If you’re newly engaged after the holiday season, congratulations!! While you may be enjoying some time just being engaged, the joy of wedding planning will no likely be starting soon. One of the first things most couples do is choose their venue. While I would love for them to hire a planner before doing anything, a lot of couples will want to get their date set in stone first. As such, I thought I would provide a few helpful tips to make the rest of the planning process as smooth as possible.
- Establish your budget and your guest count before doing anything! You’ll want to make sure that you don’t overspend on the venue so that you can still get quality vendors for all the other aspects of your big day. Capacity is extremely important as well so that you don’t end up cramming 120 guests into a room meant for a max of 100 guests.
- Make sure to get a list of everything that is included with the venue rental. Do they provide all the tables and chairs for guests, bars, buffets and cake tables? Do they have linens or is that something you’ll need to rent? If they do in-house catering, do you need to rent plates and flatware or is that included?
- If you’re doing an outdoor ceremony, ask your venue what the backup plan
would be in case of rain or bad weather. This is a question that comes up at every wedding, but usually not until you get closer to the wedding day. Making sure that you’re comfortable with either option will help make your day less stressful in the off chance you do experience bad weather. - Also if you have an outdoor ceremony, ask about electrical access if you plan to have a DJ supply the ceremony music.
Each venue will have its own unique setup and questions that you should probably ask, but these questions will help get you started and on the road for a successful start to your wedding planning!
Top Photo: ©From the Hip Photo at the Arapahoe Basin Black Mountain Lodge and Florals by Erin Ashley Design
Bottom Photo: Adore Photography at the Brook Forest Inn
I like that you talked about the importance of finding out the capacity of the venue that you’re interested to make sure that your guests are not going to be crammed. My husband and I are planning to find a private event space for our anniversary party. We’d like to make sure that our guests are going to be comfortable during our party, so it’s important for us that they can freely move. Since we’re expecting 120 guests, we’ll consider all your tips.