To not have a clue how the timings of a wedding day work? Help!

[leavetheteabagin]

I haven’t been to a wedding since I was about 4 and I have no clue what the timings should be.

We are getting married in a church and then planning on going on to a restaurant for the reception - they are a 20 minute drive apart. Is that too long? I literally have no clue!

If we wanted the ceremony to be in the afternoon at 2ish, when should the reception be booked to start? We are planning on having the same guests there all day but if we do end up having some evening guests, what time do they normally arrive?

I would love for you to share your wedding day timetable with me! Thank you so much for helping a very clueless bride I truly appreciate it!

@VinylDetective

You definitely need to provide drinks, I agree!!

We had almost those exact timings laiste

Ours was almost the polar opposite to this, so probably not much help to the OP.

Apart from the start of the ceremony which was at 2, we didn't really have a fixed schedule. Guests followed us on foot from the church to the house. Nobody had to wait for food as a buffet afternoon tea was waiting for them. A hot buffet and hog roast was available from 7.

It was all very relaxed and just happened. We had extra people turn up to the ceremony and we absorbed them into the reception without any trouble. Some guests didn't go home for a couple of days.

@leavetheteabagin

Also very tempted by the idea of shooting off early Me and DP are painfully awkward and would probably be having a smaller wedding if we didn’t have such large families! We are hoping for something relatively informal too *@therocinante* - so hopefully we feel a bit less tense!

This was our goal - we're not people who like a fuss being made of us at ALL haha! It worked really well and we both were much more chilled than if we'd had an entire day of it with big gaps in between.

My niece had a humanist wedding (Scotland) so a lot of her friends from London had no idea what to expect. She included a brief timetable with the invitation which was really useful, especially for people with small children who need to know when they're going to be fed!

We did..
2:30pm ceremony
3-5pm, photos, drinks, canapes and acoustic guitar lady singing
5pm, sit down and speeches, wine
5:30-7pm dinner
715pm evening guests
730, cake cutting and 1 hour band
830, cake and cheese board served, tea, coffee etc.
9 onwards band
Finished around 11. All on one site though.

would probably be having a smaller wedding if we didn’t have such large families

I wonder if you wouldn't be better just getting married in the next few months and taking advantage of the numbers restrictions so that you have the smaller wedding you'd actually prefer.

We had a Jewish wedding so the times will be slightly different, but roughly it was;

3pm guests arrive and have drinks/canapés
5pm service
6pm traditional dancing
6:30pm buffet dinner
Dancing until midnight, with snacks and free bar available

What we didn't want was people hanging about for hours while we posed for photos, so we had the photographer just milling around the whole time.

Hi, go with the 2pm start. I have been to so many morning start weddings it would be refreshing to have an afternoon wedding.

Guests can manage their own sugar levels before the wedding.

Have you asked your venue for suggested timings? I remember when I planned mine the wedding organiser at the venue helped work out the timings based on the church time. It's what they do so will know how it all works

What we didn't want was people hanging about for hours while we posed for photos, so we had the photographer just milling around the whole time.

That is what we did. Our 2 pm start was deliberate to allow guests the chance to feed themselves before the ceremony.

Is this completely wrong? I’m sensing that it’s completely wrong!!!

No- I think that makes perfect sense. We got married at 3pm (church). That was 40 mins and then the coaches rolled out to the reception at 4pm (took that long to get everyone out and on board). We had our photos reportage style (all the rage in 2007) so the photographer just clicked away- it's slightly risky but he was great and got all the key people/ groups. However, it does save time and stop you being absent from the reception for a chunk of time. We did 75 mins drinks and chunky canapés (got married November 5th so bonfire theme with mini hotdogs/ burgers etc) and then 2.5 hour dinner with speeches and then dancing / drinks till midnight. No evening guests so didn't matter too much if dinner slippedl.

It was great but felt a little rushed- if I was doing it again I'd start at 2pm.

We did wedding 3.30,photos til 5, 10 min drive to reception,6.15 meal then disco onwards

Just as a suggestion:

We had a small wedding and carted people around from civil to religious ceremony to reception on a double decker bus. It was fun! Guests really enjoyed it, we took pictures with it and all. Taxis/cars for more than 10/15 people is a LOT of cars! Tricky to organise and expensive (suppose it depends where you are, we were in central London)

I've never known people be so anti-wedding as on Mumsnet. It's like it's a terrible intrusion to be invited to a wedding and be expected to not have cups of tea or snacks served at the exact same time as they would at home. I've been delighted to be at every wedding I've attended and just rolled with however the day pans out. I'm a type 1 diabetic so I take responsibility for that myself. I would never expect the bride and groom to plan their whole day, cut short photos and rush through things so I could have a sausage roll and egg sandwich and a cup of tea by 1pm or I'll keel over and die. Honestly, OP, your guests should all be delighted to be there and will enjoy celebrating your day with you. Don't stress too much about pleasing everyone because you'll never do it, so just please yourself.
The comment about evening invitations being second rate and only issued to get a gift are really wrong. We couldn't physically have more than 100 in our venue for the ceremony and meal. My husband has an absolutely enormous family who we were pleased to invite but it meant that other people we were not so close to couldn't come all day and we certainly made it clear no gifts were needed. There's nothing second rate or offensive about it, i don't know why being invited to a wedding causes so much anger in people on here. Especially as in the next breath they're all telling women they absolutely have to be married before they have children, unless they are richer than their partners, in which case he can fuck off.
I'm sure your day will be lovely and perfect for you, OP

I wish more people included an approximate timetable or at least the time of the wedding breakfast. Don't forget your guests will be arriving probably 30 minutes before the ceremony starts.
We went to one wedding 12:30 ceremony and they didn't tell anyone that the wedding breakfast wasn't until 17:30! Lots of very drunk hungry guests. If they had said then people could have sorted themselves out.
Ruined the evening for many.

@leavetheteabagin I think our guests were fine but they'd say they had a good time to me regardless! As a guest, I've been to many with the same sort of timings and enjoyed them. One that stands out as not enjoyable had a really long break, one drink, no food until 7pm after a 12:30 ceremony. The ones with drinks and something to eat have all been great.

Re cars, I have also been to lots in the middle of nowhere, we normally drive and get a taxi back the hotel and collect the car the following day. People will sort themselves out how it best suits them.

I always love being invited to weddings though, and am someone who enjoys them, unlike a lot of mumsnet posters!

We’re having:
Church at 1pm
Cake, drinks, speeches in the parish centre next to the church. People are bringing cake to share so it’s not just wedding cake
4pm reception, photos, street food from 6pm.

We worked backwards with timings. So the evening party started at 7.30, so wanted the meal to finish by 6.30. So the hotel wanted people to start sitting by 4 (speeches were pre meal). So we needed to arrive at reception venue around 3ish for drinks, canapes, photos. So needed finish at church by 2.30. Needed half an hour for church photos. So ceremony needed to be at 1pm at the latest.
So we booked for 12.30.

All timings went smoothly... And unlike the several other weddings we went around a similar time, the evening guests arrived after the meal was finished.

Our timings were very similar to others above. 2pm ceremony, 3.30 - 5 for drinks and canapés, meal at 5pm, cake & first dance 7.15 and evening food from 9.30. Our reception was 10 minutes walk from church.

Photos took about 20 minutes outside church afterwards. We did family group shots during drinks and canapés at reception venue. The photos of just DH and me were done at the end of the wedding breakfast while everyone was having their coffee and were another 15 minutes or so. Our photographer was great and sized up very early on that we didn’t want long photo shoots but more casual. He also said grooms are happier posing for photos once they’ve had a drink after the ceremony!

Exactly as Cric - 2.30 church service works well, gives guests time to get lunch beforehand 2.00 is a bit early. Main reception meal at about 5 suits most people. We had buffet in the evening at about 9.00. Congratulations!

I'd start the plan by thinking through how much time you need/want to get ready in the morning. If you're planning on having someone come to assist you with make up / hair etc, and a large wedding party, there's a lot to do during the morning.

Where are you staying / what's your travel time to the church?

2pm is doable but awkward - your guests will be arriving at the church from about 1.15pm.

You need to plan time for some sort of substantial breakfast/brunch/lunch for you and any bridesmaids / your mum / anyone else with you, probably before you all get fully dressed.

A gap between the service and the reception isn't a bad plan - it allows people to eg. check into their hotels, dump bags etc.

For a 2pm wedding, ending at about 3pm, with the reception 20 mins away, I'd probably start the reception at about 3.50pm to allow for hanging about and talking time at the church / photographs [with a plan for an earlier start in case of rain]

I'd serve reasonably canapes and drinks [if it were my party I'd be serving tea/coffee in addition to champagne / orange juice, but that's just me] to keep everybody tiding over till dinner time.

Then dinner at about 5.30pm followed by speeches (if I were having speeches) [speeches before dinner = mean when everyone's hungry]

That should be over by about 7.30-8pm ish.

I like weddings where there's extra food late in the evening - hog roasts / cheese etc.

If you're not careful the whole day can become very long and tiring. Time for you and your fiance together by yourselves during the day might be limited if you don't plan this. You might want some time out during the day to recharge a bit.

It's worth planning where you're going to be staying that night ie. at your reception venue / elsewhere and maybe to plan on you and your new spouse having an official "going away" time / photography time, even if you don't leave then. [you're putting on a party for your friends and might well want to stay till the end, if you're awake enough for it on the day]

[Consider a change of shoes if you're going to be wearing uncomfortable heels with your wedding outfit]

It's definitely worth having an official "end" time advertised to your guests.

Go later - 4pm or later ceremony, quick snaps then food etc. Weekends are precious when people are working, and spending all day trapped indoors at a wedding drove me nuts if it was a decent day. Socialising indoors is for evenings.

If you want a smaller do, have it - you dont owe anyone a wedding.

We did 2pm but were able to walk from the church to my parents garden where we had the reception.

One thing we did was instead of having starters, we had really substantial hors d'oeuvres which were taken around on trays so people had food as soon as possible.

When there is a big wait for food, people either get hangry or too drunk.

We had a meal around 3:30 and asked each guest to bring a piece of cheese with them from where they lived. Then we put out a ton of bread, fruit and chocolate cake and had a free-access cheese feast for the whole evening

Feed people at a typical meal time.

Don't believe planners who suggest odd meal times are ok on your special day, or settle for a venue that seeks to impose it

Most people do not eat dinner at say 4pm, and I think it would be much better to have a later start to the ceremony (so it's pretty obvious people need lunch first) and then main meal no earlier than 5:30.

We had mass at 2, dinner at 5.30.
Church and venue a 15 minute drive apart.
We knew the priest so knew the ceremony would be well over and everyone would have left the church grounds by 3.15.
Had drinks and nibbles available on arrival at venue at 3.30, sitting down to eat at 5.30.
Snack food put out at 10.30 also.
This worked well, I'm Irish so people are used to day long weddings just usually with an earlier Mass and a later meal.
We knew we would have people travelling on the morning of the wedding and didn't want them to have to get up at the crack of dawn so pushed the ceremony later.
I actually think it works well with lunch before ceremony and then dinner a fairly normal amount of time later.
On a working day I eat lunch at 1,dinner about 7 and would imagine that's pretty common.

I went to a lovely wedding, in a gorgeous venue for civil service, they had the double decker taking us from there to a fabulous venue with gardens for the reception. There was so much that was fantastic about it, but the service being at 12, and being part of the family party so needing to arrive at the couple’s house an hour beforehand, and needing to cross london on a bus to get there meant we didn’t get any lunch. This was a real problem for older family members.

Just mentioning as it’s important to think about it from general guests point of view but also the wedding party, who might need to set off considerably earlier and not able to just eat sandwiches in car.