Hi Jenny!
To save on costs we’re not having a sit down meal at our wedding but having a big evening buffet, but me and hubby to be can’t decide what would be the best time to get married. I don’t think getting married too early is a good idea because there will be a long waiting time after the photos etc. But was thinking of having a little tea party with sandwiches and scones just to give people some food. Any thoughts appreciated.
Cara Xx (getting married in April 2013!)
Hello Cara!
Thank you for getting in touch, my first ‘Ask Jenny’!
I think it all depends on the type of venue you are going for, are they happy for you to forgo the sit down meal and provide an afternoon tea instead? If they are, then why not go for it? If you got married at 4pm, had afternoon tea at 5pm, and then a big evening buffet at 8pm your guests will be fed and watered and happy! It would be no different to a 2pm wedding, with canapés prior to the main meal – it’s just you are doing it slightly later in the day. I would imagine mosts guests having lunch before attending a 4pm ceremony, I know I would eat before hand anyway!
Afternoon tea is a lovely idea, quintessentially British, and you could incorporate that into your décor too! Lots of lovely doilies and crockery.
Another suggestion though, it’s worth looking into costs, and getting some numbers together, because by the time you have paid for afternoon tea per head, it may actually still be only very slightly more costly to go for the sit down meal and an earlier ceremony, and once you have your dress on, and you have said ‘I do’ the day will go by in a flurry of activity and you will wish there were more hours in the day for you to enjoy your wedding!
Best of luck Cara, and I hope I have provided some food for thought…. (see what I did there…?)
Jenny x
P.S please do join in with your advice too and don’t forget to send your questions into askJenny@rockmywedding.co.uk
I’m getting married at 3pm. After photos at the Register Office, we’ll be off to the hall where we’re having our Reception for a Vintage Tea Party (which i’m hoping to make bunting for!). People should have had lunch, so won’t be too hungry. I’ve been buying lots of cups, saucers and plates from charity shops, so everyone can have tea/coffee and the cupcakes me and my Fiances mum’ll be making. Then later on for the Evening, will be doing a big buffet that some friends and family are making. Hope that helps
x
We had this issue when we were looking at venues. We loved the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford but you couldn’t get married until 5 pm because they’d be open during the day. It would have been cheaper in terms of food because we would have gone for a buffet, but in the end I decided I would die with anxiety/excitement before the ceremony! So that’s something else to take into consideration – how impatient you are! But on the flip side a later wedding means more time to get ready so less rushing around beforehand.
We are doing the same as Laura! Getting married at 3pm, then at the reception venue were having pimms on the patio at about 4.30pm then an afternoon tea party buffet from about 5.15pm. This is costing us £5 a head (£5!!!). Teacups and crockery sourced from local charity shops and car boot sales, so they were very cheap to buy. Evening reception is starting about 7.30pm and we are then having a hog roast. This has worked out much cheaper than the traditional wedding breakfast 3 course meal.
I’m doing the exact same thing. We are getting married at 2, canapes at 3-5, afternoon tea at 5 and then a hog roast later in the evening. I have said on our invites that the ceremony will be following by Afternoon Tea, so this should urge people to have lunch before. The venue and their caterers have been great at sourcing lots of lovely vintage crockery etc and are really running with the theme! My florist is also getting in on the act and using old broken teacups and milk urns for our table dispays!!
x
We looked into having a buffet, more for informality than cost, but it turned out to be more expensive than a set menu because they make extra food (to compensate for all the people who have eyes bigger than their tummies!) and its more plates etc. Instead our caterers have come up with an interesting menu that has an air of informality and summeriness about it, but is still a sit down meal. A good caterer will help you get exactly what you want within your budget, so talk it through with them – don’t assume you can’t have something until you’ve looked into it – you may regret shortening your day if your only concern is budget. Good luck! x
Getting married later in the day and just doing one meal is a great money saving idea!
We’re getting married in church at 3.30pm, then we’re heading to the reception which is 15 mins away for drinks in the garden then the hog roast will be ready to go at 6.30-7pm ish.
Also having a sweetie buffet so if anyone is peckish inbetween they can get a quick sugar fix
x
Ceremony times…. hmmmm, a hard one!!
We’re having two ceremonies in the afternoon, the civil ceremony following by a religious ceremony, both in the same village. I really wanted to have the civil ceremony at 3 and the religious one at 4 (in France, you don’t have evening guests so you end up having the dinner at a ‘normal’ dinner time).
Unfortunately, the lovely priest who will be marrying us has another wedding to attend to at 3:30pm so he could either marry us in the morning or at 5pm. I didn’t want a morning wedding (that would mean getting up at 5am!!!) but was worried 5pm would be too late. He did ask the other couple if they would mind having their ceremony at least a half hour earlier, but they have refused to change. Very very stubborn.
So I have now made my peace with it. Tom and I will be having pictures taken earlier in the afternoon so that we can then enjoy the rest of hte afternoon adn evening with our guests. And let’s be honest, one hour isn’t going to make all the difference anyway!
xxx
@Stephanie Barlow We looked at the Ashmolean too, and also loved it, but decided to go for something else in the end for pretty much the same reason, I’m just not sure what I would have done with myself during the day, because I’m sure to be super nervous! We also felt that starting at 5 would perhaps not be so great for those guests that want to come up just for the day.
We’ve ended up going for the Tythe Barn, just outside Bicester, which is very beautiful, but so very, very different, and I’m hoping it will be a lovely relaxed day. We’re not having any extra guests in the evening, so I’m hoping that we can get away with only feeding them once, during the early part of the evening, and have as yet no idea what form that meal will take – personally I want a great big rustic feast.
(I don’t if this will mean anything to anyone else on here, but I loved the Redwall books as a kid, and always fancied the idea of joining in one of their feasts, they did great big tasty veggie pies and salads, and puddings that sounded out of this world – erm, lots of blackberries and stuff that you’d find in hedgerows. They were epic, and yet my fiancé claims that he read the books for the stories, not the descriptions of food… an alien concept to me, all my favourite books contain marvellous descriptions of food!)
Well that was somewhat rambly.
First post for me, yay!
Something I’m considering and have seen done once before when I used to sing in my church choir is having cake at the church. I know it’s not traditional but you can still have your cutting the cake photos. Plus this way you know the cake will get eaten and it may keep people going ’til a bit later in the day! I am having a Brownie honour guard and want to give them (and our vicar) a chance to be a greater part of our day.
Hi Jenny and all those that have left comments.
Thanks ever so much for choosing me as your first Ask Jenny and for the helpful feedback from all of you. Giving us something to think about. Thanks and enjoy your weekend. Xz
we got married at 3pm and served dinner at 5pm which was a hot buffet, we only had 5 extra guest in the evening, so decided to service slices of pizza and bacon rolls at 10pm, went down a storm and really helped save on cost of not providing another evening buffet which none missed us not having but they loved the bacon rolls, just what people needed to soak up the alcohol, I had always wanted an evening wedding and go straight into the party, but in the end Im glad we got married at 3pm because the day went so quick, I wish it had been longer xx
Hi Cara – I guess it really depends on your venue, but this is what we are up to …
getting married at 2, post photos getting to venue etc everyone there about 4? drinks and welsh cakes (like flat scones) to fill people up and then at 6pm hog roast with salads etc (hog being cooked by company with rolls etc to feed 120 but we have 70 people and salads a local pub chef is going to do NB I personally think this sort of thing could easily be done the day before by me and my mum etc but has been vetoed by my mother and The Boy on grounds they think I may get too stressed – don’t know where they got that idea)
Will also have some big dessert type things that we are getting from a local puddings maker but could easily be got from m&s or somewhere similar, then serving the cake and teas coffees later in the evening when the dancing is going on and people may need a little sponge for the champagne!
All in all, really keeping our costs down when it comes to the food, but we have a marquee so still able to put people into seats without necessarily having a ‘sit down’ meal or the such.
Hope this has helped!
- Remember canapes can be substantial things like scones. Afternoon tea is lovely and people don’t have to be sitting down for it if that is what is expensive!
Hi – we’re also having afternoon tea & then hog roast later. Getting married at 2pm, photos etc & back to reception for 4pm where we have some amazing afternoon tea canapés (our caterer also loved the idea) we figured peops will have had lunch, but free drink in the afternoon & don’t want anyone too sozzled (marquee at parents!) so have allowed 10 canapés per person (e.g sandwich fingers, mini creme brûlée, mini scones… All served on cake stands) £12 per head. We then have evening guests & hog roast/salads at 8pm (£1000 for approx 120 people to include proper knifes & forks rather than paper/plastic) traditional cake & a “cheese” & biscuit cake which we figure should be enough food. Our main issue is space as limiting factor, & being unable to seat everyone for a formal dinner. As Jenny said… Would be worth investigating cost as I don’t think we’ll be much cheaper… Just different to all other weddings we’ve been too so far. I’ve also indicated “& afterwards for afternoon tea” on the invite. Good luck!!! If you want to buy any homemade Cath kidston bunting & tea cups after 12th may let me know!!!
Hi Cara! (And Jenny)
It all sounds perfectly good to me! I would echo what @Ange has said and put something in the invitations to remind people to have a decent lunch. You know what it’s like getting ready for a wedding, everyone’s running around like lunes and sometimes forget to eat. You could include an Order of the Day with your invites and make a little quirky note at the bottom.
@Ruby – I too am a total food perv. I love to read about wit, watch programs about it and I am known to quiz my colleagues on what they’re having for lunch. Every. Single. Day.
Loving these Ask Jenny posts. Actually the wisest woman I know.
Ooo loving the 1st Ask Jenny!….has put my mind at rest after many months of deliberating about how much food is enough and when will people need/ be expecting it! We’ve settled on wedding at 2pm, afternoon tea at 4pm (post speeches!) and then “bowl food” so 3 yummy choices of simple, easy food with bread and salad at 8pm, followed by wedding cake. Has meant overall we’ve spent about £25 a head but everyone will be fed twice (when we did our tasting we were really surprised by how stuffed we were from “just” sandwiches, scones and cakes!!) and as we couldn’t seat everyone in 1 room we had to go for something a bit different to a sit down meal anyway
I recently officiated at a wedding that was held at 7pm – the reception consisted of a live band and the 5 C’s – cocktails, canapes, champagne, cake and a huge cheeseboard! It was a great way for them to all party the night away.
Great to see all the responses from people.
The ceremony and reception will all be at one place so no need for travelling, and they are letting us do what we want. We have people coming from different areas and so they have anough time to get there and get ready i thought maybe getting married later would be a good idea. Im a bugger for thinking about other people rather than myself….even doing it for my own wedding. LOL.
Maybe as Jaimie said a 3pm wedding wouldnt be to bad, still time for people to get here, not rushing for me to get ready, and enjoy the day still.
We’re doing something very similar to Celine – the civil ceremony at 4pm followed by the religious ceremony at about 5pm. Then a drinks reception and photos with a sit down meal being served at 7pm. That way, we don’t end up paying an arm and a leg for 2 meals as all the guests will have had lunch before arriving!
We’re having a ‘barn’ wedding with a civil ceremony followed by ‘cutting the cake’ then Champagne and an ‘Afternoon tea’ (with the cut cake featured strongly). This will be followed at approx 7pm by a hog roast desserts, then dancing.
At what stage do you think the toasts and speeches should occur?