Winter Weddings

It seems that most people want to get married in summer. This is because:

1, You get more hours of sunlight which is important for photography especially.

2, It is great to have your guests mingling on the lawn for canapés and champagne.

3, It also makes it easier to keep children entertained if they can run around and play.

4, Transport is easier for the guests. Often guests get ready and then get their hair ruined by torrential rain.

5, Good temperature is better for photographs. If it is very cold guest often look cold. You obviously want your guests to look happy on photographs.

6, Rain can kill the outside photography session. We have often been filming at a wedding, where it rained all day and as a result the bride and groom get no photographs of themselves and the guests in the magnificent grounds they have paid for.

7, Safer. We have attended weddings in the past where a guest has fallen on frosty ground and hurt themselves. Frost, alcohol and high heels do not mix. They are a bad combination and this is what leads to these accidents.

If you are booking a winter wedding there are a few things you should keep in mind.

1, Arrange your wedding earlier in the day, so that there is plenty of sunlight hours for enjoyment and more importantly the photography. We have done a few weddings in winter, when it has been dark so quickly after the ceremony, that there was no opportunity to do photographs in the grounds. If you are not going to use the grounds, you might as well save a load of money and get married in a function room, that could be anywhere.

2, Ensure that the venue has adequate heating. There are some old venues that have poor heating, and when the temperature gets below minus fifteen degrees centigrade, the heating can not compensate. We did one wedding where the guest were wearing coats during the meal. That is hardly the level of luxury that you expect on your wedding day.

3, Ensure good transport for guests and consider giving the elderly the rooms at the actual venue and moving the younger guests to the hotel down the road, if the venue does not have enough rooms for every one.

4, Consider the food. If you were thinking about having a cold starter, it is worth thinking about replacing that with some thing hot. Guests always love hot soup on a cold day.

5, Cost saving. With people mainly wanting a summer wedding. Venues always give a large discount for winter weddings, so it can be a route to affording a venue or not. It may be that by switching to a winter wedding you can add all the little extras, that you could not afford before.

In conclusion, the winter wedding can work out great. However you must first think of all the extra considerations that come with such a decision. Get it right and you can afford the perfect wedding you always wanted. Get it wrong and you could end up with a miserable wedding.