17 Feb · HaFl · No Comments
The question’s been popped. You’ve narrowed down your wedding venue options. Your theme is finally starting to come together.Planning a wedding is a medley of spinning plates, but when everything starts turning smoothly, the stress gives way to satisfaction. Yet there’s one element of wedding planning that tends to be more unwieldy challenging than the rest: the guest list.
Simply getting a first draft of your guest list on paper can be exhausting. Where do you start? Who makes the cut? Can you afford to host everyone you want? This is the most diplomatic aspect of your wedding, and it can cause friction. However, we’ve got a few tips to help you write your guest list in as smooth a manner as possible.
Wedding Venue: Consider Capacity
Firstly, you need to consider how many people the wedding venue of your dreams can actually host. This can be a limitation and a liberation. If you find yourself falling in love with a small wedding venue, you’ll probably have to trim some of the old school friends you’ve lost touch with – or maybe those obligatory third cousins. Working with a limited capacity can help you focus your guest list and narrow it down to the core group that you really want with you on your special day.
Tip: ask the coordinator at your wedding venue about their maximum capacity, and see if they have any pictures available of different scale ceremonies. This can give you a good measure of how a guest list of your size will practically fit in the space.
Start Big, Finish Small
The next thing you should do, is write down everyone you immediately want at your wedding. Do this without thinking about what you can actually pull off. Ignore money and wedding venue limitations. Once you have your guest wish-list; run the numbers. How much will that figure cost you? Can you afford that? This will help you visualise the actual cost. Check this against your budget and work down towards your ideal figure by striking names from the list.
Tip: if you’re footing the entirety of the bill, cutting down the wish-list can be pretty painless – it’s when generous family members get involved that this becomes more convoluted. If both sets of parents are giving equal amounts of money, Inside Weddings recommends that the couple uses 50% of the guest list for people they want, while giving 25% to each set of parents.
The One Year Rule
A great place to start when it comes to trimming down your guest list, is asking yourself: have I spoken to this person within the last year? There are a number of great flow charts available online to help you navigate the tricky, and often emotional, questions you have to ask when it come to cutting someone from your guest list. Losing touch with someone doesn’t mean they’re immediately relegated from the guest list. If you have a close personal connection with them, inviting them to your wedding could be a lovely way to get back in touch.
Tip: use a guest list flow chart to help trim the fat from your wedding, but remember: this is your big day and you don’t need to make excuses for inviting the people that you want to invite.
Hall Farm Wedding Venues
Hall Farm Cottages offers several comprehensive wedding packages to help make your rustic wedding dreams come true. Take a look at our unique wedding venues online, and feel free to contact a member of our team if you have any questions about our guest capacity.
