Weddings at Kinnick Stadium.
Four event spaces above the Hawkeye field: the McCord Club Lounge, the Mediacom Outdoor Club, and the President's and Athletic Director's suites. For a family whose whole life has a black and gold thread running through it, there is no substitute.
The press box and club levels above the Hawkeye field
The Venue
Why Kinnick Stadium photographs the way it does.
Some venues are chosen for the light and some are chosen for what they mean. Kinnick is squarely the second, and there is nothing wrong with that. If your parents met at Iowa, if every autumn Saturday of your childhood was spent in this bowl, then getting married here is not a novelty, it is the most personal choice on the list.
The practical shape is a club level rather than a ballroom: four distinct spaces, up to 200 guests, packages in the $3,000 to $7,000 range. The McCord Club Lounge and the Mediacom Outdoor Club are the two most couples build a wedding around, one enclosed and one open to the stadium air.
What makes it work photographically is elevation and the bowl itself. You are above the field looking down and out, which is a vantage no other venue in this guide has, and the structure gives hard geometry that photographs beautifully once you know when the sun is off it.
If this one is not quite right
What you actually need to know
- Guest capacity
- Up to about 200 guests across four spaces: the McCord Club Lounge, the Mediacom Outdoor Club, the University of Iowa President's Suite and the Athletic Director's Suite.
- Ceremony sites
- Indoors in the club spaces, or in the open air of the Mediacom Outdoor Club with the stadium bowl behind you. Ask which spaces can be combined and how a ceremony and dinner are sequenced across them.
- Reception spaces
- The McCord Club Lounge is the primary reception room, with the suites suited to smaller gatherings or a rehearsal dinner.
- Getting ready
- Confirm what is available inside the stadium; plan on an Iowa City hotel as the likely base and arrive finished. Downtown Iowa City is minutes away.
- If it rains
- Good, because the club spaces are enclosed. An outdoor club ceremony moves inside without losing the stadium, which is the thing you came for.
- What it costs
- Wedding packages run roughly $3,000 to $7,000 depending on spaces and guest count. Confirm what catering and bar arrangements apply, since a university athletics facility runs on its own contracted services.
- What's included
- Confirm in writing. University facilities typically bundle certain services and restrict others, and the answer varies by space and by date.
- Parking
- Stadium lots, which are enormous by any wedding standard. This is one venue where a 200 guest guest list creates no parking question at all.
- Where guests stay
- None on site. Iowa City and Coralville hotels are minutes away with plenty of inventory outside football weekends.
- End of night
- Confirm end times, and confirm them early. A university facility has its own operating rules and they are not negotiable the way a private venue's might be.
- Vendor rules
- University athletics facilities generally use contracted catering and have specific rules about outside vendors, alcohol and access. Get all of it in writing before you plan anything around it.
Worth knowing early: The football calendar governs everything. Home game weekends, and often the days on either side of them, are unavailable, and the fall Saturdays couples most want are exactly the ones the schedule takes. Check the season schedule before you fall in love with a date, and ask specifically whether you can go down to the field, because that answer decides your entire portrait plan.
The four places worth your time
The Mediacom Outdoor Club, looking into the bowl
Late afternoon, when the sun is off the seating
Elevation over an empty stadium is a genuinely singular frame. Midday it is harsh and contrasty; by five it turns and the structure starts to read.
The field, if you are permitted on it
The last hour of daylight
Ask this question first, because the answer changes everything. Standing on the fifty with an empty bowl around you is the photograph nobody else can offer, and access is not automatic.
The concourse structure and tunnels
Any hour
Concrete, steel and repeated arches give strong graphic lines and open shade. This is the reliable location when the bowl is blazing.
The club interiors, with the field through glass
Reception, and any weather
Glass onto the stadium means the setting stays in frame even after dark and even in rain, which is rare for a view venue.
Your day, hour by hour
At Kinnick Stadium
Full Wedding GalleryPhotographing Kinnick Stadium
Ask about field access before you book
The single best photograph this venue can give you may or may not be available to you. Find out in the first conversation, in writing, because a stadium wedding without field access is a very good club-level wedding rather than the thing you pictured.
The schedule owns your date
Home football weekends are gone and the days around them are complicated. Pull the season schedule before you shortlist dates, and consider that a spring or summer wedding here is far easier than an autumn one.
Midday in a bowl is brutal
An open stadium has no shade and enormous contrast. Push portraits toward the end of the day, and use the concourses when you need coverage in between.
Weddings Here
Kinnick Stadium Questions
What couples ask about this venue.
Can you get married at Kinnick Stadium?
Yes. Four spaces host weddings up to about 200 guests: the McCord Club Lounge, the Mediacom Outdoor Club, the University of Iowa President's Suite and the Athletic Director's Suite. Packages run roughly $3,000 to $7,000.
Can we take photographs on the field?
Ask, in writing, before you book. Access is not automatic and it is the single question that determines whether you get the photograph you are imagining. A stadium wedding without field access is still excellent, but it is a different day.
What dates are available?
The football calendar governs it. Home game weekends and often the surrounding days are unavailable, which removes many of the autumn Saturdays couples want most. Spring and summer are considerably easier here.
Is parking a problem?
No, and it is one of the few venues in this guide where that is true without qualification. Stadium lots are built for seventy thousand people. A 200 guest wedding disappears into them.
When should portraits happen?
Late in the day. An open bowl at midday is shadeless and harshly contrasty; by late afternoon the sun comes off the seating and the structure starts to photograph properly. The concourses and tunnels give open shade for anything that has to happen earlier.