Is a large casual wedding an oxymoron
November 29, 2011 1:23 PM   Subscribe

We're getting hitched and we want to invite a lot of people. Come, poke holes in my plan and help point things out that I might not have considered.

My boyfriend and I have been engaged for around 6 months and tentatively set the date for August 2013. (I will graduate school that June, which is why we couldn't do it any sooner.) I haven't done much of anything up to this point except a lot of brainstorming with my sister and mom. 2013 is getting closer and I think it's time to plan.

Our families are both really excited for us and are contributing financially to the cause. In return, we are appeasing our parents a bit by inviting around ~200 guests. We both live in Vermont with most of our extended families, but we have relatives all over the state as well as in upstate New York and New Jersey. I know that 200 seems like a lot of people, but all of our parents have 5-6 siblings, plus cousins.. you get the idea. Additionally, I really like spending time with both of our families and I want everyone who would like to come, to be able to.

We are totally fine with a large wedding, but what we don't want is a large, formal wedding. It only makes sense to us to invite that many people if we can spend more than just a few hours with them. What we would like to do is rent out a campground/lodge type place so that the younger folks can camp if they'd like and older relatives and friends can stay in cabins for a discounted rate for a weekend. Or, if they want to check in and then get the hell out after the wedding, no big deal.

We've scoped out one place in particular and are probably going to go ahead and rent it. We have also put the idea out to extended family and friends and the response we've gotten is "yayy!" so, yay. But this is obviously going to eat up a lot of our budget, so we are going to have to seriously scrimp in other ways. One of my girlfriends (bridesmaid) is going to make all of the invitations as a gift. Two other girlfriends (bridesmaids) are going to make the cake. My dad's bff is going to roast one of his pigs and some of my dad's turkeys, and the rest of the food is going to be catered by the restaurant I work at.

I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed trolling the web for cheap yet non-heinous bridesmaid dresses and compostable plates.

1. Is it possible to have a large, yet casual wedding? Any tips?
2. Any advice on the whole weekend wedding thing that I might not be seeing?
3. I signed up for theknot.com but it just seems way over the top and overwhelming. Are there any other simple timelines or other resources that can help me plan?

I'm sorry if this is a bit here-and-there. My fiance and I are the first in both of our family generation, as well as a circle of friends, to get married so everyone is super excited but a bit at a loss. My mom and sister are rolling-on-the-floor excited to plan stuff but they don't really know where to begin either.
posted by pintapicasso to Human Relations (32 answers total) 19 users marked this as a favorite
 
I did the thing with reserving a bed and breakfast for a weekend for my wedding and it was great. But that was a bed and breakfast and only the wedding party was staying there. I think it was unusual that we paid for the whole place so that our wedding party would not have to pay for their lodgings. I think that most of the time when I've been to things like destination weddings and wedding weekends, people have been expected to pay for their own lodging. Anyway I love wedding weekends and so I endorse the idea.

A little unclear from your question whether the major cost is just renting the space for the wedding at this particular place, or reserving the entire place for campsites and cabins so that your guests don't have to pay for lodging, but if they are coming from relatively nearby and aren't impoverished for some reason, I think most people would expect that they would have to pay for this. I notice you did mention a 'discounted rate'... so then my question would be, if the relatives would be paying for the cabins and sites, why do you need to reserve anything aside from the common space for the wedding ceremony/reception, which I would imagine in an informal setting like a campground would be fairly inexpensive?
posted by treehorn+bunny at 1:30 PM on November 29, 2011


If you're planning on serving alcohol the place you're renting might require you to hire licensed bartenders for liability reasons, which could be expensive. And if they don't you might still want to consider getting some basic liability insurance since drunk wedding guests can cause all sorts of mayhem, particularly if the spot is out of the way and some people might want to drive home after having a few.
posted by ghharr at 1:32 PM on November 29, 2011


Have you looked at Offbeat Bride? Joining their Tribe (forums) will probably help you plan, and the blog has tons of weddings like yours profiled.
posted by linettasky at 1:35 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


Are you planning to have the big shindig with the pigs and cake and turkey outdoors? If so, what's your backup plan when it rains? Also, you may want to think about tables/chairs/plates/dishes/eating tools for that part of it.
posted by joyceanmachine at 1:38 PM on November 29, 2011


(Also, seconding Offbeat Bride. Lots of budget-friendly, alt-type weddings, and decent vendor resources for anything that you end up outsourcing.)
posted by joyceanmachine at 1:38 PM on November 29, 2011


I can't help with too many of the details, but I just popped in to say that my cousin had a huge camping wedding like this back in July and it was fantastic. Giant, casual, and a total blast can absolutely be done!

I do know the venue helped with lots of the planning, had preferred vendors, etc.

Congratulations!
posted by chatongriffes at 1:40 PM on November 29, 2011


Best answer: Friend of mine had a large wedding like this, also done pretty much as a picnic-barbeque sort of deal. It worked out very well. We were, however, responsible for our own accommodations. Given that the site was a bit remote, that worked out fairly well, since most of us stayed in the larger nearby city and just drove in for the day. Solved a lot of problems. I suggest that this be a workable option for your guests, should they so prefer.

Definitely have a rain-day plan. Reserved picnic shelters at the very least.

We had a softball game at the end, friends of the bride vs. friends of the groom. Were the bride's friends to win, she got to keep her maiden name, and were the groom's friends to win, she would take his. Complicating matters was the fact that the groom had recently changed his name to something whackadoodle. Groom's friends were shut out, but she took his name anyway. True love, indeed.
posted by Capt. Renault at 1:41 PM on November 29, 2011 [7 favorites]


1. Is it possible to have a large, yet casual wedding? Any tips?

The most fun wedding I ever attended was large and completely casual. A big hall with an adjoining kitchen was rented, friends of the bride and groom made all the food and the cake, other friends played music, the bride wore a dress she'd bought for the occasion but which was a non-wedding dress she'd wear again (and only cost about $100). Bridesmaids just wore nice clothes they already owned. Everybody brought some wine or beer.

The total expense for the wedding (which probably involved about 150 people, I guess) was under $1000.

So I can give a definite "yes" to the "can it be done." It all just depends on what you want.
posted by yoink at 1:43 PM on November 29, 2011


These two had an outdoor, mostly self-catered wedding for 200+ that looks like it was pretty informal.

Since you mentioned compostable plates, we used these at our wedding and I loved them.
posted by heyheylanagirl at 1:43 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


When you say that you're going to roast a pig and some turkeys, and have the rest of the food catered, I assume you are talking about the day/evening of the wedding itself. For people who are staying the weekend, how do you plan to feed them the rest of the time they are there?

We rented out a small lodge and some cabins for our wedding and had about 15 family members come stay -- most came for the whole week beforehand. Every meal was a lot of work, and a logistics challenge that I had to have planned out well in advance. And that was an order of magnitude fewer people than you're talking about.
posted by drlith at 1:44 PM on November 29, 2011


If you're planning on serving alcohol the place you're renting might require you to hire licensed bartenders for liability reasons, which could be expensive. And if they don't you might still want to consider getting some basic liability insurance since drunk wedding guests can cause all sorts of mayhem, particularly if the spot is out of the way and some people might want to drive home after having a few.

The place I had my reception required a $1 million liability insurance policy and a security guard (more than depending on the size of the event) if any alcohol was to be served whatsoever, which pretty much made our wedding dry. Many caterers or professional bartenders that do weddings will have such a policy, but since we weren't planning on having any major drinkage in the first place, the extra expense just to serve a glass of champagne or have a tub filled with bottles of beer wasn't worth it.

Our wedding was relatively small (under 70 people), but very casual. We did a lot of stuff ourselves - picked up decorations, napkins, tablecloths and other stuff where we could at discount stores, I made half of our centerpieces as architectural models and the other half were our cakes. We didn't have any flowers.

If you've got the venue, food, and invitations down I think you're doing pretty well and are even pretty far ahead of the game at this point. We only had a little over a year to plan for our wedding and we did fine. My wife used a DIY bride book for a lot of crafty ideas for decorations and stuff (I think DIY Bride might actually be the title), and it had things organized in the book according to how close to the wedding you should be doing them. We didn't do much out of there, but the scheduling helped.
posted by LionIndex at 1:44 PM on November 29, 2011


On non-preview, thirding Offbeat Bride.
posted by LionIndex at 1:45 PM on November 29, 2011


I've attended/heard about a few weddings like this and they have been huge successes. I totally think you can do this. The folks I know about made them into summer camp-like events that incorporated low-cost but fun activities into the weekend. One had a massive scavenger hunt with clues based on the families and friends of the bride and groom so everyone got to tromp around outside, but also got to know each other by asking questions and working together on this task. The other wedding did a "pentathalon" style event that lasted all weekend. The guests were divided into teams based on bride or groom's side then went to "battle" in events like trivia, feats of strength, arts and crafts, etc. Again, super fun and especially great because the bride and groom were from different countries and the wedding was in a third country. Guests had to find some ways to communicate despite unshared languages and probably got to know one another better than they would have otherwise.

My advice to you as a former grad-student, on-the-cheap bride: don't stress about the little stuff. Folks remember having fun, not how expensive or nice your tableware was. With your friends and families pitching in, this already sounds like it's going to be a blast. Good luck to you!
posted by goggie at 1:45 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


I went to a weekend wedding this summer with about 200 people (maybe 200 at the ceremony and 100-150 who slept over all or part of the weekend). It wasn't super duper fancy, but it was also REALLY well organized. It was at a summer camp, as others have mentioned.

Remember, if you have a weekend wedding you pretty much have to feed everybody. So that was like 5 meals. The camp they stayed at cooked a lot of the meals, I think they had the rehearsal dinner catered separately.

The bride and groom did ask people who stayed at the camp to contribute about $80 bucks per head for the whole weekend-- I think some people couldn't pay, and it wasn't a big deal.

It was REALLY fun although I think just one night would have been plenty!!
posted by Rocket26 at 1:47 PM on November 29, 2011


My good friend had a great wedding last year a lot like yours. It was an outdoor ceremony in a park followed by a dinner and barn dance about 15 minutes away. The dinner was a roast pig with big trays of food catered by some friends-of-friends who were paid cost plus some labor. Mozzarella-and-tomato salad, green salad, corn on the cob, cornbread, pig, and some other big-pan kinds of food were on the menu - I think a spinach and feta pasta salad, too. very summery overall. There were a couple of kegs of good local beer and a table of wines. The place settings were paper, with paper tableclothes I think, but the favors were actually glass mason-jar tea glasses with raffia tied around the edges - these were both our beer glasses for the wedding and our take-home souvenir, nicely eliminating the problem of having to wash them. A friend DJ'd the dance part. It was a fantastic and very casual wedding.
posted by Miko at 1:49 PM on November 29, 2011


I think as long as you give people the heads up on what to expect (stuff like, It gets cold at night, bring sweaters, and The area where the ceremony will be held is not paved, wear flat shoes), they will have a great time!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 1:49 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed trolling the web for cheap yet non-heinous bridesmaid dresses and compostable plates.

Are bridesmaid dresses really important to you? One easy and less expensive possibility is to pick a color (as in a specific shade) and tell all your bridesmaids to find their own dress in that color (you can also ask for a rough length or sleeves / no sleeves). That way you have the photos of matching dresses for a "casually formal" overall look, while your friends can spend within their budgets (or even use something they already have), and everyone wins.

Compostable plates are a nice touch - another way to go is to go to goodwill or other thrift stores for discarded china, and let the guests take their place settings with them as souvenirs if they like - if not, you can donate them back to the shop. Again, it gives you a formal and casual look at the same time (real china but mismatched in a funky way).
posted by Mchelly at 1:51 PM on November 29, 2011 [2 favorites]


Do you really need matching bridesmaid dresses?
posted by Omnomnom at 1:52 PM on November 29, 2011 [4 favorites]


I've seen a lot of weddings where the bridesmaids just wore "little black dresses" - they look pretty consistent but usually people already own one, or don't go broke buying one.

Pastel sundresses could be a good bet too.
posted by Miko at 1:54 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Someone I know bought several yards of fabric for bridesmaids' dresses and sent enough to each bridesmaid for a dress, telling each that she was to have it made up in a flattering style of her choice. The bride specified the dresses were to be street-length and have no other color, but that was all. The bridesmaids--one very tall and slender and one short and round--looked great.

Good luck.
posted by Jenna Brown at 1:58 PM on November 29, 2011


Response by poster: These are all great pieces of advice. We will have to hire a professional bartender for liability reasons. I hadn't thought about feeding everyone for the weekend, that's exactly the kind of stuff I'm looking for.

I would like bridesmaid dresses that are at least made of the same fabric. I never really like how it looks when the shades are all slightly off. Hadn't thought of getting them made, thanks!
posted by pintapicasso at 2:10 PM on November 29, 2011


my favorite thing about our wedding was having everyone in one place for a few days before the main event. We rented a set of condos for friends and a large house across the street for family. First, it gave both families a chance to meet and mingle, and gave friends time to arrive and get settled and have a vacation. Second, it gave my wife and I a chance to spend time with each of our guests in a way that would simply not have been possible otherwise, given the stress of organizing and starring in the main event (which only lasts a few hours, and we had a hard time getting to talk to all of our 80 guests -- how will you find time for 200?)
posted by Chris4d at 2:12 PM on November 29, 2011


pintapicasso, another option that I used was that I chose a color from one of the national bridal chains (David's) and told the bridesmaids they could order any style in that color. The dresses there are quite affordable.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 2:16 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]


Not to be terribly unromantic or unfun but if everything is outside -- what is your bathroom plan?
posted by hmo at 2:21 PM on November 29, 2011


We had a medium, yet casual, wedding, at a local park. We had a pig, a bunch of beer, and some other little stuff to supplement and I think people were happy.

It was a bit rustic. We made some arrangements for the folks who couldn't walk distances. We made sure that elderly/infirm family members had a place to sit. We made sure kids had something to do (one of our friends was nice enough to pay their excellent and trusted babysitter to watch all the ambulatory kids - it worked out great! They were in sight, but not underfoot, and they were able to run back and mingle with adults and then go back to kid stuff.) The bathroom was the park bathroom, but my wife's mom went in and made up a really nice little basket of toiletries to set in there, and it was still there at the end of the day.

We did cupcakes, and we did not do a wedding party - just one witness each.

My very crafty wife made favors (which got lost on the setting up morning) and flowers, and we all made paper flowers at one of the pre wedding brunch things. Our single biggest expense was probably the dance floor, because my crafty wife and her friends like to do that. (If it had rained, we would have had to rent tents. These were reserved, but we were able to cancel with no penalty once the 4-day forecast was in.) The PA was "rented" from a local musician for $100, and a laptop was the DJ; a well known local musician played us in for what I thought was a pittance. And a friend of my sister in law took these great pictures and wouldn't accept anything more than gas money.

Our venue (Riverfront Park in Columbia) did allow alcohol but did not allow glass. In the end it was simplest for us to hire a friend of a friend to simply open bottles and pour them into clear plastic cups, so for beer we just had tons and tons of 12 packs of 3 or 4 different beers, along with some big bottles of cheap wine for the non beer drinkers. We got liability insurance through a third party for $75 or something (the venue required it - it was a few clicks, online) although it's possible I missed something about the liability or the serving and we just got lucky.

Just cover the big stuff first (pig, beer, keeping everyone comfortable and dry) and work towards the smallest. It's gonna be great!
posted by ftm at 2:30 PM on November 29, 2011


Definitely get thee to A Practical Wedding. Lots of good, down-to-earth and out-of-the-box wedding advice. Pretty much the (much better) anti-Knot.
posted by muirne81 at 2:42 PM on November 29, 2011 [2 favorites]


A friend of mine did a 200+ person, casual wedding. She rented a barn where the owner also roasted pigs, her family made lots and lots of salads and bought buns, so dinner was roast pork sandwiches with salad. She and her fiance bought all the alcohol, and a friend served it (this was in the UK, I don't know the law about other places). And they hired a ceilidh band, and we danced all night. It was awesome.
posted by jb at 2:44 PM on November 29, 2011


Mind mapping software is your friend for planning and keeping track of things with many loose ends. We used FreeMind to plan our wedding and it reduced stress levels considerably...
posted by Hairy Lobster at 3:10 PM on November 29, 2011


I'm in the exact same boat - large, causal gathering. getting married in a month. Feel free to memail me for more info, but here's where we're at:

Went with a less than desirable venue to hold both the ceremony AND reception. Went with it because of size, the fact that they included tables, chairs, and did NOT have a requirement for using their caterer or buy booze through them. This saved us a ton. Looks like you are dialed in on a venue, though BUT - I would really look NOW into if this venue is locking you into anything. You might be surprised. We decided not to have a wedding party to save on money/expenses all around.

Get kegs. Do you have any friends that make beer? See if you can buy booze from your work m at cost. Ditto with linens. Ditch the hard alcohol. We're having plastic cups, pressed bamboo paper plates and flatware. You could go cheaper with paper.

I got my dress, made to fit, from a Chinese knock off site called lightinthebox.com. It is fantastic and was under 200$ with shipping. I'm buying, in advance, almost everything in bulk online.

We are not having a "wedding cake." Just get lots of cakes, pies, whatever sounds good to you. Food - totally go buffet style. Cuts down on server costs.

I used the knot and offbeatbride and ninezillion other wedding blogs, that I set up in an RSS feed for easy search-ability. There's a lot of stuff I see that goes in one um... eye... and out the other because of cost, but there's a lot you can knock off. Through these sites, craiglist, etc, I'm buying a TON of our decor "gently used." Etsy, Etsy, Etsy.

Start looking for a photographer now. Key is to find one that is still building their portfolio. Sell them on the individualized nature of your wedding - DIY, craft, etc. They can use photos for their portfolio.

Really, call on your friends. We're not having a florist - we've got a good buddy that has floral experience and we're sourcing whatever is in season at the local flower warehouse. Our friend is the DJ. Tip for the invite - ours has one sheet, front and back, with an email/ call for RSPV and "check the free site from the knot for all other info." Saves on mailing costs, additional envelopes, etc. Got hooked up with a great coordinator through a friend. On that note - with that many people, strongly consider a "day of" coordinator. It is an expense, but I feel it will pay itself back.

With effort and thinking outside the box in terms of decor, favors (ditch the favors all together?), trying to stay away from things branded OMG FRILLY WEDDING, everything is turning out under budget. I think it is good to prioritize what you and your mate want as the "moneysink." For us it was food. Sounds like for you it is the venue. Critique everything - is a super fancy ass guestbook really worth it to you? Do you need that frilly pen that goes with it? If I look for a plain version of item X from this froofy wedding site, how much can I save and have it still be cool? Is there another way, that can reflect who you guys are as a couple? I ask myself that over, and over again.
posted by fillsthepews at 3:21 PM on November 29, 2011 [4 favorites]


A Practical Wedding! I favorited the comment, but I need to call this out: unsubscribe from theknot and just read A Practical Wedding. It will save your sanity! The blogger also has a book coming out in January, so lucky you, you'll have that for guidance as well.
posted by peanut_mcgillicuty at 4:04 PM on November 29, 2011


Wedding or not, a party for 200 people costs a lot, so make up a budget. You can start posting on Craigslist for gently used party lights, tulle, mason jars for flowers, and whatever decorations you want. Chinet and other formed fiber plates are compostable. You can rent flatware and glasses, or use paper cups. You can rent tables and chairs. You may be able to get flowers from a wholesaler, and have a talented friend make bouquets and decorations*.

Is it important to you and your bridesmaids to have matching dresses? You could ask them all to wear a solid-color blue dress, or floral below-the-knee dress, or any other theme. ** The groomsmen can wear similar clothes, like blue shirts and khakis. I went to a wedding where the guys all wore grey flannel pants, white shirt, blue blazer, and a nice tie. Very preppy and nice.

It's nice to have photographs and maybe a video, and you should be able to find an aspiring photographer, but you can also invite friends and family to bring their digital cameras, and help take pictures, including formal pictures.

If you can find a location with a lodge/cabins and places to tent, it's reasonable for guests to pay for their accommodations. If you get married midweek, people have to use vacation time. If the wedding is, say, Saturday evening, you could ask family to do a potluck brunch Saturday, and maybe get a group of friends to cook breakfast Sunday.

Liquor costs a lot. Consider having lots of beer and wine but not a bar. If Dad says he's really going to need some Scotch, maybe he can bring a flask. Music is important; a good DJ is a treasure if you want dancing. Or, a local Beatles tribute band? Country wedding - Contradance band & caller?

The important thing is that you and your beloved are making a commitment to one another, with your friends and family to witness it and support you. Keep that in mind when things get nerve-wracking.

* My wedding flowers were ordered from the grocery store, at good prices. They went in wine carafes that the venue had.
** I told my sisters - Wear a nice dress and pink shoes. They chose to buy matching flowered dresses and pink shoes.

posted by theora55 at 5:46 PM on November 29, 2011


Congratulations on what sounds like a super fun wedding! I'll tell you what my soon-to-be sister-in-law told me recently--"I've been to a billion weddings in the last few years, and I don't remember what anyone wore or ate or what the flowers or vows or anything were like. I do remember the people I saw and talked to."

So I really wouldn't sweat it too much, but WeddingHappy is a good app for wedding planning, if you have an iThing. It keeps you organized and has like, pie charts and little achievements that show how far along you are in the process, if you like that sort of thing.
posted by exceptinsects at 6:55 PM on November 29, 2011


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