Decorating the venue yourself?

... @Trisha, you are brilliant and I am so stealing that idea.

Our catering company set up the tables and stuff for us.

Nice! My catering company isn't going to set up our centerpieces and such and I probably wouldn't trust anyone else to do it right aside from me or a DOC.

We wll be decorating the ceremony and reception areas by ourself (different venues) luckly our reception venue is going to let us in the day before to have anything all decorated and ready to go for the day of. We are doing to much, table covers, centerpieces, cake, and gift table. O yea as well as the sweetheart table, i'm still looking for the decorations for that.

We have the venue from 8am until midnight, but are hoping we can set up the night before. We also have the tables and chairs included so we will be doing everything else ourselves. Will rent flatware and silverware. But we will be buying everything else. It is so much cheaper to buy tablecloths than rent them, it's crazy!!

Our venue is the same we have the hall 7-12 am. Definitely following this post.

How many hours would you have the venue for if you decided to save the $600 you mentioned and use it to hire a DOC? Personally, that would probably the route I would take.

@Trisha I am also organizing into tubs, I haven't gotten to the point of taking pictures. I have created a check list for each box, the list is in a plastic sleeve and taped to the top so I can check off items as I'm organizing them.

I think you should be fine that setting up in that time frame. Just try to get as much together before hand so you can delegate and enjoy the day as well!

You mention planning for set up but what about break down at the end? Personally, I wouldn't want to worry about cleaning up afterwards - I want to enjoy the day that's going to go by so quickly. I hired a coordinator for peace of mind, though it certainly wasn't cheap.

We have it for 8 hours on Saturday, but we have also taken it for four hours the evening before as well. I would have only rented for two hours the night before but if you take the night before the fee is 4 hours regardless, so we will probably get some food too and call it a rehearsal dinner.

I'm going to do as much as possible the night before, but we will also have a family friend who is an interior designer/decorator to kind of direct and help in the early afternoon. The tables and chairs will all be there since they belong to the venue and I believe they also set them up in whatever layout we request too, which is great.

Our entire event will be held at a private estate so we have as much time as we want (friend's house). That being said, I asked a small group of friends to be a part of "Team Lewis" and they will be there the day of the wedding to help set up everything. I made a one pager that shows pictures of what the decor should look like. Then the next day, a huge group of people will go back to the estate to help clean everything up and get her house back to normal.

My venue said that as long as nothing gets scheduled the morning of (our cocktail hour starts at 4:30PM) or the night before, we can go in the day before to set up. I'm crossing my fingers that no one books anything there bc our wedding ceremony is at 1:30PM and there's no way I'll be able to go there and mico manage everything, haha. So as long as everything goes according to plan, I'll be decorating the place starting around noon, with plenty of time to get back to my ceremony rehearsal at 4PM and then the rehearsal dinner at 6:30pm the night before. That way all we have to do the next day is double check stuff

We are renting out our venue for the whole weekend friday set up an extra $100 sat ceremony n reception and sunday for clean up $25 dont ask where they came up with the weird prices lol

We have 4 hours that we are allowed to go in and set up... With a good team I doubt it will take that long.

I admire you ladies who are tackling that. It seems very daunting to me. This is my second go round, so, I'm WAAAYYY older than the majority of brides here, so, my wedding morning will be leisurely.

Fluffy, I'd have the venue for a minimum of six hours, with a ceremony time of 5pm and a send off time of 10pm. So it would only leave us an hour for decorating, even with a DOC - so if I invest in a DOC instead of $600 more for two extra hours, that DOC better be fast!

Diana, my bridal party volunteered to break down for me. Otherwise I'd have to hire and would, haha.

I didn't read all of the comments, but our venue was sort of similar. They just did tables chairs and the linens/napkins on the guest tables. If I brought some stuff in they would set it up, to an extent. I wanted a lot of stuff done (which would've had to be DIY) except I found decorators in the area. I endedup hiring two of them. One was for chair covers/bands/satin table cloths for a couple accent tables and the other was for all the rest of the décor. I would've never had time to do all this myself besides that is their job. I think for both of them and all of the stuff I wanted it was $2000ish. Best I ever spent. everyone commented how elegant and elaborate it all looked which was what I wanted. Can you check in your area to see if you have décor companies for weddings like this? it can't hurt to go see what they have and their pricing. When I started looking myself at purchasing satin table clothes, sure I could buy them a little cheaper than renting, but then having to iron, get them to venue, set them all up it was a no brainer to just rent everything.

I think my venue sets up the tables (linens, chair covers, centerpieces), but I have to do everything else. I apparently get the venue at noon (ceremony starts at 4:30) so I hope to be there at that time to ensure that I have time to get everything done!

We are decorating after the rehearsal the night before the wedding. We are giving people an incentive to stick around and help by having pizza there after we are done with everything. Please know this is a very laid back event! Lol!