What happens between the wedding ceremony and the dinner? Suddenly gripped by the fear that my wedding will be boring and people won’t know what to do with themselves!

[ComtesseDeSpair]

I’m trying to think back to other weddings I’ve been to and drawing blanks. (Except for my friend who got her family’s racehorses out for us all to meet, but I don’t have any racehorses.) Does somebody give a speech? Am I meant to give a speech? Oh god. Do we go for a walk en masse around the venue grounds? We could, it’s a nice venue. Ceremony is at 13:30 and then dinner is at 17:00, as our coordinator suggested. There will be a bit of photography but we’re a fairly small group and so I can’t imagine it will go on for very long, we’ve arranged for cocktails and cakes during that bit, but how long are we supposed to drag it out for? I don’t recall ever being a bored guest at a wedding before but I also can’t remember what we all did! Any ideas so my guests don’t look bemused and ask what’s happening next?

If instagram / tik tok is your thing The unfiltered bride has good advice on timings and entertainment etc etc. Or the wedding planner on instagram (Georgina Rose Events). Very experienced wedding planner / coordinator.

The gap only feels long if you don't know many people to catch up with. Most weddings I can remember have about 1.5-2h gap for canapes and mingling. If I know lots of people that time flies by. My cousin's wedding where I only knew my immediate family felt like it dragged on forever. If the majority of your guests know and like each other, then 2h should be perfect.

Oh and one of the best weddings I've ever been to had lawn games and a magician so I vote for those.

Personally I wouldn’t serve cakes with alcohol, I’d serve substantial canapés. It’s fine to have a couple of hours between ceremony and wedding breakfast as long as there are plenty of drinks and canapés, somewhere nice to be, mingle, sit whatever, and some entertainment e.g. jazz quartet or steel band or something, lawn games if outdoors and summer. It’s horrible waiting about at weddings where they only offer one drink and there isn’t a nice space designated for that part of the wedding, so it is just waiting rather than part of the day. Done well it’s a nice part of the day because guests get the opportunity to have a good catch up with people they might not have seen for a while.

Thanks all, some good advice. Will run potential updated timings past DP and then moving dinner forward won’t be much of an issue. Nobody attending is backwards about being forwards and we have a free bar all weekend so everyone can help themselves to whatever they want without asking in that respect, so anyone who wants soft drinks will be able to.

Lawn games probably more feasible than a magician: the venue logistics mean they’d have to stay all weekend and doubtful we’d find one up for that!

We had canapés and pimms and people spent the time finding their rooms and checking in, catching up with family they hadn't seen for a while and taking photos. In reality it went by super quick.

I find the gap awkward only if I don't know what's happening. Like the ceremony ends and then couple fucks off to take photos and I have no clue when the next thing is. In 30min? In 3h?

So letting people know that they should be back for dinner at 4.30 (or if you wanna have an icebreaker, speeches etc. Before dinner then earlier) and in the mean time there will be snacks, drinks and games. It will let people know not to rush from the ceremony and they are free to do what they want for a bit

She wants you to pay for more drinks.

The gap is far too long. Ceremony at 1.30, finish at 2pm (at the latest if civil ceremony), that’s 3 hours. It doesn’t take 30 minutes to seat 40 guests as others have suggested.

You need to start with drinks before the photos, you can’t have people just stood around for an hour whilst you have photos. They will be wasted after 3 hours of drinking.

Bring the meal forward to 4pm and provide a light snack later in the evening if you want to.

The only issue I’ve ever had at weddings is where there is not enough food and drink between ceremony starting and dinner.

including one dreadful affair where the B&G went for a wedding package of one welcome drink and rationed canapés. They fucked off for photo’s for at least an hour leaving the rest of us in 28°c heat, no shade and a venue that refused to serve us drinks until they returned.

awful.

I went to one wedding where most of the guests were staying at the venue and the itinerary included a couple of hours in the afternoon for everyone to go and have a lie down and it was brilliant.

My DS had canapés, an ice cream van, Buck’s Fizz and lawn games,also lots of seating areas which helped. Photo sessions can be a bit long and boring if you are not involved in them.

I think that gap is way too long. We had 3hrs from start at 12 to meal at 3, and that included a church wedding (which take longer), a few photos at the church, a 10-15min drive to reception, and more photos.

With only 40 guests it is going to be easy to get any group photos done, so unless you want millions of just the 2 of you I think it is a massive gap.

Tbh, we were bored rigid at a friend's wedding with a similar gap. They fucked off to the nearby beach with the photographer and the immediate family for a photo shoot and the rest of us were abandoned at a very expensive bar (£7.50 a drink) with no one having any clue where they were it how long they would be gone.

At another friends wedding, the bloody bar was closed on arrival straight after the ceremony and we were huddled up, freezing cold around a radiator (at the evening venue), praying for the bar to open.

I think leaving guests to entertain themselves for 3+hrs is a bit shit tbh.

At ours, we had a lunchtime ceremony with champagne and snacks like blinis for an hour, then all the guests invited in for big group photos before narrowing it down to family and the couple, so people could drift off to the bar. We then had a coach booked to take us all to the evening venue and dinner was served 30mins after arrival there plus bacon butties and pasties were brought out at 10pm.

I was desperate not to become one of the boring weddings people would remember for the wrong reasons and tried to keep it all fairly low key and snappy.

We had a cream tea during the afternoon with sherry. (Just scones etc and lots of tea.) It saved people getting hammered too early. Worth considering?

As a guest I find this middle few hours excruciating.

Oh God, me too. Just give me somewhere comfortable to sit down and a succession of cups of tea, and I'll be fine. All that relentless chit-chat with distant relatives-of-friends-of-relatives does my head in.

I hate those gaps, so dreary and boring.

For some years now, we attend ceremony only.

Dress up, mingle, see important part, maybe one glass of champagne, chat a bit, then leave. Job done and doesn't suck up our entire weekend with the predictable dinner and overly loud DJ.

I have been to two weddings with a huge gap between the ceremony and food, one was thought through, endless canapés a (free) ice cream van, lawn games, a band, and arts section for the children.
The other was literally waiting for over 2 hrs worth of photos with not a lot else to do. People either got bored or very drunk

This is the worst part of any wedding IMO. People get bored and hungry, especially if there's not enough canapés or similar.

There needs to be enough seating so that people arnt stood around for hours and ideally the bar will be open at this point rather than just one or two drinks being served

Free ice cream van sounds lovely.

With only 40 guests it is going to be easy to get any group photos done, so unless you want millions of just the 2 of you I think it is a massive gap

I agree. It's a big gap for a regular wedding, but if there are only 40 of you and you're all staying at the venue it's far far too long. In these circumstances I don't think you need more than an hour between the ceremony and food, so you're right to think about changing the timings.

Yeah I agree,looking back the best weddings I've been to had a very short gap between ceremony and food.

Lawn games
Magician
Casino
Cartoonist

Hmm, I’ve just looked at a photo I had saved on my phone which had our timings on it, and whereas I was breezily saying ‘oh yes that’s fine ours was similar’ I’d actually remembered completely wrong.

Our ceremony was at 2, and we sat down at 4 and did speeches first (I was militant about these not taking long and they came in under half an hour) then dinner served straight after.

So canapés and drinks, plus a few photos in between, then more drinks on table for speeches and obviously the marvellous entertainment value of listening to said speeches (ahem).

So yeah, maybe it is a bit long.

But I think people saying how terrible it is are basing it on particular bad experiences - I’ve definitely been at weddings where the gap has been a bit long, it was all a bit awkward, I was hungry and it felt like the guests were an afterthought in the couples big photoshoot.

I’ve also been to ones where the gap was probably similar but I was with my nearest and dearest, there was food and drink provided/ a well staffed bar nearby, the surroundings were pleasant and I was perfectly happy to chat and wait. We went to a good friend’s wedding recently and I can’t actually remember what the gap between ceremony and dinner was - quite long I think but then it was all in one (fabulous) venue, I was really happy to be catching up with other friends and the bride’s family, there was plenty of drink flowing and some pretty substantial canapés to keep us going and it was great and I could have sat where we were for another hour quite happily.

I think as long as you’re thinking about your guests, how they will gel as a group, whether they will have enough to eat and drink, if there’s somewhere comfy for them to sit etc it will probably be fine - you’ve said most know each other well and are likely to enjoy the time catching up. But if you’re still worried bring it forward an hour.

I was at a wedding recently and for the gap, they had cocktail sausages, chicken goujons and scones/cookies with tea/coffee. I was delighted!

People chatted, ate and drank.

I think the gap is very long.

Weddings I've been to have had two hours max from start of ceremony to serving the first course of dinner.

You need to serve something more substantial than cake during the afternoon.

Went to a really bad wedding a few years back with a similar timing (12pm ceremony, 5.30pm sit down meal), but this is what made it bad:

1. Church ceremony which was at lunch time so most people had only eaten breakfast
2. How to then travel to the reception, one welcome drink provided (prosecco or orange) and then an expensive paid bar after that
3. Canapés came around about 3pm, by which people were starving. That was probably enough for 3 tiny canopies each.
4. B&G disappeared for hours for 'family photos', no entertainment. Beautiful grounds though and the sun was out.
5. When we all finally sat down for food (by which everyone was grumpy, bored and hungry), they decided to do speeches before which noone could hear or care enough about to listen.

Very self indulgent and boring wedding. Not saying yours will be like this OP, but the above are probably things to avoid if you're going to have a big gap.