Review - Crossed Keys Inn in Andover, NJ

The Crossed Keys Inn is located in what I consider to be the middle of nowhere in western New Jersey. It is specifically designed and marketed to be an outdoor wedding venue. If your dream wedding involves pastoral scenery, autumn sunsets, rustic old barns and Pintrest-y swing sets, this is a good place to check out.

There is no "indoors." The reception takes place under a very large tent. The kitchen and bathrooms are trailer trucks, and I would bet the place shuts down completely in the colder months. Naturally, a place like this is very weather-dependent, and I would not want to be here in the dog days of July or August. However, in early October the temperature is cool, the leaves are changing and it's a joy to be outside.

It's a wonderful location, but beyond that you start to see cracks in the facade. At the wedding I attended, the tent was not lit nearly as nicely or creatively as it could have been. There were strings of paper lanterns all above the dance floor, but unfortunately no lightbulbs in them or wiring connecting them. The decor was just untapped potential.

The food is average or below average, and I did not get the impression that the mâitre'd really knew what she was doing. I was working with a DJ friend of mine and there were several occasions where we needed her and she was nowhere to be found. We had to tell a waiter to find her and ask her to turn the lights down a little bit. People won't dance in a well-lit room. They get self-conscious. You're in the wedding reception industry. You should know that.


When it comes time to do the introductions of the bridal party and happy couple, a good mâitre'd should be on the floor guiding everyone as they come out and telling them where to stand and what to do. This is exactly the kind of thing that a place like Seasons has down to a science. Needless to say, this venue's staff was much more laissez-faire about it and so things were a bit sloppy.

But some people like sloppy. Or "casual" as you may call it. If you're not that into formalities and just want a relaxed hangout in the country, I would definitely recommend a visit to this place. It's a great spot for that modern, rustic, vintage, retro, country, farm, meadow, autumn, Pintrest, Instagram, sun through the trees, hipsters with beards and chuck taylors and bridesmaids with pin up girl tattoos riding two seated bicycles to nowhere kind of wedding. If you get what I mean.

Plus there's a barn. I really dig barns.

NOTE: One of the biggest downfalls of this place is that apparently Andover has some kind of noise ordinance thing. So even though the Crossed Keys is pretty secluded from residential areas, the festivities must be over by 9 o clock. Yeah, that's right. And they won't let you forget it either. We were reminded to shut the party down for playing one last song at half volume at 9:02. Fortunately there's a cozy little lounge thing in the barn where you and a few friends can hang out and play pool after the reception. So that's kinda neat. But since we've included a lot of french in this post, I must say that the 9 o clock thing is tres bête.

Below are some photos of the place. This time I was not the official wedding photographer, so I chose to keep the guests and bride and groom largely out of the photos and focus on the scenery. You'll have to use your imagination!

You can do some interesting photography stuff with cool spots like this

If your guests get bored they can play Tiddlywinks!