Weddings
The wedding week, meal by meal.
The estate-week format is Kauaʻi’s wedding identity: not one reception but five meals across the week, each its own line, all one crew. From $175 a guest plus staffing — itemized before the deposit.
The five events
- Welcome dinner (Thursday) — family-style, 20–75 guests · Table band $125–$150/guest
- Rehearsal dinner (Friday) — plated or family-style, 12–40 · Signature $150–$250/guest
- Ceremony-adjacent pūpū (Saturday, golden hour) — tray pass while the photos run
- The reception (Saturday evening) — plated 2–3 courses or premium buffet, 30–75 · from $175/guest
- Recovery brunch (Sunday, late) — the gentle one · quoted per event
The week’s shape, event by event:
Why one contract beats five vendors
The same kitchen crew all week means the dietary flags settle once, the welcome-dinner conversation informs the reception menu, and the family knows the servers by Saturday. One deposit schedule. One written quote where every event is its own line.
Against the island’s caterer average of roughly $75 a plate: the estate week costs more per event and transforms the week — nobody who’s done both books the $75 version twice.
The staffing spine
Servers $55/hr, sous chefs $75/hr, 4-hour floor, one server per 10–12 seated guests. The crew scales per event — two servers Thursday, five Saturday — and the quote shows the per-event math, not a lump sum.
Logistics honesty
One bridge. One road.
Everything past Hanalei — Wainiha, Hāʻena, the end of the road — crosses one one-lane bridge and one stretch of Kūhiō Highway. HDOT closures are documented reality: nightly full closures and slope-stabilization work happen, and heavy rain can close the road with little warning.
We plan around it in writing: far-North service requires 72-hour notice, and if a closure lands on your date we reschedule rather than forfeit. No competitor puts this clause on a webpage. We do.
Questions, answered
A 50-guest week — welcome dinner, rehearsal, pūpū, reception, brunch — runs roughly $20,000–$30,000 all-in depending on tiers, worked line by line on our cost page. Every figure traces to the published rate card.
Yes — each event is its own line. Reception-only bookings are fine; the week exists because one crew across all five is better and usually cheaper than five vendors.
Daily — venue rules, rentals, timelines, and load-in all settle in the quote phase with your planner. The written quote already contains the logistics when you approve it.
Keep reading
- wedding Married in the garden.
- location Wedding catering in Poʻipū.
- location Wedding catering in Kōloa.
- wedding The rehearsal dinner is the week’s best-kept secret.
- wedding The welcome dinner sets the week.
- wedding The reception, priced like adults.
- wedding Sunday, late, gently.
- wedding Two people, one table, no production.
Get a written quote
Kauaʻi runs inquiry-first: you tell us the table, we send a written quote — and that quote is the confirmed total. We never hold a date we can’t crew.