Weddings
A hundred people, a hilltop, and nobody else for miles
En Bosc takes weddings of up to 100 guests. The family stays in the house; everyone else comes up the hill for the day.
What it is
Not a venue with a diary. A house that clears itself for you
There is no other party before yours and none after. No adjoining function room, no shared car park, no coordinator moving you along because the next booking arrives at six. The hill is private, the land is ours, and for those few days the whole of it is yours.
The wedding party stays in the house — 6 bedrooms, sleeping 12— which means the bride and groom and their families get somewhere to be that is not the party.
Everyone else stays nearby, and this is worth knowing early: it is open country out here rather than a town with a dozen hotels. Rooms around Saint Clar and Lectoure are limited and go a long way ahead in summer. We will point you at what exists and help you block it, but the sooner that starts the better it goes.
The shape of it
Church, lawn, canvas, dance floor, pool
01
The ceremony
A church nearby seats up to 100, with a lawn outside where everyone spills out afterwards. Guests walk out into the shade and the drinks start there.
02
The reception
Back at the house, on the grass under the trees. Wine barrels for tables, and the whole hill to yourselves while it happens.
03
Dinner
Under canvas, with the wheat going gold on three sides and the light dropping through it. Long tables, festoon lights, nobody in a hurry.
04
And then the evening
A stand for live music, a DJ, a dance floor, and a pool that is a great deal more popular at midnight than anyone plans for.
What we take off you
Bring a planner, or let us find you one
Either works. If you already have someone, we work with them and stay out of the way. If you do not, the package is largely the planner: we book the chapel, order the food, and put the power, sound and furniture in before anybody arrives.
For the things outside it — photographer, flowers, a band, a car — we know who is good and will make the introduction, and those you contract yourself. Knowing who to ring counts for a great deal in a corner of France that does its business in French, on the phone, and largely by reputation.
- Up to 100 guests
- At the church, and back at the house.
- Somewhere for everyone to sleep
- The party in the house, the rest placed in hotels and houses nearby. We help book them.
- Music and dancing
- A stand for live music, a DJ, and a dance floor. The pool stays open into the evening.
- Parking and space
- Plenty of both, which sounds dull until you have tried to park a hundred people in a village.
What it costs
Two ways to do it
Both are starting points rather than quotes. What a wedding costs here moves with the season, the numbers and how much you want laid on, so treat these as the figures to plan around and let us give you a real one once we know the date.
The house on its own
€12,000
From · the weekend
Exclusive use of the house, the pool and the land, and the setup that a field does not come with. You bring your own planner and caterer and run it your way. It is how most weddings here are done.
Everything handled
€25,000
From · around 70 guests · the weekend
The same weekend with the work taken off you: the chapel booked, the food cooked, the reception poured. Almost nothing in this part of Gascony operates in English, which is why most people take this one.
What the €25,000 covers
- The house, for the weekendExclusive use of the house, the pool and the land. No booking before yours and none after.
- The setupPower, sound, lighting, tables and chairs. The infrastructure a field does not come with.
- The chapel, arrangedThe church nearby seats a hundred. Booking it, and dealing with the people who hold the key, is ours.
- The foodThe wedding meal, cooked by people we know and have used before.
- The receptionDrinks and canapés on the lawn after the ceremony.
Add on, if you want them
A car for the day. Live music. A wine tasting somewhere worth going. Fireworks at the end of it. Flowers, a photographer and a fuller bar sit here too — all quoted on top, none of them assumed.
What moves the number
July and August cost more than May or September, and September here is the better month anyway. Numbers much beyond seventy change the infrastructure rather than just the catering.
Not included, either way
Rooms for everyone not sleeping in the house. The wedding party takes the six bedrooms; the other eighty-odd people stay nearby, and that is yours to book. We will tell you where and help you block it. Start it early: rural Gascony has thin hotel stock and what there is goes first.
Talk to us early
A wedding is a different thing from a week’s stay and is not arranged through the booking platforms, so this comes straight to us rather than to a listing. Write further ahead than feels necessary: the good people locally are booked a long way out in summer, and the rooms nearby go earlier still.