Gather & Gold Tipis are well known for creating beautiful celebrations in the most picturesque of locations all over the South Island. From wild mountain landscapes, to the most majestic natural landscapes, these Tipi’s offer a stunningly beautiful alternative to your traditional wedding marquee.
Read more as Sarah Fecher tells us how Gather & Gold Tipis came to be and offers insight with her own experience growing this amazing family run business.
Tell us a bit about Gather & Gold?
We are an event Tipi hire business based in the Queenstown/Wanaka area and service the whole South Island. Our story began when we were looking for venues for our wedding and couldn’t quite find anything that we felt was ‘us’ until we came across a picture of a Swedish Tipi tents in a wedding magazine and I just knew that we had to have those for our wedding. It was the best decision ever and where our dream to start Gather & Gold began – to share the most magical wedding ever with people in the South Island of NZ – so we moved back home and started Gather & Gold. We’ve been established since 2016 and have delivered hundreds of amazing weddings with the most amazing clients. We love our job.
What sets you apart from other Marquee / Tent companies?
The natural canvas and wood sits in our landscape so perfectly. They are honestly made for the mountains and are so beautifully ambient at night, the canvas just comes alive. Our couples all say how magical they are and how they make for such a rad party space, there’s something super special about Tipis that just makes people relax and enjoy themselves. Nothing pretentious, just a dam good party space. As all celebrations of love should be.
We live here, we are locals through and through and can give you all the inside knowledge of what makes for a perfect gathering in the place we get to call home.
Our collective experience in hospitality and events and have been in the game for quite a few years now, with that comes experience and knowledge that you know you can trust.
Our team really care, nothing is more important to us than our customers and each event is super special as we know how special it is to you. Our crew are a mix of Mountain Guides, Ski Patrollers, and Tradespeople. All come with heaps of experience and heart. We really care.
Tell us about the experience you offer to your clients?
We offer a hands-on service from the minute you enquire till we pull the last tent stake – we will do everything we can to make your wedding the most amazing and memorable day of your life. As it should be. We never take for granted just how much trust people put into their wedding vendors and we are always so grateful when a couple choose us as their marquee provider. We become really close to our couples and build a lovely relationship and are still in touch today with clients from our first year. It’s the best part of our job. Making dreams come true!
How many do your Tipis hold?
The beautiful unique nature of the Tipis means we can link them together to create lot of different ‘zones’ so it may be three Tipis linked together seating around 150 guests in two Tipis and the third Tipi for an epic dance/party space. Or maybe you’re after a small intimate wedding, then a single Tipi is perfect. Or you could go for 300 plus guests for a rad festival feel wedding with 6 Tipis. The possibilities are endless.
What has been your favourite wedding venue?
We love Wanaka & Queenstown venues. Our most favourite is Dublin Bay Weddings and Lake Hāwea Station – The Hide. But we have so many amazing sites around us and are always more than happy to arrange site visits with you, and maybe even fit in a coffee at one of our fav local cafes. We’ve also been doing lots more events on farms and in backyards around Wanaka/Queenstown and Arrowtown. If you have a lovely backyard that’s big enough then it makes so much sense (and is so special) to hold it in the place you call home (or Mum and Dad’s).
The best weddings are…
The one’s where the couple do exactly what they dreamed. Just do you! And make sure to go with the flow a little, every wedding will have some moments you can’t plan for but it’s those moments that make THE MOST magical memories.
Best piece of advice you ever received?
Trust your heart. When we were starting out so many people told us not to do it, they told us the events industry was hard to break into, that the market here wasn’t big enough etc. But we just knew in our hearts that people here would love Tipis, as we do and we were right. We sold our home and put all our money into launching it was a huge risk but we had a strong belief it would be worth it. We doubled in size in our first three years and this summer was absolutely huge. We are solidly booked for next Summer too. So trust your heart, know when something feels right and just do it. I’m so glad we did.
What’s next for you in 2023 and beyond…
We have some really exciting new Extra Hire Items for next Summer Season plus some other super duper exciting news. Watch this space. But really we are just going to keep being us and doing what we love to do, which is delivering beautiful events for our couples. Making dreams come true is our jam.
|| CREDITS ||
Photography by: Sarah Clements, Bonnie Jenkins, Kate Roberge, Kate Drenan | Floral: Little Botanica
