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We also had a winter wedding, and our time was 4:30 in TX. We had good light for our before pictures, but not so much by the time our reception started. I think lighting is another pro!
Also, everyone I know who did an afternoon wedding was SO GLAD, bc they had energy to start off their honeymoon right!
I agree about the lighting... that was my pro about photography :)
I just thought of another con-- would people be less likely to dance, etc in the afternoon (and without as much alcohol haha)?
Honey...it's YOUR wedding. Do whatever you want (traditional or not). Whatever makes you happy. The rest of your family members either already had THEIR wedding or will have THEIR own wedding and they already did/can do whatever they want then. For the meantime, it's all about you, darling! Live it up! It is better to be practical at the start of your marriage and save tons of money (perhaps for a down payment for a house later -- or just for your sanity that you have savings) than have an evening bash and start your marriage in debt. Best of luck!
Two things:
1. many Catholic weddings are held in the morning, and they are quite traditional and formal, so I don't think that a late morning/early afternoon wedding is non-traditional
2. as you said, it gets dark VERY EARLY in Chicago in January, so by the time the reception is ending, it will be dark, and it will probably feel very natural to be leaving at that time. And I am sure most people will appreciate not going to bed incredibly late after celebrating with you.
The dancing thing is really dependent on your guestlist. Meg at APracticalWedding had a daytime wedding and everybody danced. I don't think there's anything wrong with a day time wedding, if that's what you want. Didn't people used to get married during the day?
We seriously considered a daytime wedding! The ONLY reason we changed our minds was because we got an amazing deal at our venue for a Friday night wedding.
When we were thinking about doing a daytime wedding, we were planning on doing an after-party that night...and we were both really excited about it! Then you can go chill/have lots of sex/maybe take a nap after the reception and go back out and see everyone that night and party as late as you want!
On the dancing thing, I agree that it really depends on your guests. We're having an evening wedding and I'm still concerned about people not dancing, just because in our circle of people there usually isn't much dancing at weddings (although I'd love to change that!!) If you have people who love to dance, they'll be dancing no matter what time it is! I know I would! :-)
Our ceremony was at 1pm and the reception started a little after 2pm. It went great! We had good lighting for the pictures, I wasn't exhausted at all and I think the older people and families appreciated that they got to leave by 6:30-7pm.
People drank. The fact that there was sunlight did not refrain them, so I wouldn't really count on people drinking less. We had a major dance party, so I also wouldn't worry too much about that. As for what to do after the reception, it worked out great for us! My husband and I went to my parents house and socialized with my family for a little bit, we went to the hotel we booked and changed our clothes, then we went back downtown to a bar where all our friends and younger family members were hanging out and partied till about 1am.
I just liked having the choice to stay up late, or escape early. Very fun! Some of our friends stayed till the bar closed at 3am!
We're having a Sunday wedding. We're starting around 3 and cutting the cake by 930 so people can get home if they need to for work the next day. If people want to stick around and socialize after, they are welcome to do that as well. We're not having dancing, so if you want dancing, it might not be pertinent for you, but Sunday room rentals are also usually much cheaper, and people probably won't drink as much if they have to work early the next morning.
@LorennaL- I know that lots of different people do things differently... I just meant for my family. Everyone always gets married at like 3 or 4 or 5 an then has receptions that go until 11 or 12.
@amanda.lynn/mskalinin- i love the afterparty idea..... this might be something to think about!
I agree with amandalynn, you can have an after party for the people that stay in town, or live there and celebrate with your guests for even longer! I think you should do what works best for you. If a day wedding isn't what you want, consider doing one on Friday evening to still get a discount. I know it's still different and that your family prefers the traditional, but just a thought.
We are getting married at 10:30am with a brunch reception immediately following. Like many others, we are having an after party. I am clearly biased :)
To address some of your concerns: I think an earlier reception is a little nontraditional, but it can also be done with a lot of elegance and formality, in a more refined way. Brunch is VERY elegant! So is an afternoon tea. It doesn't have to be more informal if you don't want it to be. I also think the unexpectedness makes it more special because its not the same as all the other weddings your loved ones have been to.
I think you can have the "picture in your head" at any time of day! Don't worry about it being awkward - people will either head out, grateful to be getting home at a decent hour, or head to your after party to keep the party going!
I obviously think you should go this direction if it works for you!
for the dancing, I think you really set the tone! make sure you have a mix of oldies and goodies in there
While I could've spent more time mingling, I spent a LOT of time on the dance floor, and I think it set a fun tone to the reception!
We got married at 1 pm and I'm very glad we did! It was so nice to leave the reception and enjoy our evening together. We actually ended up going our to dinner at a nice restaurant near the hotel where we stayed as we didn't really eat much of anything at our reception - too busy enjoying our guests! :)
However, in response to your post, I recommend that if you have a choice between morning or afternoon, I highly recommend going with afternoon for two specific reasons.
1. Getting married at one pm allowed for guests that lived within 5 or 6 hours of the wedding to drive or fly in that day and not have to miss work on Friday if they didn't want to. I actually had multiple out of town guests who came in on Saturday and then spent the night at a hotel Saturday evening. I was recently invited to a 10:30 am wedding 5 1/2 hours away and had to decline it because I couldn't take off work that Friday. Had it been in the afternoon, I would have gladly gotten up early and drove or flown in.
2. Getting married in the afternoon makes it very difficult to do pictures before the ceremony if you are making any beauty appointments before the ceremony. With our one pm wedding, I had my hair apointment at 8:30, was done with hair by 9:30, drove to church and arrived at 10:00 and had an hour and a half for makeup, dress and accessories and grabbing a snack before I started pictures at 11:30. I was done pictures by 12:30 and had a half hour break while guests arrive. I can't imagine how early that whole process would have to start for a morning wedding. If you are going to a makeup artist or hair stylist you have to consider how early they can work with you.
Just my thoughts...
Oops! One con I forgot to mention about afternoon weddings! As I posted earlier, we got married at one p.m. Our reception started at 2 and we were thinking it would go to 5:00 or 5:30. It wasn't a seated meal - more of a mingly cocktail party/hors de vours. We were surpised when many people were gone by 4:00 pm. We realized that what had happened was that people had double booked themselves - planned to attend our wedding in afternoon and an evening event as well. (Some people even had an evening wedding to go to!) Once we realized people weren't leaving because they were board but legitimately had somehwere to go, we decided to leave while the party was strong and check out early ourselves. However, if you want a long reception, realize that people attending an afternoon reception may book evening plans.
Everyone has such great advice! I think we will definitely keep our minds open to an afternoon wedding. We may also go the other direction and consider a late-night wedding, with a reception starting at like 9. I feel like that might free us up to serve appetizers rather than dinner and will also be shorter (less alcohol) while still partying hard into the night, etc.
Does anyone wish they got more than one wedding because there are just too many good options?? haha. Okay I really don't because weddings are EXPENSIVE but gosh are there a lot of choices. :)
My husband had so much fun at our wedding he told me we should do a wedding every year on our anniversary! I was like.. yeah that would be nice if we were made of money XD
I had my hair appointment at 9:30am with my 4 bm's and it was kind of tight to get to the church by 1pm. We actually had to skip the pictures I had planned with my BM's and my family at the hotel we stayed in (did it after the ceremony instead). If I had made my hair appointment at 8:30 it would not have been a problem, though.
While I think its true that there is the chance people will plan evening events for themselves, most of our guests were out of towners, so were happy to follow my in-town friends to our favorite local bar. The older guests all went to more low-key after parties hosted either at my parents' house or at my husband's aunt and uncle's rented vacation home. Everyone told us they had a lot of fun at these parties, it was a chance to catch up with family they don't see often.
Our reception lasted from about 2pm till maybe 7 or 7:30pm. It was after dark when the rental company started removing all the tables, chairs, dishes, etc. Might have even been like 8:30 becuase we had scheduled pick up at 7:30 but paid them to wait another hour. We had to turn the juke box off to get people to stop dancing!
I <3 daytime weddings for the below reasons (bullet style like you)
@crebre, you?
@Corgi - I think afternoon weddings can be awesome, but they definitely tend to have a different feeling. From what I've heard, afternoon receptions with just cake and punch are way more common in the south than up north by us. I don't think breaking your family out of an old mold is necessarily such a con :)
This are just my opinions only.
I went to 2 afternoon/morning wedding and they are just very tiring and somewhat boring. I'm not a big drinker or party person, but def not a morning person. What happens if it rain, it'll be dark too. It actually takes up the whole day b/c it's at a weird time where I woke up I have to get out and when the wedding is over I'm too tired to go out. People might give you less money too b/c they know it's afternoon wedding and it cost less. You and bm also have to get up really early to do makeup.
At the end it's your wedding, do whatever that makes you happy, it's your wedding and it'll be with you forever :). You can't make everyone happy.
I'm having a mid-day wedding. It's going to be a more casual, outdoor wedding with a catered buffet lunch. To be honest, i never really considered a dinner reception. We have a lot of families coming, and people driving the day of, and it just seemed more "us".
I worried about people leaving early and it feeling awkward, but my dad's wedding was a daytime wedding as well (2 years ago) and it went well and didn't seem awkward.
We are having lawn games in addition to dancing (weather permitting). Neither FI or I dance much, and we aren't having a dance floor. Actually, if it's not raining, we'll be dancing outside on the grass lawn.
I think you should think about the feel of your wedding and how formal you want it to be. I do think day time weddings have a more relaxed feel to it.
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Beekeeper
So we haven't booked a venue yet... but we've just been assuming we'll do a night reception. The costs of it all are driving me nuts and I realized that I totally didn't even consider having an earlier reception which would save lots of money. Here are some pros/cons I can think of... but I'd love for other people's opinions and experiences (I have never been to something like this). All my cons seem to be non-tangible "in my head" kind of things... but its really hard to get past that!
Pros:
1- will save lots of money because everything is cheaper-- especially bc people won't drink as much
2- saving money will free me up to do more DIY stuff and have more *extras*
3- my FI doesn't drink and doesn't love seeing people get drunk... I think people would drink less in the morning/afternoon
4- will make photos easier. We are getting married in January so it gets dark EARLY and I don't love the idea of a "first look"... so we'd have to get creative with no daylight.
5- I have a lot of family who lives 2 hours away, this might free them up to come here and drive back in one day so they don't have to pay for a hotel room if they don't want to
6- we will actually stay awake throughout the reception... and maybe have energy for sex afterwards!
Cons:
1- No one in my family has ever done this and my family is VERY opposed to non-traditional stuff... they would definitely find this weird.
2- somehow I feel like the day is less formal/special if it is in the day--- but i realize this feeling is totally irrational
3- doesn't match the picture in my head i've had since forever about how my wedding would be
4- it might be kind of awkward to have the party over by evening... like where does everyone go?
5- less time time to get ready in the morning