The average UK wedding costs approximately £25,000. When planning a wedding, it’s easy to get caught up in all the finer details and often forget about the cost until it’s too late.
When it comes to choosing your budget, you must consider all aspects of your wedding including; the ceremony, reception, food and drink, the dress, the suits, the rings, the transportation and so on. Then once you have all listed the main costs, you remember you need to decorate the venue, but you haven’t got much left in the pot.
So what happens next? You start looking at compromising, the rings you have set your heart on, the number of guests, prosecco for the cocktail hour instead of champagne or decreasing the budget for THE dress!
Planning a wedding can be one of the most expensive chapters in your life and whilst you want it to be affordable, you also want it to look a million pounds! But not to worry, one of the ways you can save money is with creative DIY decorations and some savvy thinking regarding location and room layout.
Here you’ll find our recommendations for creating the perfect wedding on a budget.
1. Choose a fabulous location
Stretch tents are an amazing outdoor, cost effective solution you can incorporate the countryside as part of your wedding. Choosing an amazing location gives you one of the best decorations you can possibly get – a view!
In a fabulous location you can place the sides of your stretch tent up, allowing your guests to be mesmerised by an amazing view and great weather. Doing this means that your guests will be concentrating on you and the view, not on how much you have decorated or how much you have spent.
The possibilities of using a stretch tent for a wedding are endless. There is so much you can do to incorporate the location; make it dreamy and romantic with festoon and fairy lights with soft colours of LED uplights, or if you want more of a festival atmosphere, use a DMX controller to change the LED lights to give a party vibe. Also, using hay bales outside as seats or rattan furniture for chill out ambience expands the area of the tent, providing a feeling of expanse.
2. Choose a theme or style
Whether you want to stick with traditional, go all out glitter party or go down the vintage route, there are ideas and hacks to make your vision come alive on a budget.
Visit wedding fayres, take ideas from craft shops and involve your wedding party. After all, you didn’t ask your closest nearest and dearest to be a part of your big day for nothing.
If you are struggling for a style, don’t worry there are so many ideas out there and they aren’t hard to find with the use of the internet, but try to keep it simple. Using lights inside a stretch tent means you do not need much more or any extra decorations on the canopy.
Hanging fans, paper lanterns or honeycomb balls, bunting or garlands are easy to make with a little practice but do your research as you may find you can buy them already made. But remember less is more in some cases, you want to compliment the surroundings with décor, not be overpowering.
3. Make it intimate
You want enough space for everyone to be comfortable but close enough that conversations can easily be sparked. You need to make it easy for strangers to build relationships because let’s face it, not everyone knows each other at weddings.
When it comes to space saving (smaller space means less décor needed) choosing the table layout can be a real help. Round tables use up more space. If you have 10 guests on a 6ft diameter table, you have a lot of wasted space in the middle that you need to fill. You can use this space with pretty big bowls and floating petals/ large flower heads which will smell nice and look lovely for a traditional fairy-tale wedding. But it is an extra expense with not only the décor but having to pay for a larger venue.
Using rectangular tables decreases the space dramatically overall, having a 3ft wide trestle table, calculating 12 inches per place setting means you only have a remaining 12 inches in the middle that needs to be decorated. Tentickle stretch tents offer an option to hire trestle tables and benches seating up to four guests or white wooden chairs, as we recognise the need to save space and there are so many ideas on how to utilise this vintage look with décor.
Having only 12 inches to decorate not only keeps it cost effective but also is a nice relaxed atmosphere for your guests. Conversation can flow freely when there is a smaller space to talk. Decorating these few inches is easy, just depends on your theme.
Candle lanterns or flameless tea lights can provide a magical experience, pine cones or painted acorns if you wanted to bring the outdoors in, pebbles, jars and paper or felt flowers which you can easily make yourself. Don’t forget your table runners, nice lace runners you find in markets, patterned linen runners found in most homeware shops or you can use hessian fabric if you were going for the real rustic look.
4. Favours and other little details
Wedding favours are fun to make, you can personalise them to your guests (recommended for a small wedding as personalising a substantial amount of wedding favours can be time consuming). You can find quirky imaginary ideas from the internet or use your own creative mind.
In my experience sweets are always well received; love hearts, traditional sugared almonds or pick and mix! Make your own sloe gin or similar if you feel adventurous, lotto or scratch cards or a simple thank you card. If there is a charity close to both your hearts, then why not donate the money? The charity will usually provide cards for you to place on each place setting or make your own thank you cards, this can be personalised and will not take too much precious wedding planning time.
DIY seating plans and table numbers are very popular, these can be elegantly written on card, it is a bonus if you know anyone with calligraphy skills. Wooden table numbers or mini chalk boards can complement a larger table plan made of chalkboard and vintage frame. You can make it fun by using old hilarious photos, this will not only get your guests laughing but it will take the pressure of you.
5. Package deals
Whether you have an indoor venue or an outdoor, always look into package deals. This will save all important money for the little extras. Tentickle Stretch tents provide package deals as we know how hard a wedding is to pay for.
By getting a package deal including the tent, the lights, the furniture, dance floor, bar area and many other items we can help with, really helps you save so your day will be perfect.
Keeping it simple helps your budget stretch. With a little creativity, some help from the bridal party and some DIY skills you can create and fantastic atmosphere for your big day, at the fraction of the price!
If you have always wanted an outdoor wedding or are curious about a none traditional venue with package deals then contact Tentickle Stretch Tents today by calling 07826843099 or send an email to info@tentickle-stretchtents.co.uk. We are always here to provide style and quality to outdoor events come rain or shine.