Weddings at the Veterans Memorial Building.
A civic landmark standing on an island in the Cedar River, spanning a whole block between two bridges, holding a Grant Wood stained glass window twenty four feet high. Three rentable rooms, packages from $2,600, and a twelve hour setup day the day before included in every one of them.
May's Island, mid-river between the 1st and 2nd Avenue bridges
The Venue
Why Veterans Memorial Building photographs the way it does.
The window first, because it is the reason this building is more than a large room. In 1927 the city commissioned a memorial window from Grant Wood, then a local art teacher nobody outside Cedar Rapids had heard of and three years away from painting American Gothic. It stands twenty four feet high and twenty wide, roughly ten thousand pieces of glass, with a female figure of the Republic holding a palm branch and a laurel wreath above six soldiers. Very few couples anywhere get married in a building holding a work like that, and almost nobody knows they can.
The packages are unusually well documented and reward reading properly. Package A gives you one room, either ceremony or reception, for eight hours plus a twelve hour setup day beforehand: Coliseum $4,000 for 350 dining or 500 ceremony, Armory $2,600 for 250 dining or 400 ceremony, Ballroom $2,600 for 100 dining or 190 ceremony. Packages B and C bundle two rooms and stretch the day to nine in the morning until midnight.
Now the arithmetic worth doing before you call. Package A gets you the Armory alone, eight hours, for $2,600. Package C gets you the Armory from nine to midnight plus a ceremony in the Ballroom plus dressing room access, for $4,000. So fourteen hundred dollars buys a second room, dressing rooms and roughly six extra hours. If you were considering Package A at all, Package C is the one to price against it.
Guides that cover this venue
If this one is not quite right
What you actually need to know
- Guest capacity
- Coliseum 350 or more dining, 500 or more for a ceremony. Armory 250 dining, 400 ceremony. Ballroom 100 dining, 190 maximum ceremony. Those are the published figures, so confirm the seated number with a dance floor and head table in place for whichever room you take.
- Ceremony sites
- Any of the three rooms, and in Packages B and C the Ballroom ceremony is included at no extra charge alongside a larger reception room. Ask which room holds the Grant Wood window and whether your ceremony space includes it, because that is the single question that should decide your room choice here and it is not answered by the price list.
- Reception spaces
- The Coliseum, the Armory or the Ballroom. Additional rooms can be added by the hour: the Mezzanine and the North 2nd Floor conference rooms at $65 an hour with a three hour minimum, the Restaurant and Bar at $100 an hour.
- Getting ready
- Dressing room access is included in Packages B and C from 9:00am to midnight, and Package A includes one additional dressing room. That is a genuinely long window and it means the morning happens in the building rather than a hotel.
- If it rains
- Total. Everything is indoors in a civic building spanning a city block, so weather is simply not a factor in the day.
- What it costs
- Package A: Coliseum $4,000, Armory $2,600, Ballroom $2,600, each eight hours plus a twelve hour setup day before. Package B: Ballroom ceremony and dressing rooms included with a Coliseum reception from 9am to midnight, $6,000. Package C: the same with an Armory reception, $4,000. Hourly add-ons run $65 to $265. An extra setup day is $500. A deposit is required on top and returned after the event.
- What's included
- The room, and the part most venues charge for: a full setup day the day before, 8:00am to 8:00pm, in every package. Compared with the venues in this guide that give you one hour before doors, twelve hours the previous day changes what is buildable.
- Parking
- Downtown Cedar Rapids on May's Island. Ramps are close but the island is reached by bridge, so send guests specific directions rather than an address and a hope.
- Where guests stay
- None on site, but this is downtown Cedar Rapids and hotels are within a short walk or drive.
- End of night
- The wedding window runs Saturday 8:00am to Sunday midnight, with City of Cedar Rapids observed holidays excluded. Packages B and C run the reception room from 9:00am to midnight. Confirm load-out expectations, since a civic building has staff hours of its own.
- Vendor rules
- Not published in the package sheet, and that is the gap to close first. Ask about catering, bar and whether there is a preferred or exclusive list, and ask separately what may be attached to anything, because this is a memorial building with significant artwork in it.
Worth knowing early: Check the rates are current. The wedding package sheet is filed as a 2026 document but carries a footer saying it is valid through 31 December 2025, so treat the figures on this page as the published structure rather than a live quote and confirm the numbers before budgeting. While you are asking, confirm which observed holidays are excluded, since that list is not on the sheet either.
The four places worth your time
The Grant Wood memorial window
Whenever the light is behind it
Twenty four feet of stained glass by the artist who painted American Gothic. Shoot it wide enough to hold the whole window and then work out where its coloured light lands on the floor, because that patch is either your best frame of the day or a stripe across somebody's face.
May's Island and the bridges
The hour before sunset
A civic building on an island in a river, with bridges on both sides, is a frame no other venue in this guide can offer. Cross a bridge and shoot back at it.
The Coliseum and the Armory interiors
Once lit
Large 1920s civic volumes with height. They give you nothing for free and reward a real lighting plan, so treat them as sets rather than rooms.
Downtown Cedar Rapids across the water
Golden hour into blue hour
The river, the bridges and the skyline are all within a short walk, which is unusual for a venue this size.
Your day, hour by hour
At Veterans Memorial Building
Full Wedding GalleryPhotographing Veterans Memorial Building
Ask which room the window is in
It is the reason to choose this venue over any other room in Cedar Rapids, and the package sheet does not say. Establish it before you pick a room, because booking the wrong one means paying for a landmark you cannot see from your ceremony.
Price Package C against Package A
Armory alone for eight hours is $2,600. Armory from nine until midnight, plus a Ballroom ceremony, plus dressing rooms, is $4,000. That is the best value in the sheet and it is not flagged as such.
A free setup day changes what is possible
Twelve hours the day before, in every package. Most venues in this guide start your clock while the florist is still unloading. Here you can build something properly, which is worth real money in what a wedding can look like.
Coloured glass lands somewhere
A twenty four foot stained glass window throws saturated colour into the room when the sun is behind it. Beautiful across a floor, difficult across a face. Walk the room at your ceremony hour and find out where it falls.
Veterans Memorial Building Questions
What couples ask about this venue.
How much does a wedding at the Veterans Memorial Building cost?
Package A is $4,000 for the Coliseum or $2,600 for the Armory or Ballroom, each eight hours with a twelve hour setup day beforehand. Package B is $6,000 for a Coliseum reception with the Ballroom ceremony and dressing rooms included, and Package C is $4,000 for the same with an Armory reception. Confirm current rates: the sheet is filed as 2026 but says it is valid through the end of 2025.
How many guests does it hold?
The Coliseum takes 350 or more for dining and 500 or more for a ceremony, the Armory 250 dining and 400 ceremony, and the Ballroom 100 dining with a 190 ceremony maximum.
Can you get married in front of the Grant Wood window?
Ask the Veterans Memorial Commission which room the window is in and whether your ceremony space includes it. The window is 24 feet high and 20 wide, around ten thousand pieces of glass, designed by Grant Wood in 1927 before he painted American Gothic. It is the reason to book this building, and the package sheet does not tell you where it is.
Is there time to set up the day before?
Yes, and it is included. Every package covers a setup day the day before from 8:00am to 8:00pm, twelve hours. An additional setup day is $500. Very few venues in this guide include anything comparable.
What is May's Island?
An island in the Cedar River in downtown Cedar Rapids. The Veterans Memorial Building spans a full block of it between the 1st and 2nd Avenue bridges, which makes the approach and the exterior frames genuinely unusual.
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