Daytime Wedding Brides.

Its cheaper to not serve a big meal, but it may be better to have a 1pm ceremony with the reception to follow immediately?

It appears you are leaving guests with gap times? This is because A: you have entertainment planned for everyone inbetween B: are providing them with an activity C: they are all from and in your hometown and dont need any sort of inbetween time activity because the drive is 5 minutes.

Otherwise, there are many budget brides who have requested how to make a wedding cheaper, and when we suggest an afternoon ceremony with only appetizers and champagne and cake afterwards(1930s, 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s style) Im not sure if they cave under the idea that a wedding MUST HAVE seated meal and dancing or not -due to some expectation of our "cultural" norms.

Anyways, there is nothing worse for an out of town guest than a long waiting time inbetween events.

I see your comment, but I think we are talking about different things. I am referring to a full-fledge wedding. Take an evening wedding and simply start it 6 hours earlier.

Daytime weddings actually don't have gaps. Every evening wedding that is in a church has a gap and it is awful (why I am not doing an evening wedding).

For daytime weddings, the church is followed directly by cocktail hour followed directly by a full-course reception.

We had a 2pm wedding. The cocktail hour began at 3:15. We arrived at 4:30. Dinner was around 5. Reception ended at 10pm.

I was. My ceremony started at 10, cocktails at 11:30, and lunch/dinner was served at 1. Much more affordable to do it that way.

Eta: our reception hall was about 30 minutes from the church. Doors opened for coffee/tea at 11.

Yeah, I suppose. I never really looked at how much it would be at night so I never was able to compare the two prices.

Our facility had the various prices listed and it saved us about $15 per person for our buffet option doing it on a Saturday afternoon as opposed to a saturday evening. But I'm sure it varies by location.

Another positive thing was that the receltion ended at 4, so I was asleep at the hotel by 10. We were going to have an after party at a bar for the younger crowd, but ended up canceling due to snow. Just as well--i slept for literally one hour the night before lol

Figure there may be other future brides in the same situation I was in, so I will share the list I used to weigh pros/cons of a daytime wedding (i.e. 10-11AM wedding followed directly by a reception that ends around 5-6pm).

Daytime wedding pros

1) More time to enjoy your wedding day. Wedding is at 10AM followed directly by cocktail hour and then a full meal. Once 7-8PM rolls around, the after-party begins.

2) Removes the typical 2 hour gap found between a 2PM church wedding and 5pm cocktail hour at most venues.

3) The venue per head cost is usually upwards of 30-40% less than for the same exact thing only 6 hours later.

4) Older family and friends will stay for the entire wedding and not leave right after the cake cutting.

5) If you have young nieces and nephews, day weddings are simply great for all involved.

6) Still not too hot out when you are getting married and taking photos.

Daytime wedding cons

1) You need to get up very early to get ready. Like 5:30AM.

2) Your guests may not feel as comfortable at first drinking and letting loose on the dance floor if it is still light out.

Feel free to add any that I may have missed.

FH and I are stoked to have our daytime wedding! Our ceremony will be at 1130 and things will wrap up around 4pm. There will be no gap since everything is at the same place. Guests will have cocktail "hour" while we finish up photos and then straight into reception. This gives us time to do an after party with our friends (and the fun family members). It also allows time for people that need to get back for work the next day. Plus even with an after party we will still enjoy our wedding night before I pass out from exhaustion! We are saving a bunch on the catering side of things too.

As you can tell, I am pro daytime wedding.

I hear you Madeline. We are a rare breed haha. I asked our venue what was up with the lack of day weddings, and they said a lot of times people just assume they need to have it at night and it never really crosses their minds to have it during the day. I just think younger brides tend to gravitate towards night weddings naturally.

Our wedding is at 11am on the beach in Dominican... I didn't have a choice on the time unfortunately, but I am excited regardless! It will be an all day long party

I'm having an afternoon wedding. The ceremony starts at 3pm in one part of the banquet hall, then the guests go straight to the other part of the banquet hall for drinks and followed by dinner and dancing from there.

My ceremony starts at 1:00. I don't think I could have cocktail hour at 11:30 that would just be weird to me.

Evening bride here, but I am planning a wedding weekend, so there will be various activities for our out of town guests and the wedding party from Friday to Sunday.

Our ceremony starts at 2pm and we plan for everything to end by 8pm. There won't be any gaps because the ceremony is outside in a park right beside the pavilion where the reception will be.