Wedding venue in Alsace: a private hamlet, Friday to Sunday

Le Hameau du Morimont is an 18th-century farm, set apart from the village of Oberlarg in the Alsatian Jura — eastern France, on the Swiss and German borders. It is a place that is lived in year-round: a hotel, an extraordinary barn, a flower farm, a wood workshop, travellers, families, working teams.

For one weekend, it is yours. The site is private from Friday to Sunday, with no other event taking place. Eighteen rooms sleep forty-seven of your guests, vans and campers settle a few dozen metres away, and you set the pace.

Le Morimont seats up to 120 people comfortably, and works just as well for a wedding of around fifty. Larger numbers are possible and we talk them through case by case. It is a wedding venue in Alsace that does not look much like the others — the rest of this page is here so you can judge that for yourselves.

A wedding weekend in a place that is lived in year-round

Picture your guests arriving on the Friday, dropping their bags, finding each other over a first drink in the courtyard. Conversations start with no set programme, the children take over the place, the fire is lit slowly. The wedding begins before anyone has announced it.

Most venues offer a concentrated format: access late on the Saturday morning, a rushed set-up, a run of moments compressed into a few hours, then a closing time you did not choose. One event, one room.

Here, the wedding is measured in days rather than hours. Your guests are not simply attendees — they become temporary residents of the hamlet, sharing meals, corridors, late nights and slow mornings. Leaving after the day-after brunch on Sunday lets the whole thing end gently rather than simply stop.

If you are reading this from Belgium or the Netherlands, none of that will be new to you: a wedding weekend is not an exotic idea where you live. What is less common is having all of it on one site, with nobody driving anywhere between the ceremony and their bed.

Slow living at Le Morimont, since 2006

Reconnecting with the rhythm of the seasons, taking pleasure in simple things, enjoying the moment you are actually in: it makes both the wedding and the year of preparation better. That has guided us for nearly twenty years, and you can feel it in the way people get married here.

In practical terms, the hamlet sits away from the village, between forest and flowering meadows. Nobody will disturb you, and you will disturb nobody, however late the night runs. Once the cars are parked, there is no reason to drive again: the ceremony, the dinner, the party and the bedrooms are all on the same site, spread across several very different spaces.

Le Morimont has a plain, honest aesthetic. The materials, the volumes and the grounds tell a story — an old farm reinterpreted with care and restraint, most of it built by hand by the people who live here. That leaves plenty of room for your own world, provided you like the one you are stepping into.

Is Le Morimont the right venue for your wedding?

Ten questions to work through together, quietly, before you even write to us.

A wedding here is prepared over a long time, with care. Nobody gains from discovering halfway through that the venue was never right for the plan. So here, without dressing it up, is what getting married at Le Morimont actually means.

  1. Le Morimont is rented from Friday to Sunday, never by the day. Three days, two nights, the whole hamlet to yourselves. Is that the format you were looking for?
  2. The hamlet seats up to a hundred and twenty comfortably, and some of the loveliest weddings here have had fifty guests. Larger numbers are possible and we talk them through case by case. Does your guest list sit in that range?
  3. Your caterer will have to play along: organic and/or locally sourced, seasonal, no disposable tableware. That genuinely narrows the field. Are you willing to search a little longer, with our help?
  4. Nothing flies here: no balloons, no lanterns, no fireworks, no confetti. Alternatives exist and we suggest them. Are you already missing something?
  5. The place does not transform. The wood, the stone and the old volumes will stay exactly what they are; your decoration comes and sits on top of them. Do you like Le Morimont as it looks in these photographs, or as you picture it once repainted and rearranged?
  6. What gets damaged here is not settled with a cheque: somebody repairs it. The furniture was found second-hand or built in the workshop, the oak floor laid board by board, the trees planted two centuries ago or last spring. And the team will not work for you: it will build this weekend with you. Does that suit the way you like to work?
  7. The flowers grow a hundred metres from the barn and follow the seasons. No peonies in September, no dahlias in April. Can you let go of one particular flower?
  8. Gravel, grass, forest paths. Stiletto heels do not survive a weekend here. Is that a detail, or is it a problem?
  9. A hamlet restored building by building, a team that keeps it alive all year, a weekend that includes the rooms, the meals and the flowers. Anyone looking only at the figure may find Le Morimont expensive, and would be right to prefer a hotel ballroom or a venue that runs three weddings a weekend — both are perfectly good answers for a great many weddings. Can you see what sits behind the number?
  10. The Allée des Seigneurs: four rows of trees more than a century old, fifty metres of green nave, a clearing opening onto the valley under one monumental lime tree. Did that sentence make you want to come and see it? If it leaves you cold, none of the nine points above will make up for it.

Ten times yes, without hesitating? We should meet.

Two or three hesitations? Le Morimont is probably not your venue — and it is much better to find that out now than after a long drive or a transatlantic flight.

In short, Le Morimont is for you if…

  • you picture a whole weekend, not a reception;
  • your guests are travelling to get here and you want to keep them close;
  • our ecological charter reads as inspiration rather than as a constraint;
  • you would rather have a place with a character of its own than a blank canvas;
  • you like the idea of building this weekend alongside the team, not handing it over.

Look elsewhere if…

  • your wedding fits into a single day;
  • you dream of a neutral space to transform entirely;
  • you want a religious ceremony celebrated on site — there is no church at Le Morimont;
  • you expect a team to execute instructions without ever discussing them;
  • you want a venue that supplies the full catalogue of wedding props and packages.

The spaces at Le Morimont for your wedding in Alsace

Six distinct places, all a few dozen metres from one another. You use them freely, according to the season, the weather and your own idea of the weekend.

The barn

Over 300 m² of floor space under an old timber frame: this is where a barn wedding actually happens, dinner and party, seating up to a hundred and twenty guests comfortably. The floor has been entirely rebuilt: 270 m² of solid oak, with character tiling in front of the bar and in the catering area, where the traffic is heaviest. It is recent work, and it changes everything — evening light on oak, warmth underfoot, the sound of chairs softened. The barn has a sound and lighting system, a bar with refrigerated storage, restrooms, and a catering area with a professional oven and refrigerated cabinet, so the food is prepared a few steps from the tables. Amplified music can run as late as you like without disturbing the neighbours — there are none.

The Allée des Seigneurs

Four rows of trees more than a century old, running over fifty metres. The trunks rise high, the branches meet overhead: you walk down a green nave, and the word is not an exaggeration. The avenue opens onto a clearing above the whole valley, in the shade of one monumental lime tree.

This is where most of the symbolic ceremonies at Le Morimont take place. It is also, according to almost everyone who discovers it, the moment the place suddenly makes sense.

The courtyard

The courtyard is the centre of Le Morimont. It links everything else: the barn to the Allée des Seigneurs, the bedrooms to the path up to the castle. Its lounge furniture and the natural shelter of the barn canopy make it the obvious place for a cocktail hour or an unplanned moment.

It is also the nearest refuge if a shower passes through: about a hundred people fit under the canopy, dry, without the party stopping.

The vault

The vault sits beneath the barn, reached directly from the courtyard. Bare stone, a painted starry ceiling, a soft acoustic.

For a ceremony, a welcome dinner or a quieter moment, it is a sheltered option with a very particular charm — and the fallback when the weather decides to join in. The most attractive plan B imaginable: if the Allée des Seigneurs did not exist, this would be the first choice for an unusual wedding ceremony.

The terrace

The terrace opens off the hotel veranda, but what makes it is the light, the breeze, the long stretch of grass and an uninterrupted view over the valley. Metal tables and chairs are set out there.

This is Sunday morning territory: the day-after brunch stretches out, the children run, nobody feels like leaving.

The hotel

Everything in the hotel is available to you for the weekend. The restaurant, the bar and the veranda are part of the private hire. Rooms can be set aside for babysitting, while the dining room hosts breakfasts and the brunch the morning after.

It is also where the couple gets ready, calmly, without crossing half the region to do it. The atmosphere of a proper working hotel filled with your own people for a whole weekend is worth the journey on its own.

Accessibility. We would rather be straightforward about this than let you find out on the day. Some of the outdoor areas do not meet accessibility standards: the ground slopes in places, and is gravelled, cobbled or wooded. In practice, no guest has ever been left out — the awkward stretch gets crossed together, and during your visit we plan ahead for whatever needs planning. Tell us about wheelchairs, walking frames, prams and anyone who tires quickly, and we will find the way round.

The castle ruins. The medieval castle of Morimont, built in the 12th century, stands 350 metres from the hamlet and is not part of the site you rent. Nothing stops you walking up there or taking photographs: the path leaves from the courtyard.

A word on the weather. Every key moment has a plan B less than fifty metres away: the courtyard canopy, the vault, the barn. Extra heaters can be brought in on request. Nobody here has ever cancelled a ceremony because of rain — in fact we struggle to remember it raining at all.

A wedding venue with accommodation: 18 rooms, 47 beds

The hamlet has eighteen rooms, sleeping forty-seven people: eleven doubles, four triples, two rooms for four and one for five. Cots are not counted in that total — we keep four available, and you are welcome to bring more.

Having everyone sleep on site changes the texture of the weekend. Nobody drives after dessert. Grandparents go up when they feel like it and come back down for breakfast. Friends who have flown in do not spend the evening watching the clock for the last train. Baby monitors reach the barn, so the party carries on once the children are asleep.

Beyond the forty-seven beds, there is a camping area immediately next to the barn, and vans park on the car park. Several hotels and guesthouses a few minutes away complete the picture for larger guest lists.

Who pays for what?

You decide, room by room, which ones you offer and which ones your guests pay for themselves. Many couples cover close family and their witnesses, and let everyone else settle their own night — which, for a destination wedding, is what most of your guests already expect.

What your guests pay is deducted directly from your rental invoice. Accommodation does not inflate your budget: depending on how you split it, it can reduce it significantly.

The whole allocation is handled through an app built by the Le Morimont team. Every room is described there, and for each guest you enter the dates, the room configuration and the amount paid. Your guests have nothing to arrange with the hotel: no booking code, no room block to negotiate, no separate confirmation to chase.

Extra nights before or after the weekend are possible subject to availability, for anyone who wants to arrive on the Thursday or take Sunday evening slowly.

The table: what we cook

Le Morimont cooks the meals around the wedding: the welcome dinner on Friday evening — often a salad bar with tartes flambées, the thin, crisp Alsatian answer to pizza — the breakfasts, Saturday lunch if you want it, and the day-after brunch on Sunday.

The cooking is generous and unfussy: long tables, buffets, dishes to pass around. Produce is organic and comes from a network of growers next door. Églantines etc., the flower farm based at the hamlet, supplies jams, herbal teas, fresh herbs and part of the vegetables and fruit.

Menus adapt to dietary requirements, and we are glad to encourage less meat-heavy choices. Leftovers go to your guests or to local charities.

Saturday evening dinner is down to the caterer of your choice. You select them freely, provided they work within the charter of the place: seasonal produce, short supply chains, no disposable plastic tableware. That is a real constraint and it does narrow the field — better to know early. You may also bring your own wines and spirits, under conditions set out in the quote.

Flowers and furniture, made at the hamlet

Floral decoration is included in the rental. It is done by églantines etc., the flower farm based at Le Morimont, which grows organic, seasonal flowers on site. That covers the bridal bouquet, the accessories, the ceremony decoration, the cocktail hour and the tables, plus setting up and taking down. A preparatory meeting lets us agree the style and the colours together.

The arrangements take their cue from what you want, but also from the garden and the season. This is where we have to be clear: what is in bloom decides. No peonies in September, no dahlias in April. In exchange, your flowers will have grown a hundred metres from the table they sit on, with no refrigerated lorry and no intercontinental flight.

Part of the furniture follows the same logic: it comes out of the wood workshop at the hamlet, made to measure from trees on the estate or from reclaimed timber. Benches, trestles, display stands, signage — what you see here does not exist anywhere else, and it has not travelled.

You are of course welcome to bring additional decoration, within the charter and the spirit of the place.

The wedding weekend, Friday to Sunday

Three days, two nights, the entire site to yourselves.

Friday
The barn is open to you from 10 am for setting up, so your suppliers can deliver and install without rushing. From 4 pm the site is yours and the rooms open: your guests arrive, drop their bags, gather in the courtyard. The welcome dinner is taken together, with no protocol whatsoever.

Saturday
Breakfast at the hotel. The day runs the way you imagined it: getting ready, the ceremony most often in the Allée des Seigneurs, cocktail hour in the courtyard, dinner and party in the barn. The music holds until the end of the night.

Sunday
Day-after brunch on the terrace or in the restaurant. Rooms are released at noon, but nothing obliges you to leave: you can stay on the site for the rest of the day. It is often the moment couples describe best, long afterwards.

Before the weekend. Early access is possible during the preceding week to drop off equipment. For those who want to stretch the moment further, arriving on the Thursday with a small group can be discussed, subject to availability.

Midweek and off-season. Le Morimont also hosts weddings during the week and outside the high season, on particular terms. If your date is flexible, it is worth saying so.

The calendar. We host a limited number of weddings each year, on a calendar set to fit the life of the place and its other activities. That is what protects the atmosphere of the hamlet and the quality of the welcome — and it is also why it pays to write to us early.

Cleaning. The final clean is handled by Le Morimont. On your side, you sort the waste, gather the returnable bottles, remove your own equipment and put the furniture back where it was.

Planning a destination wedding in France, from abroad

The legal side, the ceremony itself, and getting everybody here.

The legal wedding. France requires a residential connection with the commune before a civil marriage can be celebrated there — one of the two of you, or a parent, has to live locally. For couples based in Belgium, the Netherlands, the United States or anywhere else, that generally rules out a legal ceremony at Le Morimont itself.

In practice it is much less of an obstacle than it sounds. Almost all of our international couples complete the legal formalities at home, before or after the trip, often as a short registry appointment with two witnesses — and then hold the ceremony that actually matters to them here, in the Allée des Seigneurs, led by a celebrant. It is not a lesser ceremony. It is the one your guests will remember, written by you, in whichever language or languages your families speak. We can point you towards celebrants working in English, German and French.

Rules change and every situation is different, so please confirm your own case with your local registry office and, where relevant, with the French consulate: they are the ones who decide, not us.

Getting everybody here. Guests coming from Belgium and the Netherlands mostly drive — roughly five hours from Brussels, seven from Amsterdam — and park on site. Those flying land at EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse, thirty-five minutes away, usually connecting through Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, Frankfurt or Zurich. From North America, plan it as you would any destination wedding: a hub, a short hop, and a car for the last stretch.

What your guests will ask you. Where to sleep — eighteen rooms here, more in the villages nearby. What to wear on gravel and grass. And whether there is anything to do around: there is. Basel is forty-five minutes away, the Black Forest an hour and a half, and the castle ruins are a ten-minute walk from the courtyard.

What the rental includes

One single, readable package covering the place, the equipment, the accommodation and the flowers.

Included

  • Exclusive private use of the hamlet from Friday 4 pm to Sunday 12 noon, with no other event on the site;
  • the fully equipped barn: sound and lighting system, restrooms, bar with refrigerated storage, professional catering area with oven and refrigerated cabinet;
  • the StudioBooth photo booth and its 400 prints, with every photograph downloadable afterwards from an online gallery;
  • all the outdoor areas: the courtyard and its lounge furniture, the terrace with its metal tables and chairs, the Allée des Seigneurs and its 30 wooden benches, the garden, the vault;
  • the indoor spaces of the hotel: restaurant, bar, veranda, plus the outdoor restrooms for guests who camp;
  • the games corner: pétanque, Mölkky, croquet, Kubb, tin-can alley and the rest;
  • accommodation for 47 people in 18 rooms for both nights, with Saturday breakfasts and the Sunday day-after brunch included;
  • the floral decoration, using organic flowers grown at the hamlet farm;
  • electricity, wifi and the final clean.

Not included, quoted separately

  • the Saturday evening caterer, all meals other than breakfasts and brunch, and the drinks;
  • breakfast and brunch extensions beyond the 47 guests staying on site;
  • the barn furniture and the tableware;
  • the planning and decoration service, run by the Dentelle Rebelle team;
  • extra nights before or after the weekend;
  • additional audiovisual equipment, and any ancillary service: photography, DJ, live music, babysitting, shuttle.

And the price? It is in the brochure we send on request to interested couples, together with the detail of the options and the rental conditions. You can ask for it using the form on the page linked below.

A restoration that started in 2006

In 2006 the hamlet was in a very poor state. The roofs let water in, the barn was a storage shed, several buildings were unusable or close to collapse. After major work on the main house, what followed is a building site that is still not finished and probably never entirely will be. Today almost every roof has been rebuilt. The barn has its tall glazed wooden doors, and its floor has 270 m² of solid oak. Each time according to the same rule: good materials, and craftspeople who work knowing that what they lay has to last a hundred years, not twenty. It costs more per square metre and far less per century. That is what a wedding weekend rental pays for. Not a return on capital: the next roof, a lime-mortar repointing, and a team that keeps the place alive all year, including the months when nobody is getting married. When you book Le Morimont, you are not renting a function room — you are taking your turn on a twenty-year building site.

An eco-friendly wedding: the commitments you make here

The Morimont charter, for a wedding that does more than announce its good intentions.

If you have fallen for the place and for the way it works, these commitments will feel less like constraints and more like a genuine support for what you were already trying to do.

The charter rests on four principles: respect for the seasons, produce that is as local as possible, care for the environment, and reducing and properly handling waste.

In concrete terms, you undertake that:

  • no single-use plastic is used during the wedding — cups, straws, balloons, tableware, non-returnable bottles. Alternatives exist and are preferred: fabric, wood, earthenware, glass;
  • the food is made of seasonal produce, organic and/or locally sourced. Leftovers go to your guests or to local charities;
  • decoration materials are hired. Single-use items are kept to a minimum and are fair trade certified or environmentally sound: candles, printed matter, textiles;
  • the flowers come from the Morimont farm, with the arrangements made by églantines etc.;
  • nothing is released into the air: no balloons, no lanterns, no confetti, no fireworks. Here too alternatives exist and we suggest them: a performance, fire bowls, candles.

And to go further:

  • the menu can contain little or no meat, with a vegetarian or vegan alternative offered to your guests;
  • you can keep the guest list shorter. Staying under a hundred and twenty people, for instance, means less travel and less impact overall — which is one of the reasons we do not try to fill the barn at any cost.

No later than thirty days before the wedding, you send us the list of your outside suppliers and a description of what you are bringing. If something is plainly incompatible with the charter, we tell you then and we look for an adjustment together. That is also why this framework sits on this page rather than in an annex: better to read it before falling in love with an idea that cannot happen here.

Sorting waste is compulsory during the event. It is not a decorative extra: it is what makes the whole thing coherent.

Getting here: a wedding venue near Basel

Le Morimont is in Oberlarg (68480), in the Alsatian Jura — eastern France, a few kilometres from the Swiss and German borders. That is what makes it workable for guests arriving from very different places, while still feeling properly cut off once you are here.

  • EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse — 35 minutes
  • Basel — 45 minutes
  • Zurich airport — 1 h 45
  • Brussels — about 5 hours by road
  • Amsterdam — about 7 hours by road

EuroAirport is a short hop from Amsterdam, Brussels, London and most European hubs; guests flying in from North America usually connect through Zurich, Frankfurt, Paris or Amsterdam. The last few kilometres run through rolling, wooded countryside — the weekend really starts there.

There is parking on the estate, including for vans and campervans. Once parked, most guests do not open a car door again until Sunday. The hamlet is not served by public transport: anyone arriving by train or plane should arrange a car share or a taxi from Basel in advance. The team moves easily between English, German and French.

Route des Ruines du Morimont, 68480 Oberlarg. See it on the map.

The questions we get asked before all the others

No. Plenty of wedding venues in Alsace offer that format and it has its merits — but it is not ours. Le Morimont is rented for the whole weekend, Friday to Sunday. The long format, the accommodation on site and the shared meals are what make the experience; cutting them up would be selling something else.

The figures are in our brochure, sent on request from the form on this page. Two useful points in the meantime: the rental covers the place, the equipment, accommodation for 47 people over two nights with breakfasts and brunch, and the floral decoration. And whatever your guests pay for their own rooms is deducted from your invoice, which changes the arithmetic noticeably.

There is no church at the hamlet. The overwhelming majority of couples we host hold a symbolic ceremony led by a celebrant, most often in the Allée des Seigneurs, sometimes in addition to a civil or religious ceremony held elsewhere on another day.

Floral decoration is provided by églantines etc., the flower farm based here, and it is included in the rental. The style and the colours are agreed with you at a preparatory meeting. You remain free to bring additional decoration, within the charter.

Yes, and it is a condition. We can talk by phone or video first, but no booking is confirmed without a visit. Allow an hour to an hour and a half on site: enough time to walk the spaces, ask everything and feel whether the place speaks to you. If you are flying in, we start with a long video call and a filmed walk-through, and we plan the visit as one trip. After the visit, a date can be held provisionally.

No, and that is not what we are trying to be. It is an old farm, with irregular stonework, gravel and beams two centuries old. The care is real — in the welcome, the cooking, the flowers, the solid oak floor in the barn — but it does not take the form of marble and gilding. It is an unusual place to get married, comfortable with its own imperfections.

Gladly. The place takes adults, children and babies: four cots are available on request, rooms can be set aside for babysitting, and the games corner keeps the older ones busy while the adults linger at the table. Children take over the hamlet within half an hour, which is quite something to watch.

Yes, on conditions: tell us in advance, keep the animal on a lead in shared spaces, supervise it and clean up after it. A dog that is comfortable in a crowd will have an excellent weekend here.

Yes, and on particular terms. If your date is flexible, tell us: it is often the best way to reach an agreement.

No. A planning and decoration service does exist, run by the Dentelle Rebelle team, with a preparation weekend on site and a presence on the day. It is offered, never imposed. Plenty of couples organise everything themselves or bring in a wedding planner, and that works perfectly well — the Morimont team stays present and available either way.

The more practical questions — equipment, suppliers, the contract, accommodation, catering — are gathered in our dedicated wedding FAQ.

Ask for the brochure, then come and see us

Every wedding at Le Morimont starts with a meeting.

Fill in the form and we will send you the full brochure: the spaces and their capacities, the detail of what is included, the possible options, the rental conditions and the prices.

Then come. The place does not fully make sense on paper — it has to be felt. You need to walk down the avenue, listen to the silence, picture your own people here. Allow an hour to an hour and a half on site. It is also the moment when we check together, honestly, that Le Morimont is the right venue for your wedding — and sometimes we conclude that it is not.

If the answer is yes, a date can be held provisionally for you at the end of the visit.