Table Combinations

I've been to a wedding where it was tables of 6 and it felt too....intimate (if that makes sense). I would personally do at least tables of 8. I think that you have enough extras to spread everything out though!

View Quoted Comment Part of the problem is that no one wants to sit with my fiance's father. His parents are divorced and most of the guests from my fiance's side are on his mom's side. We invited the dad's sister and two brothers, but only the sister is attending. On my side, my father is a recovering alcoholic and there will be alcohol so we would prefer to sit him with people that won't be drinking. We also have an entire family that is 7 people (2 flower girls, ring bearer, 1 usher, their mom and dad, and the nanny) and we don't want to stick one random person at their table. We thought since we do have a smaller guest count than we could at least put those mentioned at smaller tables.

This will depend some on the size of your tables. Many venue tables are 60", but not all. Daughter's wedding had 101 guests. They had: a sweetheart table, 2 72" tables with 10 guests at each (the two families, and it would have been super awkward to split them up any other way -- groom's parents are divorced and absolutely could NOT be together, so the only place to put his mom was with my husband and I at our table; that bumped our table up to 10. I sat his, potentially volatile, mom next to one of my close friends and just gave her a heads up. My friend and her husband were incredibly gracious, and likely helped keep MOG on her better behavior. We packed FOG's table with the officiant and his wife, again to help, potentially, keep everyone on their best behavior.... I understand the family dynamic issues.... ), and 11 60" tables. All but one of the 60" tables had either 7 or 8 guests (it was about half-and-half) depending on friend groupings. We had one table of 6 -- a set of parents and their 4 kids, ages 4-10, who were all in the wedding and the only children invited. Like your situation, there was NO ONE else who was going to want to sit with them.... Their table was kind of sparse, but oh, well.... They also had a bar set up, 2 8' rectangular tables (one for the coffee service and another for pictures/decor), a smaller round cake table, and the DJ's set up. Technically, I believe the reception space had a max of 220 for dining, and we had 101 (plus about 5 vendors, but they ate in a different space, so they didn't have a table in the reception room). The way the venue set up the tables, it didn't look like "Wow! This room seems empty." There was plenty to fill it up. We had chargers and at least 3 glasses per place setting, etc., so the tables with 7 did not look empty by any means. Good luck!

View Quoted Comment Thanks! My concern is the room looking empty and making sure that people that don't want to sit with certain are far away from each other. Some of my fiance's friends also dated each other and have broken up and don't want to sit by each other which further complicates matters.

Ah I know what you mean.
I needed 26 tables to take up the whole space otherwise they would have sectioned me off.
I didn't have enough people for 26 tables but i ended up spreading people out 8-9 to a table instead of all of them being ten to a table.
Sometimes the tables get so crowded anyway. But I do agree if your tables are large and you're spreading it out like that then it could seem really empty

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I just checked our paperwork and the reception space was 5000 square feet, a bit more rectangular than square. They set everything up around the dance floor, and probably left a little more space between tables than they would if it were a bigger group. The room didn't look empty with 13 guest tables and the other stuff I listed. Daughter and SIL also had some friends who couldn't be seated with certain other friends. I think she spread them over about 4 tables. In watching the raw video footage, it's obvious there may have been some awkward encounters between ex's on the dance floor, but for the most part people avoided anyone they needed to. Good luck! I'm sure it will all be fine and turn out beautiful.

View Quoted Comment Thank you so much!

View Quoted Comment 26 tables is crazy. I am not sure how large the tables are. She said they have ones that fit 10 and 8, but that we could do smaller if we want. I know the other stuff I mentioned will take up some space as well.

This was the table set up for 101 guests (13 tables + sweetheart) in 5000 sq ft space (tables 1 & 13 were 72"; all others were 60")

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Wow what did you use to make this?! This would be very helpful for planning the reception seating.

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The coordinator at daughter's venue prepared it for us...sorry!

Vanessa, you talk about closing off part of the ballroom as an option, but you are concerned about the unused ballroom space getting sold and people walking through your pre-function/cocktail space, right? Did you already contract the full ballroom, but with a smaller guest count you are reconsidering the space? And there are air walls to partition the ballroom? If all this is the case, why not keep the contracted full ballroom, but close the air wall and use the smaller space so your party feels good and nicely filled? The empty space on the other side of the wall should still be yours, even if you aren't using it.

There are often clauses in hotel contracts that they can move to you a different space suitable for the size of your group (so they can resell your space). You'd want to make sure this clause doesn't come into play. One thing you can do is "use" the extra portion of ballroom for other things. Storage? Coat check? Getting ready space? Anything to ensure the space remains yours. However, if you are going to have trouble hitting your food and beverage minimum spend for the full ballroom and reduced guest count, that's another can of worms.

I also agree that not every table must have the exact same number of settings. Since you'll be assigning tables, it'll look totally fine if most are 8s with some 7s and 9s as make sense for your groupings (make sure you get 60" rounds, not 72"). I agree that 6 will feel a little awkward.

View Quoted Comment Our contract just says we can use the ballroom, but it doesn't specify how many rooms. Our venue coordinator already told us if we choose not to use all three rooms then they can try to rent out that space. Therefore, strangers would be walking through where our cocktail hour is as well as where our card table is. My fiance started working on the seating chart and only a handle full of tables have 6 people. Most are tables of 7 or 8. I know one of the tables of six is my parents, my brother and his wife and my mom's two friends and since my dad can't really be around people that drink they don't mind having a smaller table. As for the extra space, I think our buffet, candy bar and photo booth will take up a good amount of it.

View Quoted Comment We had a couple more people RSVP since I originally posted this but we are still under the minimum requirement. My fiance and I have decided to do add a mashtini station which is about $10 extra per person so we will be over $7,000 with adding that.