Ceremony & Reception

Hi there! We will be doing a flip for our event space. The venue staff and my wedding planner team will be doing the flip while my guests and us are outside for cocktail hour! Ceremony is from 4-430 and reception starts at 6 pm. The venue is fully private so our guests are welcome to wander the grounds for cocktail hour while the space is being flipped!

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Sorry I edited my post. I should have mentioned there is no venue staff because we are using a hall. And it is in the winter, so guests probably don't want to go outside. I am at a loss of how to set it up and/or arrange everything.

Does the hall have additional rooms where you could hold a cocktail hour or something for guests to get out of the way? We’ve been to a few weddings like this.

Tables were out but guests sat in regular rows. After ceremony, we went to a different room for cocktail hour while they converted the space.

Does your venue have another space the guests can go during cocktail hour? Our original plan was to get married & have reception in the same room and have the guests just sit at the tables, which I still think is fine and sometimes that might be better budget wise for some. We decided to just get married right outside that room on the terrace where the coctail hour will be and then people can go into the reception room.

The last wedding I attended had everything in the same room and guests were seated at their tables for dinner for the ceremony. It worked out really nicely but they didn't have a cocktail hour.

If I rains we will have to have ceremony inside. I am planning for everyone to be seated at tables and we will get married on middle of dance floor.

I’ve been to 2 weddings like this. Everyone just sat at the tables during the ceremony. I can’t speak from guest experience though as I was a bridesmaid both times. It seemed to work fine though.

If you don't have staff to move tables or anywhere for guests to go during the room flip, I would just have everyone seated at their tables.

I went to a wedding where they pushed the tables to the side in the main part of the space and left them in the balconies, and after the ceremony the DJ asked everyone to go to a different room (kind of a large vestibule area) for cocktail hour while they flipped the space. Their coordinators did most of the work, but I think some guys stayed behind to help too, and it only took a few minutes. If you have the opportunity to do something like that, I'd go for it.

Search for “wedding ceremony same room” on Pinterest. Lots of ideas for virtually any style.

Our indoor back up plan in case bad weather prohibited our beach ceremony was to do both in the same space. We wouldn’t have gotten into moving tables (except for one— pulling our sweetheart table out of the way to make an “aisle”), but would’ve just had guests seated at their tables (with chairs turned to see), walked between some tables for the aisle, and stood on the dance floor for ceremony. The only thing i really would’ve changed is I would’ve assigned seats at tables (in addition to the table assignments) to ensure that the VIPs had
the best view

At my fiancé’s cousin’s wedding we all sat at tables during the ceremony and then like right after they announced the bar was open and then a little after that they announced the buffet was open. We sat at our tables like the entire night. They had a dance floor in the center too.

My ceremony and reception are in the same room (its just a firehall, but a nice one). We're expecting about 115 people.

We're setting up the tables ahead of time and we're going to have everyone except parents, siblings, and grandparents sit at the tables. The above mentioned people will have chairs off to the side of where we are doing the ceremony. We'll be doing our ceremony on the small wooden dancefloor. The only thing that will need moved after the ceremony is the wooden trellis.