By Caleb Wheeler | Staff Writer
Behind an ornate door and countless stained glass windows is a little-known place where Baylor students can tie the knot.
Rachel Bates is an event manager for Baylor and works with couples to make weddings happen at Armstrong Browning Library & Museum. While she has been working with Baylor for nearly two years, she has been in the wedding industry for 13.
“What you would do to schedule a wedding is that you would request a wedding application from me, and then we can kind of go back and forth for a little while to really nail down the date and time and everything,” Bates said. “But we only allow one per month on a Saturday, and we don’t book it until nine months in advance.”
Bates said the booking is for five hours, which is usually divided into a one-hour rehearsal on Friday followed by a four-hour ceremony on Saturday. The fee is $2,000.
To reserve the space, the bride or groom must be a Baylor student, a Baylor graduate or the child of a Baylor graduate; a current employee or the child of one; or a library patron or the child of one.
“There’s not a whole lot of different options for wedding ceremonies on campus,” Bates said. “I know there’s a few others, but I think [Armstrong Browning Library is] a really unique place for somebody that wants to incorporate the Baylor setting into their wedding.”
Plano junior Nikki Früsh hopes to use Armstrong Browning Library as the venue for her wedding to Baylor alumnus Kenny Hopkins.
While Früsh originally thought she was going to be an Aggie, she said she and Hopkins now bleed green and gold and want nothing more than to get married on campus. However, she said the goal hasn’t been without its challenges.
“Originally, we were trying to get a wedding date of late August or early July,” Früsh said. “But that was before we realized just how far Armstrong Browning is booked out. So right now, we’re trying to get it booked for early next year, but we’ll see what happens.”
For Früsh, Armstrong Browning has always been an important place. She said she regularly goes there to sit in front of the stained glass windows and picture what it will be like when she finally gets to say “I do” in the very same room.
“I may not have known that I was going to be at Baylor, but looking back at everything, I wouldn’t change a single detail,” Früsh said.
