Top Chardon Venues

• Spaces for 75 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Park

Walter C. Best Wildlife Preserve is a 101-acre park in Munson Township, roughly 1.5 miles south of Chardon, Ohio, donated in memory of Walter C. Best, founder of the nearby Best Sand Corporation. Best had a strong interest in waterfowl, and the preserve's 30-acre lake, once a settling pond for the quarry, was built with that in mind. Today the lake and surrounding grounds are home to more than 100 species of birds alongside deer, fox, muskrat, and beaver. Three paved trails, the Goldenrod, Cattail, and Waterfowl trails, wind through the preserve for a combined 1.6 miles and are suited to birdwatching, hiking, and cross-country skiing. For gatherings, the preserve's Sunset Shelter can be reserved for events of up to 75 guests. The shelter offers nine picnic tables, electrical outlets, a grill, and nearby vault-style restrooms, making it a straightforward setting for picnics and outdoor celebrations against the preserve's lake and woodland views.

• Spaces for 30-150 Guests
• 1 Bar
• 2 Barns
• 2 Total Spaces

Legend Lake Golf Club has welcomed golfers to Chardon, Ohio since 1968, when designer Reece Alexander converted a 200-acre dairy farm in Geauga County into a Par 72 course built around Legend Lake and Legend Creek. Alexander planted more than 4,000 trees, including soft pines, white pines, elms, and maples, that have matured into the strategic defenses of a shot-maker's course known for its speedy, subtle greens and rounds that move in under four hours. The club's barn-style clubhouse keeps its original barn wood and gambrel roofline, with a circular staircase inside one of its two silos leading up to the Legend Bar and Grill, an old-world Irish pub setting overlooking the course through two large windows. This bar and dining hall doubles as the club's Banquet Center, hosting up to 150 guests for weddings, showers, reunions, baptisms and communions, birthday parties, award ceremonies, corporate dinners, and celebration-of-life luncheons. A private meeting room upstairs comfortably accommodates smaller gatherings of 25 to 30.

• Spaces for 48 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Park

Bass Lake Lodge sits within Bass Lake Preserve, a Geauga Park District property in Chardon Township, Ohio. The lodge rests alongside the expansive Bass Lake and the Spring Brook Sanctuary, a protected State Nature Preserve home to Ohio's last known indigenous population of brook trout. The partly enclosed lodge accommodates up to 48 guests and includes five picnic tables, electrical outlets, and seasonal heat from mid-October through mid-April. Outdoors, the space offers four additional picnic tables, a charcoal grill, and a stone fireplace, with restrooms accessible through a covered walkway. The surrounding setting of wetlands and shoreline forest — including red maple and swamp white oak — makes this lodge a serene choice for intimate gatherings, reunions, and celebrations in nature. The facility is available to reserve from 8:30 AM to 11 PM, with bookings required at least seven days in advance. Guests should note that sound amplification — including speakers, DJs, and live bands — is not permitted at this location.

• Spaces for 250 Guests
• 1 Event Space
• 1 Country Club

St. Denis Golf Club is a golf course and event venue situated in Chardon, Ohio, just east of Cleveland. The club's Party Center is a spacious, light-filled banquet room with panoramic views of the golf course, accommodating groups of 25 to 250 guests for weddings, corporate events, birthday parties, anniversary celebrations, and holiday gatherings. An outdoor balcony overlooking the course offers an additional setting for cocktails or photos. The Party Center is equipped with a parquet dance floor, full-service bar, projector and screen, and a sound system with microphone. Complimentary parking and free Wi-Fi are available on-site, and a professional event coordination staff supports planning from booking through event day. Couples can hold outdoor ceremonies on the golf course grounds and move inside for the reception, or keep the full event within the Party Center.

• Spaces for 75 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Park

Mountain Run Station is a 32-acre Geauga Park District park in Hambden Township, Ohio, serving as the gateway to the central section of The Maple Highlands Trail. The park's name recalls the hilly terrain of Geauga County, which reaches its peak nearby — the Lake Branch of the former Baltimore & Ohio Railroad that once passed through became known as "the mountain run." The setting is primarily open lawn with a retention pond, where pines near the parking area transition to maples deeper into the park and thickets shelter songbirds. Chardon Run Way, a 0.36-mile asphalt trail, keeps the grounds accessible for walking, biking, and cross-country skiing, and a free-to-use bicycle repair station donated by the Cleveland Touring Club stands ready for riders coming off the trail. For outdoor gatherings, the reservable Chardon Rotary Shelter accommodates up to 75 guests and comes equipped with 10 picnic tables, electrical outlets, and a grill, with vault-style restrooms nearby. A parking lot for 40 vehicles sits close at hand, and the park is open daily from 6 AM to 11 PM.

• Spaces for 71-150 Guests
• 2 Outdoor Spaces
• 1 Event Space
• 3 Parks

Big Creek Park is a natural woodland preserve managed by the Geauga Park District in Chardon Township, Ohio. The park is bisected south to north by the scenic Big Creek, creating a landscape of varied relief through rich beech-maple forest, hemlock-lined ravines, and open meadows. A certified Monarch Waystation butterfly garden at the Donald W. Meyer Center draws pollinators throughout summer. Three reservable gathering spaces accommodate private events ranging from small group outings to larger celebrations. The Deep Woods Lodge is a fully enclosed indoor facility with a covered outdoor canopy extension, hosting up to 71 guests. Aspen Grove Shelter offers an open-air covered structure for up to 75 guests with electrical outlets, picnic tables, and a grill. Maple Grove Shelter is the park's largest gathering space, accommodating up to 150 guests alongside a nature-based playground, with a firepit and grill available on site. All reservations run from 8:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. The park also hosts live summer music performances at the Frances S. Hall Amphitheater and serves as a trailhead for nine trails, a 6-mile mountain bike trail, and cross-country skiing routes — making it a distinctive setting for events that extend beyond the indoors.

• Spaces for 48 Guests
• 1 Park

Sunnybrook Preserve Lodge is a reservable event lodge within Geauga Park District's Sunnybrook Preserve, a 73-acre natural sanctuary in Chester Township, Ohio. The preserve was maintained for horticultural purposes for much of the 20th century and now harbors unique wetlands — including a rare fen fed by alkaline, mineral-rich groundwater — along with four trails totaling 1.64 miles through conifer forests, ravines, and sedge meadows. The lodge accommodates up to 48 guests and includes electrical service. Bocce courts and a tetherball court are available on the grounds. Reservations are required at least three days in advance; amplified music, including speakers, DJs, and live bands, is not permitted on the premises.

• Spaces for 200-225 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Event Space
• 2 Total Spaces

Fowler's Mill Golf Course is a Pete Dye-designed championship golf facility set on scenic countryside in Chesterland, Ohio, about 30 minutes east of downtown Cleveland. Spanning 27 holes across three distinct nine-hole combinations — Lakes, River, and Maple — the course earned recognition from GolfWeek in 2021 as the best public golf course in Ohio. For private events, the facility centers on the Pete Dye Banquet Room, which hosts weddings, corporate outings, business meetings, and banquets for groups from 25 to 225 guests. The clubhouse is designed in the Western Reserve architectural style, with banquet room windows overlooking the course. Weddings have access to four ceremony settings: three outdoor locations on the course — including a lakeside site at Hole 4 with panoramic views and a rustic setting at Hole 12 — plus an indoor option for inclement weather. Outside vendors are permitted, and the venue provides in-house catering led by an executive chef.

• Spaces for 45-5,000 Guests
• 4 Outdoor Spaces
• 1 Theater
• 7 Total Spaces

Lake Metroparks Farmpark is a 235-acre working farm and educational center in Kirtland, Ohio, tracing its roots to 1831 when the property was first purchased for agricultural use. Dr. Leonard T. Skeggs later raised Polish Arabian horses on the land as Locust Farms before Lake Metroparks acquired the property in 1987 and opened it to the public in 1990. Today the farm is home to dairy cows, pigs, sheep, chickens, rabbits, horses, alpacas, and goats, alongside a plant science center and farm machinery exhibits, with horse- and tractor-drawn wagons carrying visitors across the grounds. The Sales and Corporate Services team hosts weddings, reunions, corporate picnics, seminars, and showers across several spaces, including a Theater, classrooms, a Cafe/Patio, a Courtyard, a covered Pavilion, an Atrium, and the open Festival Field, with capacities ranging from small meeting groups up to 5,000 for large gatherings. In-house caterers build custom breakfast, lunch, and dinner menus, and event planners can arrange wagon rides, tours, and entertainment to round out a celebration. The facility is fully wheelchair accessible, with ramps available for wagon boarding and interpreters available with advance notice.

• Spaces for 60-300 Guests
• 1 Ballroom
• 2 Event Spaces
• 2 Country Clubs

Located in Concord, Ohio, Quail Hollow Country Club combines championship golf with warm, family-friendly hospitality. Its two distinct 18-hole courses, designed by Bruce Devlin and Robert von Hagge, offer diverse challenges amid rolling fairways and scenic woodlands. Members enjoy casual and fine dining, a resort-style pool, tennis facilities, and an inviting clubhouse perfect for both everyday dining and elegant events. Quail Hollow’s tranquil grounds create a picturesque escape for recreation and celebration alike.

• Spaces for 132 Guests
• 1 Event Space
• 1 Park

The Rookery is a 594-acre Geauga Park District preserve in Munson Township, set within a former glacial lakebed of open marshes, swamp forest, and abandoned river oxbows along the Chagrin River. The park is also home to one of Geauga County's nesting colonies of Great Blue Heron, along with beech-maple and red-maple forests that shelter Wood Thrush, Veery, and a native population of endangered Ohio brook trout. At the center of the park, the Great Blue Heron Lodge offers a reservable indoor gathering space for up to 132 guests, furnished with twelve picnic tables and four serving tables. The lodge features a wood-burning fireplace, electrical outlets, and seasonal heat for cooler-weather reservations, making it suited to everything from family celebrations to community gatherings. Outside, guests have access to a charcoal grill, with restrooms located in a separate building nearby. Two trails wind through the property — the paved Woodcock Trail and the gravel Interurban Trail, tracing a former rail line — offering scenic surroundings for guests to explore before or after an event at the lodge.

• Spaces for 75-80 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Park

Observatory Park spans 1,100 acres in Montville Township, Ohio, where the Geauga Park District encourages visitors to explore nature from the ground to the galaxies. The park holds a permanent Silver Tier Dark Sky Park designation from the International Dark-Sky Association, one of only 111 such parks in the world and one of two in Ohio, and offers access to the Nassau Astronomical Station, making it a rare setting for gatherings that stretch into a truly dark night sky. For private events, the reservable Cygnus Shelter accommodates up to 75 guests with ten picnic tables, electrical outlets, and a grill; alcohol is permitted within the shelter, and restrooms are available nearby at the park's Central Plaza. Beyond the shelter, six trails totaling just under four miles wind past interactive planetary pods, life-sized Great Pyramid cornerstones, and henge stones, through old-growth forest, wetlands, and open fields that protect the Cuyahoga River watershed.

• Spaces for 50-80 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Waterfront
• 2 Parks

Headwaters Park is one of northeast Ohio's most extraordinary natural event destinations — a magnificent 926-acre reserve centered on the shimmering East Branch Reservoir in Claridon Township. Leased from the City of Akron through a conservation partnership that prioritizes both ecological stewardship and public enjoyment, the park offers an exceptional backdrop for gatherings of every kind, with five trails spanning 4.7 miles winding through landscapes where bald eagles, ospreys, and migratory waterfowl make their home. Two dedicated, reservable event spaces bring the park's natural grandeur to life for private occasions. The Headwaters Boathouse is a wonderfully versatile facility for up to 50 guests, with an indoor fireplace, heat, and electricity paired with a covered outdoor terrace offering direct views over the reservoir — a setting of rare warmth and scenic beauty. The Crystal Lake Shelter welcomes up to 80 guests with electricity, picnic tables, and a grill, delivering a spacious and welcoming outdoor gathering space perfectly suited to family celebrations, corporate outings, and group reunions. From the peaceful reflections of the reservoir to the canopy of mature forest overhead, Headwaters Park is a truly remarkable place to gather, celebrate, and connect with the natural world.

• Spaces for 30-48 Guests
• 2 Outdoor Spaces
• 2 Parks

Orchard Hills Park is a 237-acre Geauga Park District park in Chester Township, Ohio, set on land that operated as a golf course until 2007 and is now being restored to a mature beech-maple forest ecosystem with headwater streams and wetlands feeding the Chagrin River. Six trails totaling 3.6 miles wind past fields, ponds, and apple trees, and the grounds include an orchard-themed playground and a sledding hill for winter visits, making a naturally scenic backdrop for an outdoor gathering. The park offers two reservable event facilities. Orchard Hills Lodge pairs an enclosed section with an open-air area, welcoming up to 48 guests with picnic tables inside and out, electrical outlets, seasonal heat, a charcoal grill, and an outdoor fireplace. For smaller get-togethers, Pondside Shelter hosts up to 30 guests beside the water, reached by a short paved trail, with picnic tables, electrical outlets, a fireplace, and a grill. Facilities can be reserved from 8:30 AM to 11 PM, at least seven days in advance, online, by phone, or in person.

• Spaces for 75 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Park

Bessie Benner Metzenbaum Park is a natural park managed by the Geauga Park District in Chester Township, Geauga County, Ohio. The park preserves a rich mosaic of habitats — mature beech-maple woodlands, conifer plantations, a 140-foot sandstone knoll, wetland areas fed by Griswold Creek, and the remnants of an abandoned orchard — that together attract a wide variety of wildlife throughout the seasons. Three trails wind through the park, totaling 1.15 miles, including two paved accessible pathways and one primitive trail suited to more adventurous visitors. For outdoor gatherings, the park offers the Wisteria Hill Shelter, an open-air pavilion set within the woodland landscape. The shelter accommodates up to 75 guests and is equipped with picnic tables, electrical outlets, and a grill, with reservations available through the Geauga Park District.

• Spaces for 40-75 Guests
• 3 Outdoor Spaces
• 3 Parks

The West Woods is a 956-acre park in Russell and Newbury Townships protecting the sandstone ledges of Ansel's Cave, Silver Creek and its watershed, extensive wetlands, and mature forest along ten trails totaling more than eight miles. Operated by Geauga Park District, the property is a wooded, naturally scenic setting for gatherings that call for a rustic backdrop. For private events, the park's main indoor space is the Lewis & Ruth Affelder House, a lodge built in 1955 and donated to the park district in 1994. The house features floor-to-ceiling windows, a stone fireplace, and a patio overlooking the surrounding woods, with a large gathering room downstairs and a small loft above. It seats up to 40 guests and includes free WiFi, a 55" smart TV, and a kitchenette with refrigerator, microwave, and coffee maker. The West Woods also offers Deer Run Shelter and Turkey Ridge Shelter, two open-air picnic shelters that each accommodate up to 75 guests and include picnic tables, electrical outlets, a grill, and nearby restrooms — suited to larger outdoor gatherings and reunions.

Basil Place offers event spaces for your next celebration in Chardon, Ohio.

• Spaces for 120 Guests

• Spaces for 300 Guests

• Spaces for 75-120 Guests
• 1 Outdoor
• 1 Art Gallery
• 2 Total Spaces

Penitentiary Glen Reservation is a 424-acre nature preserve in Kirtland, Ohio, managed by Lake Metroparks. The park takes its name from a 100-foot deep gorge that earned the nickname "Penitentiary Glen" from settlers in the 1880s — the gorge was easy to enter but hard to escape, much like a jail. The grounds encompass forests, fields, wetlands, and 8.5 miles of hiking trails, and have been recognized as a "Watchable Wildlife" site by Ohio's Division of Wildlife. For private events, Forest Hall in the Nature Center accommodates up to 120 guests in a climate-controlled, wheelchair-accessible multipurpose room fitted with kitchen facilities and audio-visual equipment. Rabbit Run Shelter offers smaller outdoor gatherings for up to 75 guests. The grounds also include the Kevin P. Clinton Wildlife Center, which rehabilitates approximately 2,000 injured or orphaned animals each year, and Lake Shore Live Steamers miniature steam train rides — distinctive features that give the reservation a naturalistic character unlike traditional event venues.