in, and a forgiving one, which are not the same thing. The height gives you somewhere to put light. The timber keeps the room warm rather than flat. That matters more than people realise once the sun has gone and every picture is lit rather than found.

It is also an intimate room by the standards of a catering hall. The Inn seats up to 125 in there. As a result it behaves differently from a room built for three hundred and filled halfway.

The couple sees it finished before anybody else does, which is worth asking your photographer to be present for. A room is only empty and perfect once.

The Window After the Room Reveal

Here is one worth knowing about.

After the reveal, there is often a stretch where the guests are still being brought in and the couple has nothing to do with themselves. It is short, and it is the only unclaimed time in the entire evening.

Victoria and Nick spent theirs outside, in front of the building. Whether the gap exists on your own wedding depends on your schedule and on how the room is being turned, so ask rather than assume it, and ask early enough that somebody can protect it.

Whether that window exists on your wedding depends on your schedule and on how the room is being turned. Ask your planner and your photographer rather than assuming it. It is worth having.

What the Jedediah Hawkins Inn Wedding Venue Offers

Most of what follows is the sort of thing a venue either does or does not do, and this one does. Inclusions still vary by package and date, so treat this as the list of questions to ask rather than the answers.

• Day of coordination by their events team
• Exclusive use of the ceremony and reception spaces
• Cuisine from their own kitchen
• Full bar service
• Tables, chairs, linens and basic decor
• The bridal suite for getting ready
• On site accommodations for the wedding party
• A tasting for the couple

Food comes from the Inn’s own kitchen. Their site says they do not take outside caterers, and weddings there do still carry cake and dessert vendors, so the question to ask is not whether you can bring anybody in but which categories they arrange through the kitchen and which they do not. Settle that before you start talking to anybody else.

Capacity, and Staying Over

The Inn hosts weddings from around twenty guests up to 125 seated for dinner. It says the outdoor ceremony space can take more than that for the ceremony itself. Confirm both numbers for your own date.

There are five guest rooms and the Belvedere Suite, so a wedding party can stay on the property. One couple told us they had the Inn for the weekend rather than the day. That is worth asking about if your guests are travelling out to the North Fork anyway. The answer will depend on your date and on the rooms.

Three Weddings, Three Different Days

The useful thing about having worked here more than once is seeing how differently the same property behaves.

All three of the couples below were answering the same question, which is the one almost every couple is really asking. How do we actually see the people who came? Each of them solved it differently. The venue does not solve it for you, but it stops adding to the problem, and one of the three answers below spends the property directly.

Emily and Corbin: everything on one property. They kept the whole wedding on site and finished every portrait before the ceremony. That bought them a receiving line and a photograph with all hundred of their guests on the way into cocktail hour.

Victoria and Nick: a ceremony somewhere else. They got ready at the Inn, married at a Greek Orthodox church in Mattituck, and came back for the reception. Two drives on a busy autumn weekend, and a timeline built with slack in both directions so the delays never reached them.

Martyna and Jesse: no first look, ceremony on the lawn. That pairing left exactly one window for portraits. They took twenty minutes out of their own cocktail hour and paid almost nothing for it, because we worked beside the terrace rather than away from it.

Same venue. Three completely different timelines, and all three worked.

There is also a portfolio set from Martyna and Jesse’s day, if you would rather look at the property than read about it.

What I Would Tell a Couple Planning Here

Use the fact that everything is close. It is the property’s real advantage and most couples never spend it. Short distances buy you time with your guests, and time with your guests is the thing people remember.

Settle the wet weather plan when you book. The barn is the answer, it is a good one, and you want to have made peace with it long before the morning.

Ask which way your ceremony faces. Direction and hour decide more about how an outdoor ceremony looks than the flowers do.

Ask about the rooms early. Five rooms and a suite go quickly, and whether your people can stay changes what the night feels like.

If anything is happening off the property, plan the drive twice. Out and back. The North Fork will take more time than you expect in both directions.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many guests can the Jedediah Hawkins Inn hold?

The Inn hosts weddings from about twenty guests up to 125 seated for dinner. It says the outdoor ceremony space can take a larger group for the ceremony itself. Those are their figures, so confirm them against your own date and your own headcount.

Is the Jedediah Hawkins Inn a barn wedding venue?

Yes, and the barn is the reception space: timber beams, a high ceiling, and lights strung above the room. Ceremonies also happen in there, which is what makes it the wet weather plan for an outdoor ceremony.

Can you have an outdoor ceremony at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

Yes. The Inn offers ceremonies on the lawn in front of the barn, in the wisteria breezeway, and in the fountain garden. Ask what is available for your date, and settle the indoor alternative at the same time.

Can you get married at a church and have your reception at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

Yes, and we have photographed it. Victoria and Nick got ready at the Inn, married at a Greek Orthodox church in Mattituck, and returned for cocktail hour and the reception. The part to plan carefully is the travel, in both directions, because the North Fork is slower than it looks on a map.

Can wedding guests stay at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

There are five guest rooms and the Belvedere Suite on the property. It is a small number, so it tends to go to the wedding party and immediate family rather than to the whole guest list.

Can you bring your own caterer to the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

Catering comes from the Inn’s own kitchen, and their site says they do not take outside caterers. Cake and dessert are worth asking about separately, because weddings there do carry outside bakers and dessert vendors. Get the categories straight with the Inn before you book anybody.

Where do couples get ready at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

At the weddings we have photographed, brides have started in the solarium and moved up to the bridal suite. Meanwhile, grooms have got ready downstairs in the speakeasy. Both are in the same building as the rest of the day, so nobody has to travel in. Confirm which rooms come with your own date.

Is the Jedediah Hawkins Inn wedding venue good for photographs?

Yes, and for a reason beyond how the place looks. The grounds, the terrace and the barn sit close enough together that a portrait session does not have to cost your guests their evening. That is not true of every beautiful venue.

About the Photographer

Stephen Mayo is the founder and lead photographer of Heritage House, a boutique wedding photography studio. We serve Long Island, New York City, Westchester, New Jersey, and the East End. Stephen is a member of Fearless Photographers, and his work has appeared in Sophisticated Weddings and hamptonBRIDE.

We have photographed weddings at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn more than once. Ceremonies on the property and ceremonies somewhere else entirely, with first looks and without them. This guide is written from those days rather than from a site visit.

Planning a Wedding at the Jedediah Hawkins Inn?

The Jedediah Hawkins Inn wedding venue will handle the food, the room and the day-of logistics, and it handles them well. What is left to decide is the shape of your own day. That gets settled while the timeline is still being built rather than on the morning.

So tell us what your wedding looks like, and we will tell you what we have learned photographing weddings there.

Schedule a call with Heritage House.