A black San Antonio-based event planner is speaking out against the racial undertones connected with plantation weddings.
According to ATTN, Jordan A. Maney is the owner and founder of All the Days Event Company in San Antonio. Maney said she received a call from a bride recently asking her to plan a wedding at Kendall Plantation in Boerne, just outside of San Antonio. ATTN reports it’s unclear if Kendall Plantation was the former home of slaves, but the venue’s website states it was built “just for weddings” in 2011.
ATTN excerpted a few lines from the website’s “about us” section, some of which appears to have been removed since the article’s publication.
“The name Kendall Plantation represents the county in which it rests (Kendall) and the architecture of a Southern antebellum home,” the website now reads, without mention of the land’s former use as “a plantation for growing cotton and other crops.”
The website still goes on to state that the venue is modeled after “true Southern Louisiana Plantation homes” and says, “The history of the land has been preserved, as we have kept original items used to work the ranch centuries ago; they are on display in unique spots along the property.”
Maney told ATTN having a wedding at a former plantation was like “having a wedding at a grave-site,” saying she didn’t understand why these aspects of history are “glamorized.”
“In the state of Texas we do have a Confederate history day, and it’s still very well practiced,” Maney told ATTN. “The idea of Southern pride tied to the Civil War is still around, but I don’t know why it gets glamorized and fantasized about.”
After Maney received the phone call from the couple requesting the wedding at Kendall Plantation, she wrote on Facebook (in a post that is now not available on her page), "DON'T CALL MY BLACK-OWNED BUSINESS ASKING ME TO PLAN YOUR PLANTATION WEDDING." In the comments, she later detailed how the conversation with the bride unfolded, according to a screenshot captured by ATTN.
ATTN says it has reached out to Kendall Plantation for comment, but has not yet heard back. However, Kendall Plantation posted the following photo on their Instagram on Tuesday, clarifying the venue was built “from the ground up exclusively for weddings.”
