New Westminster's Best Wedding & Event Venues

01The short answer

For weddings, start at Queen's Park: the Rose Garden for the ceremony and Centennial Lodge next door for the reception. Larger outdoor gatherings suit Westminster Pier Park, with the Fraser River waterfront and a festival lawn. Company and family picnics fit the shelters at Queen's Park, Hume Park, and Port Royal Park in Queensborough. For photos or smaller affairs, there are the Friendship Gardens at City Hall and the indoor Anvil Centre.

New West is the easiest permit desk of the three Burnaby-Richmond-New West cities to read, because the City publishes its event package and its insurance and tent rules plainly. Learn one rule early: like Richmond, New West doesn't allow staking in its parks, so every tent here is a weighted install.

02The New West permit path

A single event, such as a wedding or a private party, can often be booked directly with the facility (the Rose Garden and Centennial Lodge both go through Parks & Recreation at 604-777-5111). Anything more public or complex runs through the Community Events Office: you submit an Outdoor Event Space Request to tentatively hold a date (the City replies within about seven business days), then complete the full event package. Lead times scale with complexity: roughly 30 days for a simple event, 60 days once food, beverage, or liquor is involved, and up to six months for the biggest gatherings.

Insurance is published and firm: $5 million in commercial general liability, naming the City of New Westminster as additional insured, with the certificate due at least 30 days out. That requirement also extends to vendors (tenting, staging, sound, food), so we'll send our certificate to the events office as part of your file.

03Queen's Park: the Rose Garden

Queen's Park dates to 1887 and is the city's horticultural showpiece. Since a 2010 renovation, its Rose Garden has had over 600 floribunda and hybrid roses, a gazebo, and decorative trellises. It is a designated, bookable ceremony site, and the City itself describes it as "the perfect venue for your wedding ceremony and photos." We think it's the single best ceremony spot in New West.

Steps away, Centennial Lodge is the reception room that pairs with it: indoors, up to 110 guests, with wood beams, a gas fireplace, and a warming kitchen. Both book through the same Parks & Recreation line. One current caveat: the Queen's Park Bandshell is unavailable for bookings, so if you'd pictured a bandstand ceremony, confirm the status first.

04Westminster Pier Park: the waterfront

Westminster Pier Park is the city's modern waterfront park. It won awards, it's built partly over the Fraser on 3,600 pilings, and it has a 325-metre boardwalk, a festival lawn, gardens, and elevated river viewpoints. It's the obvious pick for a large outdoor celebration or a corporate gathering that wants the skyline and the river behind it.

Because it's a flagship civic space, event use goes through the City's booking process and can't be booked like a simple facility rental. The waterfront setting also means you plan for wind and a weighted tent install. If you're considering the festival lawn, start with the events office to confirm what's bookable and at what capacity, then bring us the footprint.

05Picnics & family gatherings

For company picnics and big family days, New West's bookable picnic shelters are at Queen's Park (its larger shelter seats 112, up to 150), Lower Hume Park on the Brunette-Fraser riverfront (seats 96, up to 150), and Port Royal Park in Queensborough (up to 70). Resident booking windows open in the late fall for the next year, so popular summer dates go early.

If alcohol's on the menu, note that at picnics the City allows it only in designated zones at the Queen's Park shelters and Port Royal Park. Amplified sound, generators, and bouncy castles all need prior authorization (bouncy castles are limited to Lower Hume Park). Tell us what you're planning and we'll match the gear to what the site allows.

06Photo spots & indoor options

For wedding photos, the Friendship Gardens and Tipperary Park beside City Hall, with ponds, stepping stones, and public art, are a long-time favourite that the City notes is "popular with wedding photographers." Use it for photos and small gatherings; it isn't set up as a programmed event venue.

When the weather won't cooperate, the City-owned Anvil Centre by the SkyTrain has indoor cultural studios and meeting rooms, and the Samson V Maritime Museum can host small wedding parties and photo groups. In an indoor room, the rental order is mostly finishing touches like chiavari chairs, cocktail tables and linens, and usually leaves out tents and floors.

07Tents, sound & alcohol: the rental rules

New West publishes its rules clearly, which makes planning easy. There are three to know.

Tents. In the parks, tents are allowed with no staking into the ground, so it's weighted ballast only, same as Richmond. Cooking tents must use fire-rated fabric (CAN/ULC-S109), and there's no open-flame cooking under any canopy or tent, so keep BBQs and grills out in the open.

Amplified sound. Music and sound equipment in parks need prior authorization and fall under the City's noise bylaw. In picnic shelters, amplified sound and generators aren't allowed without sign-off.

Alcohol. Serving requires a provincial Special Event Permit (selling adds a business licence), within a beverage garden, a patio extension, or (only for established events) a site-wide model. The permit has to be in the organizer's name, not a third party's. Confirm alcohol is allowed at your specific park before you apply.

08A sample rental order

Take an 80-guest wedding with the ceremony in the Queen's Park Rose Garden and the reception in Centennial Lodge, a classic New West pairing.

• 80 white chiavari chairs (ceremony, then flipped into the Lodge)
• 10 5ft round tables
• 4 cocktail tables for the cocktail hour
• Linens
• Crew for delivery, the ceremony-to-reception flip, and teardown

Because the Lodge supplies the room and a kitchen, this is a furniture-and-finishing order with no tent build. That is a big part of why the Rose Garden and Lodge combination makes such a simple, affordable New West wedding. If your guest count outgrows the Lodge's 110, that's when a tented reception (and ballast) comes into it.

09Next steps

New West is one of the most straightforward cities to plan a wedding in, with a designated ceremony garden, a matching reception room next door, and clearly published rules. If your event moves outdoors onto open parkland, remember that tents there can't be staked.

Text or email 778-990-7983 or welcome@foreverpartyrentals.com with your venue and date. We deliver across New Westminster and can tell you what tent, ballast, insurance, and access details your specific site will need.

"New West makes it easy: the City literally calls the Rose Garden the perfect ceremony spot, and Centennial Lodge is right next door. Pair them and most of the planning is done." — Forever Party Rentals Team

We deliver to: New Westminster · Burnaby · Coquitlam · Surrey