What makes a wedding fun or terrible?

[Friedseasalt]

We’ve still got a while until our wedding, but I’ve been thinking about what actually makes weddings fun for guests.

I know some people love them and others find them long or a bit boring, so I’m curious — what are your favourite things about weddings and what do you dislike the most?

Anything that really makes a wedding enjoyable (or the opposite)?

The worst wedding I ever went to started at 11am, we didn't get fed until past 6pm - they did the speeches BEFORE the meal - and allowed nowhere to go to eat elsewhere. Bride and groom took three hours having a photo shoot. All performative of course. Marriage deeply unhappy for years.

The best weddings for me as a guest have been about hosting properly. Seats, drinks, food. I don't want to have alcohol all day. I don't want to eat chilli at 1,000,000 on the scoville scale. The wedding where they didn't want a seating plan but we all got asked to get up and sit somewhere else was a highlight of bad planning: unplanned seating requires at least 30% extra capacity i.e. more seats than you need. That was the same wedding when the horrid teenager tried to short me, the big woman, on roast pig and said I couldn't have any more yet there was massive leftovers. I had half the portion of my pretty thin cousin!

Nowhere to sit and talk because there is a too loud disco is also a big minus for me.

The worst wedding I ever went to started at 11am, we didn't get fed until past 6pm - they did the speeches BEFORE the meal - and allowed nowhere to go to eat elsewhere. Bride and groom took three hours having a photo shoot.

That's pretty much every wedding where I live, they're excruciating. It's so inconsiderate to fail to host guests properly, and to inflict a 12+ hour day on them.

Don't hold the wedding or reception in the middle of bloody nowhere so that getting there/back is an expensive and logistical nightmare for your guests. The best weddings are always the simplest with short formalities, plenty of food and booze and a relaxed vibe. Not a great big country house extravaganza with napkins made into swans. Nobody really enjoys that.

Have a convenient venue.

Went to a wedding in the middle of nowhere recently, bugger to get hotels and taxis. Lots of people didn’t have cars so I was (happily) ferrying people when I could but it was a massive palaver for something that could have been in a church hall or similar.

I’m going to a wedding in the bloody Philippines this year and I’m looking forward to it, but if I get married I’m having it in town. Plenty of hotels for the few that will need it, no one needs to book a day off and everyone can get the bus home.

The best wedding I went to hired a wood fired fish and chip van that you could go and order from whenever you wanted as well as a buffet which included pizzas for food. They also had a bouncy castle.

Plenty to eat and drink at all times - not just alcohol - it shouldn't be difficult for someone who doesn't want to get plastered to access nice alternatives (as in not just ultra-sweet kiddy-drinks as the only alternative to booze). More important for food to be plentiful than posh - if I have to wait for a couple of hours before my meal sipping champagne I need carbs more than I need 2 mouthfuls of exquisitely delecate canape creations or I am going to start feeling ill.

Speaking of which - keep the photographer under control. The worst weddings I have been at, the photography session was longer than the wedding ceremony. The photographer wants to offer plenty of shots both to justify the enormous fees and also to maximise the chances of getting additional money by having every possible shot available. Photo shoots are incredibly tedious, keep them short and simple and for God's sake don't plan for the bride and groom to go off with the photographer for a little threesome orgy of photo-taking while your guests stand around getting bored.

Curate your guest list as a community - people will enjoy themselves if they are with nice people, even if they are people they have only just met. Make sure there's no-one there who only knows you and DH and knows no-one else - anyone who would be in that situation should be allowed a +1. It can be nice to give them "something to do" that might turn into a way of getting to know each other better - one wedding I went to, there was a sort of "quiz" about the bride and groom where the questions were colour-coded according to which "era" of their lives the questions related to - and there were sheets of star-stickers in different colours and you were invited to take a star of a matching colour if you knew about that era of their lives and could be persuaded to give clues.

Make sure the people giving the speeches are witty and don't get too drunk and lose the ability to form coherent sentences before they have to speak.

Agree with PP that a Ceilidh is generally great fun!

Are you 12 😂?!

Food always food! I went to a wedding once that started at 12 they had a few canapés at the drinks recwlyin
lokw
maybe 3 each. And then didn’t feed us till 530. And then hardly fed us anything it was the most miserable day. And don’t do speeches before food its so rude when every one is starving.

I guess this is where ‘know your audience’ comes in as the ice breaker quiz and the ceilidh would be my idea of hell.

Oh God, that sounds hellish.

worst one I’ve been to was on an unusual day, middle of nowhere, tiny portions of food and the fathers of the bride harped on about him paying for the full wedding and how the bills kept coming in and how he couldn’t say no to his daughter, speeches went on for ages , marriage lasted about 6 years if that.

Apart from food and drink (and as a gluten free person, please note we will never get enough canapés to actually make a difference), I’ve done 3 weddings where I was responsible for elderly and ill relatives. None of the couples had thought about this, so we were carrying chairs around, getting blankets out of cars and having to work out the terrible lift in an otherwise beautiful venue where there were no toilets on the same level. So think about chairs where your photos are and doing all the photos with your walking impaired guests in one go so they can go inside to where they have seats.
Also, if your photographer is doing candid shots later, they will take lots of your young friends and family having fun, missing out granny and great aunts etc who you may see together for the last time

Don’t leave your guests standing around. If there is a point when the formal pictures are being taken, make sure your guests can sit down if they need to, and give them something to eat and drink while they wait.

Reading this makes me really appreciate our fat American weddings. 90% of the weddings I have attended, you eat from the minute you walk in - and its real food - not nuts and crisps. Typically you walk in to cocktail hour - an open bar, some kind of buffet of cheese, crackers, crudite', and passed canapes (crab cakes, mini quiches, Sausage rolls, shrimp, etc.) The wedding party usually gets photos done within that cocktail hour and joins the party, then we are seated for dinner, and toasts take place during or immediately after dinner. Then as dinner wraps up the wedding party starts the dancing, and then its drinks and dancing for the rest of the night. Its 50/50 whether they make a big deal out of cutting the cake but many times your cake is delivered to your seat as you dance and they also start serving coffee and tea. Its becoming more popular to offer food trucks or very casual food as the evening ends - pizza, ice cream buffet, sometimes a breakfast buffet for a very late night. Again, this is 90% of the weddings, so of course there are outliers. Worst wedding I went to it was 95 degrees, outdoor wedding and reception, very little shade and the meal was very spicy Indian food (honoring the couples "meet cute" while in the Peace Corps in India). But the bulk of the guests were older people who couldnt eat anything but the naan bread. Our inlaws were with us and after 3 hours of sweating and rationing Naam bread we left and went to McDonalds.

We’ve been to several American weddings and I think they’re so much better than British ones.

Classier, later starts so better timings and dress codes (every one has been black tie), excellent food, open bars, live bands, minimal speeches (but equality between bride and groom parties) and boring stuff.

I'd usually say the bride and groom should choose what makes them happy (as long as they accept that some people may choose not to come if it's an awkward location etc). But since you're asking about what guests want I'll add to the chorus of 'Food'. In my view food should be plentiful, filling, served frequently and ideally with a variety of choices. Even if you opt for a formal meal I think a running buffet in the evening is a necessity. It doesn't need to be expensive- one of the best wedding receptions I've been to was in a village hall with a seemingly endless buffet from the moment we arrived until the very end of the night. If you want to have something like a hog roast, make sure there is plenty for everyone and other substantial options (speaking from experience having been a vegetarian guest at a full day wedding in the middle of nowhere where the only food available from 1pm to the end of the night was a hog roast and a few crisps and nuts).
A later start is always a winner for me- especially if guests are travelling. And if guests are going to be waiting around whilst the bride and groom have photos it's best to provide them with somewhere comfortable to sit and something to eat. I've been to a few hotel weddings where guests were left hanging around in a foyer or a very small bar area for ages. On that note, if it is going to be a long day with different elements and some waiting, provide guests with an idea of the timings for the day (in the invitation, or displayed somewhere). That way anyone who needs a break can decide a sensible time to nip out and people won't be getting frustrated wondering how long they have to wait/when they can eat/drink.

Another vote for American weddings - I’ve only been to one but it was terrific in every way. Loved the cocktail hour and canapes.

What makes a wedding fun is genuine love and affection in the happy couple, and warm and welcoming fellow guests. A nice wedding breakfast that everyone can eat, and some funny speeches. Funny uncles etc all together are good.

What makes weddings terrible are awkward evening parties and restrictions on food/drink and any form of fisticuffs.

Once went to a wedding that had 3 separate venues!!! Church service, wedding breakfast at a very fancy country hotel then the evening do at another hotel. All I wanted was a sit down and some food!! 😂 Ended up traveling about 50 miles between the different venues 😬

Singing waiters are just vile. They relentlessly picked on me so much so I ran out crying.
I was really enjoying myself till they started.

Oh no that's awful! 😣Definitely won't be having them.

100% food, we made sure we had loads at our wedding because we have been to so many where we have been starving! It was a long day for some of our guests so we wanted to ensure they were as comfortable as possible. We had cocktails/beer on arrival with canapes, a wonderful wedding breakfast - this was the highlight of the day. Loads of amazing meats and salads which everyone loved. We had lots of dietary requirements so this set up catered for everyone really well. In the evening we had street food and we also did a sweet table but included stuff like popcorn and pretzels which was very popular with the kids and adults. We also made sure there was plenty to keep the kids amused. Fun packs on the tables for each of them. Games in the gardens for them to play with etc. A photo booth.

This sounds lovely!

I agree on the food: I usually bring snacks just in case 😂

Well according to a thread yesterday not having alcohol at a wedding makes it a very enjoyable celebration, but personally I would take that with a huge pinch of salt 🧂 Everyone wants to be well looked after with plenty of food and drinks.

I agree on the food: I usually bring snacks just in case 😂

Yes, I no longer go to weddings without a box of emergency rations in the boot of the car

I was in my 20s at the time but I'm 58 now and still love a go on a bouncy castle.