My first blog post of 2024 and I’m hopeful that amongst all the Christmas festivities some of my readers may be entering 2024 a fiancé! In which case, let the wedding planning commence.
Planning a wedding can be overwhelming so in these early stages my top tip to you would be to enjoy the engagement and don’t start worrying about too much of the intricacies of the wedding just yet – there will be plenty of time for that later.
I have written this blog to help guide you through the next steps of wedding planning which is all about timings. There is no right or wrong way of doing it, I have just written up an example to showcase the various timings required for each supplier. (Again, I haven’t incorporated every supplier in the book – there may be some you won’t consider for your weddings and others that I haven’t included but that you will.)
It’s actually easier if you don’t plan your order of the day from the beginning – weird right? The morning preparations are generally dictated by your ceremony time. This is because if you are opting for a registrar-led legal ceremony, their time is often precious and in high demand. That being said, my sample wedding day timeline is in fact in chronological order for you:
Bridal Prep – 7am
Bridal prep differs whether you are male or female and who you have as part of your bridal party. 7 bridesmaids will take a lot longer in the hair and make up studio, than if it were simply just your sister and Mum. From working with hair and make up professionals, although it all depends on the style you opt for as a Bride, I would suggest allowing an hour and half for make up and an hour and a half for hair. Although it may seem unreasonable at first and you may think “why can’t they do it quicker?”, who wants to be rushing on the morning of their wedding? They are the professionals, trust their judgement.
Guest Arrival – 1pm
Make sure you give your guests enough time to be late. There are elements wherever you are getting married which inevitably means guests will be late. On the other side of this spectrum however is the likelihood of your guests being early – there’s really no in between so ensure you/the venue will be ready for them at least an hour before the ceremony.
Ceremony – 2pm
Different styles of ceremony take different lengths of time. You must consider if you have any readings, your own vows or traditional vows, hand fasting etc.
Confetti/Drinks Reception – 2:30pm
The confetti line works really well from my experience if it’s done straight after the ceremony because you still have all your guests attention and it leads nicely into the drinks reception – almost like your guests earn a reward for participating.
Wedding Breakfast – 4pm
The type of meal service you choose will dictate the timings of your wedding breakfast. For example, a 3-course sit down meal will take around 2 hours. This is longer than a buffet-style or family style service would take.
Evening Guest Arrival – 7pm
They then have a solid 5 hours to party the night away with you.
Cake Cut/Champagne Tower – 7:30pm
It’s nice for your evening guests to have the privilege of seeing you cut your cake or pour your champagne tower as it’s traditionally a big part of your wedding day – who would want to miss that?
First Dance – 7:40pm
The first dance follows the cake cut in my eyes simply because you already have everyone’s attention. When this is played by a live band, it’s usually a good idea for them to go straight into their first set after your chosen song/s are played.
Evening Food – 9pm
From my experience of working with caterers, they often suggest a gap of 5 hours between the wedding breakfast and evening food to ensure both the people who have been in attendance the whole day are peckish again and those who joined you for the evening line their stomachs ahead of the party.
Carriages – Midnight
It is worth noting that different venues have different licenses and noise curfews and these often depend on the day in which you plan your wedding. More often than not, Friday and Saturday weddings have later licenses than Sunday-Thursday weddings. That being said, some venues can apply for a restricted amount of late licenses so be sure to ask those questions. If you’re getting married at home, just make sure a conversation has been had with your nearest neighbours to avoid any future noise complaints.
With special thanks to Emily Robinson Photography for the images.
