Wedding Reception
Choosing a perfect spot for your wedding reception can be confusing and difficult. So, here are some key things to look for to ensure you have a wonderful experience for your wedding reception and your guests do, as well.
Capacity and Layout of the Event Space
Ensure the space you need can comfortably accommodate your guest list. A good rule of thumb is to allow 8-10 square feet per person for a seated dinner and dancing. Also, consider the layout’s flow between the ceremony area, cocktail space, dining room, and dance floor. Open floor plans offer flexibility, while separate rooms provide more intimate settings.
Amenities and Services
Evaluate what’s included for the rental fee and if there are any unexpected additional costs. Do they include tables, chairs, linens, sound systems, and adequate lighting? Ask about kitchen facilities, bar setups, and whether they provide serving staff. Do they allow outside catering or must you use their inhouse caterer?
Location and Accessibility
Choose a venue that’s convenient for most guests, with ample nearby parking. Easy access to the highway or bus routes are a must. Will they be able to easily accommodate elderly guests or those with mobility issues with wheelchair accessibility, elevator availability, and restroom facilities? If you’re having a wedding ceremony elsewhere, definitely factor in travel time between locations.
Atmosphere and Restrictions
The hall’s architectural style and décor should be engaging and classic. High ceilings and natural light create an elegant atmosphere, while intimate spaces work better for smaller gatherings. Inquire about decoration restrictions, noise ordinances, and end times. Some venues prohibit certain decorations, have strict music volume limits, or require cleanup by specific hours, so be sure you are fully informed.
Budget Considerations
Beyond the rental fee, budget for additional costs like security deposits, overtime charges, setup fees, and gratuities. Ask about serving alcohol and if you can bring in your own cake. Get all pricing in writing and clarify cancellation policies. Be sure to read every detail in the contract.
Book the Venue Early
Many event space centers charge less for certain times of the week or for specific seasons. If you are on a tight budget, choosing the less expensive days would be helpful. Expect to book your space a year ahead!
Wedding Reception
If you’re planning your wedding reception, you might want to take a look back in time to see where the layered wedding cake was first used. Possibly there is a fun and unique idea for your own cake.
Medieval Origins
In medieval times in England a tradition began involving cakes. The purpose was to discover if the marriage was going to be a prosperous one.
Kissing Over Stacked Cakes
Have you seen stacks of cupcakes being use as a convenient and rather trendy way of having a wedding cake?
Well, stacked buns are how the wedding cake began. The attendees brought many small buns and stacked a tower as high as they could. Then the happy couple would kiss while leaning over the tower. If they successfully kissed and the tower of buns still stood high then their marriage would be full of prosperity.
Frosting’s Beginnings
Eventually, a little cheating entered the picture in the form of apple sauce and honey. It was used as mortar to keep that bun tower from falling. You could say this began the era of frosting the buns.
Of course, the French chefs got involved with adding cream puffs and fillings to the idea. Towers of cream puffs are still a tradition today for many couples. It is a delicious way to do something different and keep the tradition of a wedding cake alive.
The Modern Cake
The nun tower eventually turned into a cake tower. Bakers started using a specially designed hardened frosting to keep the stack of cakes from sinking in the middle. So, the cakes turned into a nice hatbox style.
In the 20th century wedding cakes eventually evolved into column cakes to give more height to the layers. This gave the wedding cake a more formal, elegant design.
Your Wedding Reception
What traditional will you be going with for your wedding cake? Are you doing columns, hatbox style or a tower of cupcakes or cream puffs?
Wedding Reception, Wedding Venue
It’s your wedding. You live in Silicon Valley and probably met here, as well. So, play it up as a theme for your reception! Adding some tech to the festivities just seems so perfect.
Live Streaming
There are probably 10%-20% of your guests that want to come, but something big came up that prevents their attendance. So, be sure you live stream your wedding so they don’t have to miss a second of it. This will also be edited into your wedding video!
Digital Guest Books
You could go traditional and have a pretty guest book near the front door with a fancy plumed pen. But this is Silicon Valley in its hay day, yes? Go digital and save a tree. Use an iPad with a QR code that will take them to your guest list in the cloud.
Digital Seating Charts
If you’re assigning seating at the reception, make it easy for them to find their seats. A digital seating chart lets them know exactly which numbered table they will be enjoying.
Interactive Photo Booths
Be sure to book a booth that will share to social instantly! Your guests will love it that they don’t have to stop partying and can just click and share their fun time.
Drones!
Have a drone display in the sky at nightfall that guests can watch from the Villa Ragusa Balcony! Remember to schedule the photographer to capture it.
Virtual Reality Keepsakes
Save the environment. Go Virtual Reality for keepsakes instead of piles of stuff the guests don’t really like or want.
Go Easy with Tech
Be sure to go easy on the technology. You don’t want to overwhelm the wedding with awesome tech. The focus needs to stay on you, the wedding couple. You are the entertainment, you’re only enhancing the festivities with tech.
Guest Lists, Wedding Reception, Wedding Venue
Wedding guest list compilation sometimes needs to go farther than usual. There is sometimes a delicate situation that comes up – you need to invite both former spouses or even former business partners. Here’s how you handle this.
The Bickering Former Partner Situation
Whether it’s former business partners or freshly broken up romantic partners, it is a sensitive situation at your wedding. Typically, you’re friends with both ends of that equation so it’ll feel like you need to make a King Solomon level of decision. But you don’t have to split the couple and decide who you get to keep. No, there is a way that both can attend your wedding and reception.
This couple’s inability to be civil to each other creates much high drama. That drama feeds the problem itself and makes everyone around them miserable. But your duty is to have them there and handle it in such a way that it neutralizes the problem itself.
The Wedding with the Hatfields and McCoys Attending
There are some tricks for the wedding ceremony when the feuding partners are attending.
- Give them arrival times that are ½ hour apart, preventing them from standing in line together.
- Have assigned seating. Put their seats equally far away from the front and far away from each other side to side, avoiding them having a line of sight of the other. Create a buffer zone of friends around each of them.
These three items will keep a lid on their explosive nature. If done perfectly, they won’t even know the other is there. Then the wedding is a pleasant experience for both of them – and everyone else at the wedding ceremony.
The Wedding Reception Plan
At the wedding reception, keep on the mission of keeping this couple apart. Here are some suggestions:
- Make the Villa Ragusa Event Coordinator aware of this situation. We will do what we can to keep the situation defused.
- Assign one of the wedding party to interact with one of the problematic couple and another person to be the point of contact for the other.
- If group family photos are required, put them at opposite edges of the photo.
- Consider an alcohol-free wedding reception.
- Avoid any mention of their split.
Additional Help at the Reception
Remember you have help with those former partners all around you. Always feel free to mention the couple to the Villa Ragusa event coordinator, your wedding planner and your friends. This takes the worry off you. They won’t be able to spoil your wedding.
Wedding Reception, Wedding Venue
It is your wedding reception to celebrate your love for each other and forge your future. Making it like no other reception is important. There are several ways you can show your guests “your story.”
Your Couple Uniqueness
When your wedding reception includes a celebration of your unique personalities and your story as a couple, it adds so much more to the experience.
Think about the entire story behind your falling in love.
How and where did you meet? On vacation? At a horrible workplace?
Was it a silly experience or a very serious one?
What were your wearing back then?
Who introduced you?
What did you think of each other? Was it love at first sight?
Discuss these details with your partner and come up with “your story.” Then incorporate these details with the obligatory heartwarming details heavily peppered with a good sense of humor.
Here are some ideas on how to weave your story into your reception.
- Put on a short, funny skit of your story. Make the telling a little quirky and fun when highlighting the most important moments. Make it last no more than 15 minutes.
- Offer a slide show over dinner. Feature places and people you met along the way. Have your engagement photo at the ending.
- Include décor symbolic elements. Did you meet at a park? Include wildflowers on the table. Did he write you a sticky note? Include sticky notes all over the tables.
- Personal meaning wedding favors. Pack a bag with little things that represent what you love as a couple, a surprise baby announcement, sand from the beach where you met, etc.
Villa Ragusa Wedding Reception Event Spaces
When you reserve your space at Villa Ragusa, just let us know you need a little help with the planning. Our Event Coordinators love to give suggestions on fun and meaningful things to include with your reception.
Wedding Reception, Wedding Venue
It is important to consider the timing for transferring your guests from the wedding to the reception, even if this two events are happening in the same location. You want to ensure people arrive on time at the next event so their arrival isn’t disruptive.
At Villa Ragusa we’ve hosted hundreds of wedding receptions, so we know all too well how important that timing is.
Guest Transport
Drive the route from your wedding location to the farthest parking lot at Villa Ragusa. And do this test of time on the same day of the week and time as your wedding. This is the only way you will know for sure how long it will take for your guests to arrive.
And, FYI, people tend to take a little break between the ceremony and the reception. They’ll smoke, vape, use a restroom, chat with someone that haven’t seen in ages, etc. So, it is smart to allow an additional hour aside from the drive.
Consider hiring buses or vans to move people from one location to the next. And remember to give them a ride back to their vehicle! That makes it easy for them to get to the location and still have the celebration going without traffic headaches to blow the mood.
The Same Location Issue
If you’ll be having your ceremony in the same space as the wedding reception, there is a lag time to setup the reception. Ideally, the guests should be ushered elsewhere when this happens. A possible solution is to book two event spaces. One set up for the ceremony only. Then have them walk to the next event space that is all set up and ready for the party.
Focus on the Guest Experience
Directly after the wedding ceremony, bring out cocktails and light refreshments. Let them mingle and snack for an hour before being transported to Villa Ragusa for the reception. People are in a large group and they’ll be very excited to talk to friends and family they haven’t seen in some time. So go with the flow of that need for a short time before the big reception.
Contact Our Event Coordinators
We are happy to help with the details of your reception at Villa Ragusa. Book an appointment with one of our Event Coordinators.
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