Boston & New England Wedding Venues
Documentary Wedding Photography · Boston & New England
TL;DR, Oceanview of Nahant Wedding
Updated September 14, 2026
Oceanview of Nahant at a glance
| Venue | The Oceanview of Nahant, founded by Michael and Brenda Gallant; sister venue The Evermore at Peirce Farm Estate |
|---|---|
| Address | 0 Willow Road, Nahant, MA 01908 (use 1 Willow Rd for GPS and rideshare); 14 miles northeast of Boston, about 20 minutes by the venue's estimate |
| Setting | Oceanfront on the southwest shore of the Nahant peninsula, next to the nine-hole Kelley Greens golf course; direct access to the shoreline; one wedding at a time |
| Capacity | 220 seated with a full dance floor; 220 in the cocktail lounge; VIP suite for 25 |
| Ceremony | Beach Stone Terrace (May to late October, white garden chairs, sailcloth drapes, reclaimed wooden doors), heated Tent on the Terrace (late March to April, late October to December), or the Grand Ballroom. Ceremony fee $1,995 (WeddingWire) |
| Reception | Second-floor Grand Ballroom: floor-to-ceiling windows, herringbone floors, mirrored wall, gas fireplace with a memory mantle, band stage, full-length oceanfront deck with bistro lights. Cocktail lounge next door with a fish-scale tile bar, nautical-map ceiling and the Arcade Alcove |
| Hours | Five hours reception-only, six with a ceremony; all weddings conclude by midnight |
| Minimums | 150 adults Saturday evenings; 75 adults Monday to Thursday; Sunday of a holiday weekend treated as a Saturday; kids 12 and under and vendors don't count |
| Venue pricing | Venue fee: weekdays from $1,000, Sundays up to $5,000, Saturdays up to $12,000. Food $80 to $96 per guest, bar $26 to $55. Most couples $25,000 to $50,000 (venue's pricing page). Elopements to 25 guests $3,000; Mini-Monies to 50 from $9,000; Micro Weddings to 50 from $15,000 |
| Catering & bar | In-house only; chef on site 10+ years; beach clambake available; cake from a licensed bakery cut free; annual winter Grand Tasting for booked couples |
| Getting ready | Building opens one hour before the ceremony; the Glamour Package adds six hours of early access to the VIP suite for up to 25 |
| Lodging | None on Nahant. SpringHill Suites Revere 8 mi; Salem Waterfront Hotel, Hawthorne Hotel and Hampton Inn Salem 9 mi; Holiday Inn Express Saugus 10 mi; Hilton Garden Inn Logan 14 mi; rentals in Swampscott and Marblehead |
| Parking | On-site lot included; accessible spaces by the ceremony site; ramp to the terrace and a staff-assisted lift to the second floor |
| Best photo spots | The ceremony doors, the sea wall, the lobby stairs, the beach and its oversized Adirondack chair, the deck swings, the golf course next door and Bailey's Hill (the venue's own list), plus the beach platform at the last dance |
| Weddings I've photographed here | an Oceanview of Nahant wedding gallery · a summer Oceanview of Nahant wedding |
Oceanview of Nahant is an oceanfront wedding venue at the end of Willow Road on the southwest shore of Nahant, Massachusetts, 14 miles northeast of Boston, that hosts one wedding at a time for up to 220 guests, with an open-air Beach Stone Terrace for the ceremony, a second-floor Grand Ballroom with floor-to-ceiling ocean windows, and a platform on its own beach for the last dance.
Nahant is a peninsula of two near-islands hung off a single causeway from Lynn, and with one square mile of land it is the smallest town by area in Massachusetts. The venue sits on the settled southwest side, sharing its address with the nine-hole Kelley Greens golf course, which opened in 1923 as the Nahant Golf Club. Guests park, walk a ramp to the terrace, and the ceremony starts when a pair of reclaimed wooden doors swings open for the processional. Cocktail hour is upstairs in a lounge with a fish-scale tile bar, a ceiling painted as a nautical chart and an arcade behind a sliding wall. Dinner is in the Grand Ballroom next door, and at the end of the night everyone goes down to the stones for the last dance and a firepit with s’mores.
Of the Boston wedding venues I photograph, this is the one where the water is on three sides rather than one. Misselwood Estate and Tupper Manor up the coast in Beverly give you a mansion with the harbor as backdrop; Oceanview gives you the open Atlantic behind the vows and Lynn’s shoreline across Lynn Harbor at sunset.
What I like about photographing here is that the venue has already decided where the big moments happen, so I don’t have to steer anyone. The doors, the terrace, the stairs down to the beach, the platform on the stones: they are fixed points, and I know where to stand for each. That leaves me free to watch your guests, which is the part of the day nobody else is watching.
👉 More of the North Shore is in my Boston wedding photography portfolio, Nahant included.
Choose Oceanview if you want the ocean in the frame from the first photo to the last, and if you want to know what the day costs before you tour. The venue publishes its fee ranges, its food and bar per-guest numbers and its guest minimums, which almost no one else on the North Shore does, and it books a single wedding at a time so the whole building and the beach are yours for the rental.
The reviews back that up. Oceanview holds a 4.9-out-of-5 rating from 235 couples on WeddingWire with 98% recommending it, and the ones I read mention the views, the food and how organized the staff is in that order.
The staffing is the practical reason it photographs well. Two on-site planners are included on the day, the kitchen is in-house with a chef who has been there more than ten years, and the décor closet (table numbers, card boxes, signs, easels, aisle pieces) is free to use, so there are fewer vendors to wait on. When the planners hold the schedule, I get the ten minutes on the beach at sunset that make the gallery.
I’ve photographed several weddings on this point. Walk through a whole day in an Oceanview of Nahant wedding gallery or see it in July light in a summer Oceanview of Nahant wedding.
The property runs vertically: the terrace and the beach are at ground level, and the lounge and the Grand Ballroom are on the second floor, reached by the lobby stairs or a staff-assisted lift. So an Oceanview wedding moves down to the terrace, up to the lounge, across to the ballroom and back down to the stones, and each leg has its own light: the terrace in late afternoon, the ballroom windows going blue at dusk, the beach platform under a spotlight at eleven.
Here is how the ceremony and the reception each tend to go at Oceanview, and what I’m doing during them.
From May to late October the ceremony is on the open-air Beach Stone Terrace: white garden chairs, sailcloth drapes on the posts and the venue’s reclaimed wooden doors as the entrance, which is the frame I photograph the processional through every time. The venue sets pre-ceremony beverage tables by the seating. In late March, April and from late October into December the same terrace carries a heated tent with wooden benches and chandeliers, and in deep winter the ceremony moves into the ballroom.
Starting at 5:00 pm puts the sun behind the drapes rather than in the front row, and saves the beach for the last light. If it drizzles, the venue’s umbrella insurance puts a clear dome umbrella in every guest’s hand; if it pours, the ballroom is the call, made 24 to 48 hours ahead. Dogs are welcome in the outdoor or tented ceremony only. The ceremony fee is $1,995 on WeddingWire.
Dinner and dancing are in the second-floor Grand Ballroom: floor-to-ceiling windows on the water, floor-to-ceiling mirrors on the opposite wall, herringbone floors, custom chandeliers, a gas fireplace with a memory mantle for photos of the people who couldn’t be there, and rod-iron entrance doors with frosted portholes. A full-length oceanfront deck with bistro lights runs alongside it, with rocking chairs and swings hung from the deck above. It seats 220 with a full dance floor and the night ends by midnight.
For me the ballroom works because the glass wall lights dinner evenly and the mirrors double the chandeliers after dark, so the parent dances need no extra light. The deck is a two-minute escape for a portrait with the lights behind you. Then the venue moves the last dance down to the beach platform, which is the photo this place is known for.
Oceanview runs year-round in three modes, terrace, tent and ballroom, and the calendar decides which one you get. WeddingWire lists May through October as peak and March, April, November and December as off-peak. Here is what changes month to month, and where the light lands.
From June into August the sun sets after 8 pm (8:26 on June 20), so a 5 pm terrace ceremony leaves room for cocktail hour upstairs, dinner and still a walk on the stones before cake. The terrace is open air, cornhole is out on the beach, and the last dance happens with the Lynn shoreline lit up across the water. Saturdays carry the 150-adult minimum and the top of the venue’s fee range.
Off the point, September and October have the cleanest horizon of the year, and the terrace stays in use until late October. Sunset moves to 6:27 on October 1 and 6:12 by October 10, which lands inside cocktail hour, so I move the beach portraits to right after the ceremony and let the firepit carry the end of the night. From late October the heated tent goes up on the terrace and ceremonies continue under it into December.
From late March through April the tent is the ceremony site, and in the deep winter months it’s the Grand Ballroom with the Atlantic behind you through the glass; the gas fireplaces in the ballroom and the lounge nook do the rest. The beach is still there for a five-minute portrait in a coat, and the low November sun on the water is softer than anything July offers. I haven’t photographed a January wedding here yet and I’d take one.
Cocktail hour is upstairs in the lounge, which holds the full 220. The bar front is fish-scale tile, the ceiling is a nautical chart trimmed in blue LED, an iron chandelier hangs over the room, and a gas fireplace nook has a neon sign over the couches. Slide the wall back and there’s the Arcade Alcove: four arcade cabinets and five board games mounted on the wall. The lounge deck outside has patio seating, string lights and the venue’s ‘You Float My Boat’ photo spot.
I ask couples to spend cocktail hour in the lounge rather than on the terrace posing. If there’s been no first look, both families meet me at the open doors the moment the recessional ends; make one large group, then break it into the immediate-family sets and finish within fifteen minutes so you’re upstairs while the passed appetizers are still hot.
That hour is where the pictures nobody planned come from: grandparents on the rocking chairs on the deck, the swings, the cousins who found the arcade first. When there’s a second photographer they stay in the lounge and I take you down to the sea wall for ten minutes.
You can see the lounge filling up in an Oceanview of Nahant wedding gallery.
The venue keeps its own list of photo spots on its website: the sea wall, the ceremony doors, the lobby stairs, the last dance, the golf course, the beach, Bailey’s Hill, the swings and the wall art. Mine overlaps with it and adds the timing:
The ceremony doors: the processional through the opening, then the wide frame of you at the arbor with the doors as the border. Only works while the doors are open, so I shoot it before the recessional ends.
The beach and the sea wall: down the stairs from the terrace. Willow Road faces southwest across Lynn Harbor, so the sun sets over Lynn and the mainland rather than the open sea, and the last light comes in from the side with the water and the skyline going blue behind you. Ten minutes, timed to sunset.
The oversized Adirondack chair on the beach: the venue’s own prop, and the one photo the wedding party always asks for.
The deck swings: wooden swings hung under the deck, with bistro lights above. A ninety-second portrait on the way back up from the beach.
The lobby stairs: the venue lists them for a reason; they are the cleanest indoor backdrop in the building and my rainy-day plan for the couple.
The Grand Ballroom deck at dusk: the full-length deck under string lights with the ballroom windows glowing behind you.
The beach platform at the last dance: a spotlight on the stones, sparklers in the crowd, guests leaning over the terrace rail. The venue schedules it for the end of the night; I plan the final ten minutes around it.
Kelley Greens and Bailey’s Hill: the nine-hole course that shares the venue’s address and the town park, both on the venue’s own list. I use them for a first look when you’ve booked the early-access package and want to get away from the setup.
One rule shapes all of it: unless you buy the Glamour Package (six hours of early access to the VIP suite for up to 25 people), the building opens one hour before the ceremony. Getting-ready photos in the suite, a first look on the beach and portraits before guests arrive all depend on that package, so decide early.
Engagement sessions on this coast are a separate question; I’ve written up North Shore engagement photo locations from Nahant to Rockport.
Everything you eat and drink at Oceanview comes from the venue’s own kitchen and bar; outside food and beverage aren’t allowed. The chef has been on site more than ten years, the menu runs cocktails, passed appetizers, main entrees and desserts, allergies are handled in house, and the signature option is a New England clambake served on the beach. The venue publishes its per-guest ranges, $80 to $96 for food and $26 to $55 for the bar, and the WeddingWire listing counts the champagne toast, house wine and house and premium liquor in the bar package. Your cake is the one thing you bring in: the venue cuts and serves it free if it’s from a licensed bakery, and no other outside dessert is permitted. Booked couples are invited to an annual Grand Tasting in the winter.
What that does for the day is remove a whole category of decisions: the menu is a single meeting with the venue, the two planners run the floor, and the bar is stocked for the 150-adult Saturday minimum by default.
For photography, a kitchen that serves one wedding a day holds its clock, and the clock is what protects the sunset window on the beach. If you want photo and film from the same team here, my Boston hybrid photo + video coverage is set up for it.
Three venue rules shape every Oceanview timeline: six hours with a ceremony and a hard midnight finish, building access one hour before the ceremony unless you’ve added the Glamour Package, and the last dance on the beach as the closing scene. Around those:
Without the Glamour Package, hair and makeup happen off site and I photograph getting ready wherever that is; the suite with its glam mirror and ‘I Do Crew’ lockers is only in the pictures if you’ve bought the early access.
Guests arrive about 30 minutes before the ceremony and take the ramp to the terrace, where the pre-ceremony beverage tables are set; the venue’s planners line up the processional behind the closed doors.
If you’ve bought the early access and want a first look, we do it on the beach an hour and a half ahead of the ceremony and wrap the family and wedding-party groups at the doors with thirty minutes in hand before guests sit.
Sunset moves from 8:26 in late June to 6:27 on October 1, so in June the beach happens between dinner and cake, and by October it happens before you go upstairs for cocktails.
The last dance on the platform and the Firepit Finale take the last 20 minutes of the six hours, so I ask couples to cut the cake and do the parent dances earlier than they might elsewhere.
The first-look decision drives which of the two cards below fits you. I’ve written a guide to first looks at Boston weddings, and a separate one on running a wedding day timeline without a first look.
A July Saturday, sunset a little after 8:15, no early access booked, so getting ready happened at a rental in Swampscott and the beach came after toasts.
1:45 PM, At the rental house: the dress, the details, each of you with your own people
3:00 PM, Wedding party photos at the house, then the drive down the causeway
4:00 PM, Building opens; a few minutes in the VIP suite, then tucked away
4:30 PM, Guests arrive on the terrace; beverage tables open
5:00 PM, The doors open and the ceremony begins on the Beach Stone Terrace
5:30 PM, One photo of both families at the doors, then everyone upstairs to the lounge and the deck
6:45 PM, Seated in the Grand Ballroom; entrance, first dance, dinner
7:45 PM, Toasts
8:05 PM, Down the stairs to the beach for ten minutes of sunset over Lynn
8:25 PM, Parent dances, cake
8:45 – 10:40 PM, Dance floor in the ballroom, arcade open in the lounge
10:40 PM, Last dance on the beach platform, sparklers, firepit; out by 11
An early-October wedding, sunset at 6:27, with the Glamour Package, so the suite opened six hours early and the beach happened before the ceremony.
11:00 AM, VIP suite opens; hair and makeup for the wedding party
1:30 PM, Photography begins in the suite: the glam mirror, the lockers, the private terrace
3:00 PM, First look on the beach by the sea wall
3:20 PM, Couple portraits on the stones, the swings and the lobby stairs
3:50 PM, Wedding party and family at the open doors
4:30 PM, Couple back in the suite; guests arrive on the terrace
5:00 PM, Terrace ceremony
5:30 PM, Cocktails in the lounge, sunset out the windows at 6:27
6:40 PM, Ballroom; entrance, first dance, dinner
7:40 PM, Toasts, parent dances, cake
8:15 – 10:40 PM, Dance floor open
10:40 PM, Last dance on the beach, then s’mores at the firepit; done at 11
My wedding photography collections and pricing cover a full day at Oceanview, with or without film.
The photos on this page come from weddings I’ve photographed on the point: the doors opening on the terrace, the lounge under its blue ceiling, the ballroom set for dinner, the beach at sunset and the platform on the stones at the end of the night. They’re chosen to show the property across a whole day rather than the prettiest ten minutes of it.
The complete galleries are here: an Oceanview of Nahant wedding gallery and a summer Oceanview of Nahant wedding.
If your date is at Oceanview, check my availability for your Oceanview of Nahant wedding.
I haven’t released a film from Oceanview yet, and it’s on my list: the waves under the vows on the terrace, the doors, the arcade, and a crowd on the beach with sparklers are built for film. Until there is one, the coastal weddings in my Boston video portfolio show how I film a day like this.
👉 Next: my Boston wedding video portfolio, the full-length wedding films, and how photo + video coverage works when one team does both.
Nahant has been a place Bostonians go for the weekend since a Johnson family hotel opened in 1802 and a steamboat started running daily from the city in 1817; Longfellow summered here, and the town split from Lynn in 1853 when the temperance movement threatened the resort trade. Today it’s a quiet residential point with ten beaches, a golf course and Egg Rock offshore, 14 miles from Boston, with Salem 8 miles up the coast and Swampscott and Marblehead in between.
Nahant itself: Long Beach and Nahant Beach along the causeway for a morning walk, Kelley Greens for nine holes next to the venue, and Bailey’s Hill park with its rebuilt gazebo.
Swampscott and Marblehead: the closest rental houses on the venue’s list, under five miles and 8.5 miles away, and the harbor towns for a Sunday brunch.
Salem: 8 miles north, with the venue’s recommended hotels, the Peabody Essex Museum and the witch-trial history.
Boston: about 20 minutes by the venue’s estimate; the North End for a rehearsal dinner, Fenway for the afternoon before.
Nahant is reached one way, over the causeway from Lynn, and the venue’s own directions cover the rest:
GPS and rideshare: enter 1 Willow Rd, Nahant; the venue’s mailing address is 0 Willow Road and some apps don’t find it.
Airport: the venue lists the Hilton Garden Inn at Logan as 14 miles away, so the airport is close for a Sunday flight.
Train: the Newburyport/Rockport commuter rail stops in Lynn and Swampscott, both under 13 miles from North Station; a short cab ride finishes the trip over the causeway.
Parking: an on-site lot is part of the fee, with accessible spaces near the ceremony site, a ramp to the terrace and a staff-assisted lift to the second floor.
Dress code: most Oceanview weddings are cocktail attire with a coastal lean; the last dance is on a platform on a stone beach, so the venue hands out flip flops.
Shoes: the terrace is open air and the last dance is on a platform over beach stones; flats or block heels for the ceremony, and the venue’s flip flops for the finale.
Lodging: nothing on Nahant; the venue’s list runs SpringHill Suites Revere at 8 miles, three Salem hotels at 9, Saugus at 10 and Logan at 14.
Weather: a point in the Atlantic is windy even in July; bring a layer for the terrace and the firepit.
Timing: the night ends by midnight, and the last dance on the beach comes right before; don’t leave early.
Oceanview publishes its numbers, which is rare for a North Shore venue. On its pricing and details page the venue fee runs from $1,000 on weekdays to as much as $5,000 on a Sunday and $12,000 on a Saturday, food is $80 to $96 a guest and the bar $26 to $55 a guest, and the venue says most couples land between $25,000 and $50,000 all in. The ceremony fee is listed on WeddingWire at $1,995. Saturday evenings carry a 150-adult minimum and Monday to Thursday a 75-adult minimum, and the Sunday of a holiday weekend is priced like a Saturday. Children 12 and under on a kids’ meal don’t count toward the minimum, and neither do your vendors.
The WeddingWire listing counts the bridal suite, tables, chairs, linens, china, flatware, glassware, setup, cleanup, parking and event planning. The venue’s own planning page adds two on-site planners on the wedding day and free use of its décor closet: table numbers, card boxes, memorial and guest-book signs, easels and aisle decorations. The last dance on the beach platform and the Firepit Finale, flip flops and s’mores included, are listed as complimentary on the venue page.
Yes, $1,995 per the WeddingWire listing, the same in peak and off-peak months. It buys any of the three sites: the open-air Beach Stone Terrace from May to late October, the heated Tent on the Terrace in late March, April and from late October into December, or the Grand Ballroom. Rehearsals happen on site during the week of the wedding, never on a weekend, and the venue schedules them four to five months out.
You’ll have a first set of roughly 100 images inside a week, and at Oceanview those almost always include the doors opening on the terrace and the last dance on the stones. The whole gallery, every usable frame with no cap, is ready roughly two weeks after the wedding, and a highlight film, if you booked one, about a month after that. The full delivery schedule is on my page about the wait for wedding photos after the wedding.
Two tiers. The venue sells what it calls umbrella insurance: if it sprinkles, every guest gets a clear dome umbrella and the ceremony stays on the terrace. For real weather, the ceremony moves into the Grand Ballroom, and the venue asks you to make that call 24 to 48 hours ahead. From my side of the camera, a terrace full of clear umbrellas over the water is a photo you cannot get on a clear day, so don’t dread the drizzle.
Every wedding ends by midnight. The rental is five hours for a reception alone or six hours with an on-site ceremony, so a 5:00 pm ceremony wraps at 11:00 pm. The venue hosts one wedding at a time, so there’s no earlier event to clear out and none waiting behind you.
No outside food or beverage; the kitchen is in-house with a chef who has been there more than ten years, and allergies are handled by the same team. The exception is the cake, which the venue cuts and serves free as long as it comes from a licensed bakery; no other outside desserts. A clambake served on the beach is the venue’s signature menu. Every contracted couple is invited to an annual Grand Tasting in the winter before the wedding. Florists, bands, DJs and photographers are your call, provided they carry liability insurance and sign the venue’s vendor contract.
For the venue: a non-refundable retainer at contract signing, two scheduled payments between booking and the wedding, and the balance at your final meeting three to four weeks out. Reserving me takes a signed agreement and a retainer equal to one third of your collection; I book a single wedding per day, and the collections are priced from $4,000 to $8,500. What each one includes is listed on my collections page.
The venue seats a maximum of 220 with a full dance floor, and the cocktail lounge takes the same 220. The VIP suite holds 25 for getting ready. The other end of the scale is covered too: elopements up to 25 guests are listed at $3,000, and the Small But Mighty format for 50 guests or fewer runs on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sunday afternoons from 10:30 to 2:30.
It runs year-round in three modes. Open-air terrace ceremonies are May to late October. The heated tent covers late March through April and late October into December. The rest of the year the ceremony is in the ballroom with the ocean through the glass. WeddingWire lists peak season as May through October and off-peak as March, April, November and December.
Nothing on Nahant. The venue’s own list starts with the SpringHill Suites in Revere at 8 miles, then the Salem Waterfront Hotel, the Hawthorne Hotel and the Hampton Inn in Salem, all about 9 miles, the Holiday Inn Express in Saugus at 10 miles and the Hilton Garden Inn at Logan at 14. It also lists rental houses in Swampscott under five miles away and in Marblehead at 8.5.
On a Saturday here, yes. The 150-adult minimum means a real crowd, and the property splits it: while I’m down on the stones with you at sunset, the second photographer is upstairs in the lounge and on the deck, where the swings and the arcade wall are where the candids happen. At the last dance one of us is on the beach platform and the other on the terrace rail above. I explain how I pair with a second shooter at Boston weddings on that page; you can add one right up to the wedding week.
If Oceanview is your venue, the next step is seeing whether I’m free. Every collection and its price is on this site, and the Boston wedding planning guide takes on the questions that come before the photographer.
Doors on the terrace, a beach at sunset over Lynn, and a last dance on the stones with the whole wedding leaning over the rail. I know where to stand for every one of them. Check your Oceanview of Nahant wedding date.
