Wedding DJ at The LeGrand Center in Shelby, NC

The Space

LeGrand Center opened in 2012 as a joint project of the Cleveland County Board of Commissioners, Cleveland County Schools, and the Cleveland Community College Foundation Board, built as economic development space for the county rather than as a dedicated wedding venue. The building runs nearly 90,000 square feet total, with 55-foot glass walls, terrazzo floors, and metal-and-glass architecture throughout that give it a modern, corporate feel rather than a rustic or historic one, and that scale is what makes it possible to host a wedding of nearly any size in the same building.

The centerpiece is a 20,000-square-foot ballroom that can expand or divide using a system of custom Skyfold walls, which retract into the ceiling in about 90 seconds to create as many as seven separate rooms. Since opening, the venue has grown past its original corporate focus over its first six years to host events including the American Legion World Series Commanders Reception and the American Heart Association Heart Ball, alongside the weddings and private events it now regularly books.

Capacity & Layout

The ballroom seats up to 1,000 guests banquet style, or 1,700 theater style for a ceremony-only setup, which puts this venue in range for a large wedding that would otherwise need a convention center. Because the Skyfold walls can divide the space, a smaller wedding can use a portion of the ballroom sized to the guest list rather than one couple’s guests getting lost in a room built for a thousand.

Beyond the main ballroom, the technologically advanced business suite adds three conference rooms and one executive closing room, useful for a wedding party that wants a separate space for a rehearsal dinner meeting or vendor coordination apart from the main event room. Get-ready rooms are available on site for the wedding party before the ceremony.

Amenities

The facility provides a full-service kitchen on site along with a list of preferred caterers, and bar service options range from an open bar to a cash bar with a champagne toast. Tables, chairs, a dance floor, drapery, lighting, and audio equipment are all available through the venue, along with china, flatware, glassware, and linens.

Property-wide wifi runs on a full gigabyte of bandwidth, parking is available on site, and the building is wheelchair accessible throughout. An on-site event planner is available to help coordinate logistics, worth knowing for a couple who wants extra support beyond what a DJ, caterer, and photographer typically provide.

Location & Getting There

LeGrand Center sits less than an hour from downtown Charlotte and within reach of both Charlotte-Douglas International Airport and Greenville-Spartanburg Airport, about 66 miles away, and Asheville is roughly 80 miles further west, which makes it workable for a guest list split between the Charlotte and upstate South Carolina areas.

We have worked an event in this room, and the Skyfold system matters directly for sound: because the ballroom can be sealed into a smaller footprint for a smaller guest list, a DJ is not fighting the acoustics of a mostly empty 20,000-square-foot room, and the glass walls and terrazzo floors of the full space carry music cleanly once the walls are opened back up for a larger reception.