8 Tips for the Perfect Festival-Themed Wedding‘There aint no party like a festival party!’ The great and fresh outdoors, music and food, family and friends – it all adds up to one hell of a good time. Many brides avoid themed wedding because they believe they’re tacky. But, when it comes to a festival-themed wedding, that couldn’t be further from the truth. A festival wedding can be both elegant and fun, making it a meaningful and emotional day for the couple getting married and an event to remember for all the guests. So, how do you plan a festival-themed wedding?
Get Your Venue
Doing a festival-themed wedding means you’ll need to start with a blank canvas. Unlike many other types of weddings, you get to create every aspect of the wedding yourself. So, you need to look for a large open and flat space that’s suitable for laying out chairs and erecting marquees or tipi’s. It’s usually fairly easy to find that sort of venue, but it could be much less stressful for you to hire a venue that’s used to accommodating outdoor weddings. There may be venues who are already in touch with marquee companies and can even provide things like, portable toilets.
Prepare Your Guests
Although everyone loves a festival wedding, if your guests don’t know about it far enough in advance, it could be difficult for them to prepare. An outdoor wedding often requires guests to prepare differently to a traditional wedding. For example, it’s wise for your guests to turn up in sensible footwear. The last thing you want to see is your Aunt’s heels getting stuck in the grass and mud as she falls over. It can also get colder during the night, so guests may want to bring wraps or blankets with them for when the sun goes down. You can let your guests know about your wedding theme by sending details out via save the date cards.
Finding the Perfect Dress
Your wedding dress has to match your wedding theme. You don’t want to turn up and look out of place at your own wedding. Thankfully, there are lots of different dress styles that would fit in with a festival theme. For instance, a long lace, vintage dress, a short teacup dress or even a 70’s themed wedding dress with layers and a boho vibe. Pair it with a floral crown, statement necklace and bridal flip flops to complete the look. This look ensures you stand out as the bride but you’re still comfortable enough to enjoy your day.
Write it All Down
The downside to planning an outdoor wedding is that you often have to deal with a lot of different vendors. When you plan a wedding indoors, the venue often takes care of most of the details. To plan a festival wedding, you’ll need to have a list of all of your vendors and contact details for each of them. It isn’t unheard of for something to go wrong in the planning of a wedding. In fact, it almost always does. Getting wedding insurance with wedinsure will mean you’re covered if a vendor were to let you down last minute, or even if more than 50% of your guests are unable to show up on your chosen date.
Feeding Your Guests
A wedding can be a long day, and most guests will expect to be fed when attending one. However, serving a three-course meal during a festival-themed wedding isn’t going to be easy. To fit in with your theme, why not consider using food stalls instead? Think about the best Summer festivals you’ve been to and what was on offer there. Burgers, hot dogs, chips, alcoholic and non-alcoholic drink options. You could even go for a hog roast to feed everyone, along with a salad and pasta option for vegetarians.
Decorating
Decorating your venue can be so much fun when you have an outdoor wedding. You have the opportunity to create something truly spectacular. Light up your marquee with fairy lights, light up letters and floating LED lanterns. Add big bunches of wild flowers to the entrance and add colour by decorating your chairs with a selection of different boho chic materials. For something truly unique, why not create your own dream catchers and hang them throughout your tent?
Preparing for the Worst
No matter what season you choose to have your wedding in, the weather is always going to be unpredictable. If it does happen to rain (or worse) on your wedding day, you need to have some contingency plans in place. It could be anything from providing guests will umbrellas to moving the wedding ceremony inside. You may even want to advise your guests to wear wellies on the big day. As long as you’re prepared for any eventuality, you’ll have nothing to worry about when the morning of your wedding arrives.
Bring on the Entertainment
The whole point of a festival wedding is to have a good time. It’s all about the party and celebrating with your nearest and dearest. So, when it comes to planning the entertainment, there should be no holds barred. Perhaps you’ll want to re-create a Summer festival and get some live music up on a stage. Maybe you’ll have a magician walking around and entertaining your guests. What about a caricature artist to draw people’s pictures? You could even consider fairground games and rides for the kids (and adults). Your options are endless, so it really depends on your budget.
If you’re on a low budget, you could create your own games. For example, getting the bridesmaids and groomsmen to do a tug of war. Or playing hit the target with hacky sacks and the winner gets a bottle of champagne. The point is to create an atmosphere that people can relax in, including the bride and groom.
Themed weddings don’t have to be tacky. In fact, a festival-themed wedding is as close as you’ll get to the perfect day for everyone involved. So, roll your sleeves up and get stuck in because it will be worth it in the end.
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