Marquee Wedding Receptions I

by Bernadette Chapman

Organ­is­ing a mar­quee recep­tion at home is chal­leng­ing, stress­ful but also reward­ing. It’s a much greater chal­lenge than a hotel or wed­ding venue because you have to organ­ise every­thing from scratch, with no pro­fes­sional to guide you along the way. Over the last 7 years I have organ­ised many home cel­e­bra­tions and per­son­ally I love them, yes its hard work but the results are worth it.

MARQUEES
The first thing to do after you have set the bud­get and con­firmed the cer­e­mony is call some mar­quee com­pa­nies and ask them for a site visit, this is vital – they must see where you plan to have the mar­quee in order to give a real­is­tic quo­ta­tion. Let them know your esti­mated num­ber of day and evening guests, ask what size mar­quee is needed and obvi­ously check you have the room for the required size.

Key things to think about before your meeting:

- What style mar­quee you pre­fer: white can­vas mar­quees or giant tipis or what about an Indian theme inte­rior? Will you want win­dows and doors or com­pletely open on one side?

- What type of floor­ing would you pre­fer? The ideal solu­tion is a hard floor on its own or with carpet/Hessian on the top, this pro­vides a solid and even sur­face for guests to walk on.

- Where do you envis­age the cater­ing tent, portable toi­lets and mar­quee entrance?

- Will you want a dance floor & stage as a fea­ture with tables sur­round­ing it?

- Do you pre­fer round tables or long ban­quet­ing tables?

- Do you have a fea­ture in the gar­den you want to incor­po­rate? For exam­ple per­haps you have a tree, pond or flower bor­der that is in the area of the pro­posed mar­quee? They add an instant flair to the design.

Lis­ten care­fully to what the mar­quee com­pany rec­om­mend, they are the experts so if they feel an idea won’t work lis­ten to their rea­sons and ask for alter­na­tives. Ask for a full break­down of costs mak­ing it eas­ier to com­pare quo­ta­tions. And finally who did you feel most com­fort­able with before booking.

PRACTICALITIES

The best thing to do with a home wed­ding is write a com­pre­hen­sive list of tasks and require­ments in order to tick off as time goes by. To start you off here are my recommendations.

- Weather – I’m assum­ing you will want the drink recep­tion in the gar­den grounds but what if it rains? Think about a con­tin­gency plan whether you hire an addi­tional tent or hold the recep­tion in the mar­quee on the dance floor if uncov­ered. If space and bud­get is not an issue then you can have a spe­cial lounge area in the mar­quee with a par­ti­tion to the wed­ding break­fast, this is then unveiled at the spe­cial moment

- Entrance — Have a small porch to make it grander and keep the warmth in

- Pri­vacy — Make sure there is a par­ti­tion between the cater­ing tent and the main mar­quee, guests do not want to see staff dish­ing up food

- Toi­lets – even if the house is right next to the mar­quee I strongly advise hir­ing a mobile toi­let, they are very lux­u­ri­ous now and well worth the has­sle they will save you. Think about light­ing the way to the toi­lets and per­haps lay­ing step­ping stones across the grass

- Power — Be very aware of power, how much do the band, toi­lets and caterer need? Is the home sup­ply enough and more impor­tantly do you want to risk the power trip­ping? Think seri­ously about hir­ing a small gen­er­a­tor if only for peace of mind

- Love thy neigh­bour — Ensure the neigh­bours are aware of the wed­ding and antic­i­pated noise. If they are not invited then why not pay for a night away for them? That way you should reduce any requests for music to be turned down, well worth the £100–200 it will cost you

- Park­ing - Do you have suf­fi­cient park­ing? If park­ing is in a nearby field then pro­vide a solid walk­way for guests in case it is rain­ing, walk­ing across a sod­den field in heels is not much fun. Ensure there is good sig­nage so peo­ple know where to park. And don’t for­get light­ing, peo­ple need to ‘find’ the car park at night! If you do not have the park­ing on site then is there a nearby car park guests can use?

- Clean­ing — A prac­ti­cal tip I have is to make up a clean­ing bas­ket ready for spills or messes. Give to your wed­ding plan­ner or caterer so they are pre­pared for any acci­dents that occur. Think about hav­ing some clean­ers the morn­ing after to assist with the inevitable mess

- Secu­rity — Is there a room in the house that can be locked? If so use this for valu­ables and wed­ding presents, give the key to your plan­ner or brides­maid. If the mar­quee will be unat­tended before the wed­ding, for exam­ple if it is on premises no-one lives at then seri­ously con­sider hir­ing a secu­rity guard, this is not the time for all your hard work to be spoilt by a local thief

- Plan­ner – seri­ously think about hav­ing a plan­ner to assist with the plan­ning or at least project man­age the wed­ding day for you. Venues have ban­quet­ing man­agers to deal with prob­lems but you will have no-one. A plan­ner can dec­o­rate the venue, take deliv­ery of goods plus man­age the day itself so if any chal­lenges occur they are dealt with in a pro­fes­sional man­ner leav­ing you to relax and party.

This arti­cle con­tin­ues… part two is here!

Thanks to this article’s author Bernadette, owner of Dream Occa­sions. As one of the UK’s fore­most wed­ding plan­ners, hav­ing appeared on TV and radio as well as numer­ous national pub­li­ca­tions, Bernadette is truly an expert in the wed­ding indus­try. Past wed­dings have been seen in Cosmo Bride, You and Your Wed­ding and An Essex Wed­ding. Bernadette also man­ages Dream Occa­sions Hire – fin­ish­ing touches for wed­dings and events in East Anglia.

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