Unique Designs & Swoon-worthy Sets for Your Big Day
Decorating for your Big Day has really taken off over the last recent years and couples are going BIG on design and wanting to create unique focal points for their wedding day. Everything from vast, detailed back drops to guest lounging areas for everyone to relax in while celebrating!
Here are a few popular trends that couples are incorporating into their decoration plans and themes!
Sweet Heart Tables
One of my most FAVORITE wedding design trends I’m seeing more and more of are incorporating the use of Sweet Heart Tables. Are you wondering, “What the hell is a sweetheart table, Mindy?”. Believe me when I say that nearly every time I mention a Sweetheart Table to someone, client or other, I usually get a look from them as if I have 3 heads! Blink a few times and snap out of it! I’m about to explain what they are and why you are going to want one at YOUR wedding celebration.
Sweetheart tables are a romantic, private dinner table set just for the two of you! To enjoy those special moments as you eat your first meal as husband and wife together. Set aside from the rest of your wedding party and guests, a sweetheart table allows you have that privacy while still being the center of attention.
They also create a beautiful focal point and set the tone of your overall theme or design. Sweetheart tables can be simple in design with a less is more type of appeal or you can use it as an opportunity to go over the top with creative décor, design and personalized details that will showcase you both throughout the celebration.
My favorite aspect of having a Sweetheart table is how romantic and dreamy it can be! If I could go back in time, I would absolutely have a Sweetheart table and yes, I would be that bride to go really over the top and make it my main focal point, lavish with candles, flowers yet cozy and lush as if we were being treated as royalty!
Family Style Seating
Another great trend I am seeing becoming more popular is having Family Style seating instead of the common round, banquet style tables and the fabulous task of creating seating charts for each and every table. Every bride LOVES that job! NOT!
Family Style is great to get all your guests together. Food brings people together and what better way to host your guests than to create a relaxing, comfortable dining experience for your wedding celebration.
Doing family style seating doesn’t mean that you need to skimp on the decorations in order to make ‘room’ for everyone either! If anything, here is your chance to decorate your long tables with stunning floral arrangements or garlands, tall candlesticks and unique, personalized details to generate conversation between your guests. Make it as bold or as minimal as you can possibly dream of!
Another exciting reason to go Family Style for your wedding celebration is that it allows you to serve your meal Family Style as well! You are able to have a more varied menu and have large platters of entrée’s, more options for sides and a wide range of appetizers and desserts for each table to share. Mixing and matching, being able to serve themselves and interact with guests is a fun and memorable experience for everyone that will be remembered for years to come!
I have coordinated many weddings where the dinner was either buffet style or plated and both have their pro’s and con’s, for sure! I feel those serving options do work best when you are hosting a couple hundred guests. It is easier and more efficient for the serving and catering staff to move that much food in little time. However, for a more intimate wedding celebration, I feel the family style is a wonderful way to welcome your guests in a relaxing atmosphere.
Elaborate Ceremony Backdrops and Structures
Many couples are choosing to get married outside of the church, whether it be on a beach, in the middle of the woods, in an art museum, you name it! Often, having to create an area specifically to be wed as typically in a church, we all know where the couple stands and gets married—up at the front! Right?
Take away the church and you have wide open space! How are you going to create that focal point so your guests know which way is the ‘front’, where their eyes will be focused and where the heck this wedding is happening?
Having a breathtaking backdrop to get married in front of is one way to create your own wedding ceremony space! Again, these can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish! I could seriously go on for days about the gazillion options available depending on your style, location, size wedding, time of year, etc. That’s how extremely popular this trend is becoming—everyone wants one! Big wedding or Small!
We have all seen the gorgeous arches and arbors, adorned with flowy drapes and fabric, with greenery and florals to create a dreamy background for your ceremony photos. Flower arches are also becoming quite popular as well and depending on your budget, this could be a beautiful background to be used at both the ceremony and possibly at your reception!
There are so many ideas out there, you just need to do some searching to decide which elements you like and want to incorporate into your design. I’ve seen everything from using old vintage doors as a backdrop to having a chandelier hanging under an arch to having a large draped fabric, with a poem or the lyrics to your favorite song done with calligraphy displayed behind the lovely couple!
Head Table Designs and Backdrops
One way to make a statement as your guests venture into your reception is to Wow them with a stunning head table backdrop! I’m talking balloons, candles, signage, marquee letters, garland, flowers, drapery, lights—don’t forget lights!! Light the place up!! After all, this is your wedding celebration--when will you EVER be able to do something like this?? I’m hoping never again! Haha!
These are becoming more and more popular with couples and the designs are so unique and personalized to each celebration. Also, more couples are choosing to focus their décor here and pulling out all the stops to make it a grand, visual masterpiece to allow a more simplistic look on the guest tables and the rest of the décor throughout.
Having a back drop at your head table will also help pull in your theme and tie in your décor. These can be done anywhere, indoor or outdoor and are especially great to have if you are needing to cover up a not so pretty wall or if you need to ‘create’ a wall that doesn’t exist. I don’t know about you, but I have seen too many photos of the bride and groom at their head table, dining and laughing with their wedding party but my eyes immediately turn to the eyesore in the background and I think to myself, “Really? No one thought to cover that up, hey?”.
Don’t do that to yourselves!! Besides that, your photographer can only photoshop SO much! The options are seriously ENDLESS to create a customized backdrop and can be done with any budget!
Psst: The backdrop in the photo is one of my designs from last year, a custom designed Head Table backdrop for a lovely couple's wedding celebration at The Swan Barn Door in Wisconsin Dells, WI.
Thinking about coming up with something cool and unique for your Wedding Celebration? Consider this as well, if you are undecided on how to decorate your tables or you would prefer to dress-down your guest tables or if your budget doesn't allow for something fancy on every single table, having one main focal point to your decor scheme would allow you to scale back in other areas of your celebration yet still display your overall theme.
Share with me your thoughts and ideas behind this trend!!