One of the biggest challenges—and most rewarding parts—of planning your wedding is trying to make sure that the reception is fun, stress free, and most of all, representative of both bride and groom. The standard reception featuring a dinner, a DJ, a bouquet toss, and some dancing is an easy blueprint, but how do you make your day memorable and personal? Some people put together their own playlist of music for the DJ or cater from a special restaurant, but there are many more ways to make the reception stand out.

1. Location, location, location

Often, wedding receptions are held either in a banquet hall adjacent to the ceremony or in a nearby restaurant, but more and more, it’s becoming common to travel a short distance. Directions from the ceremony to the reception venue can be included in the wedding invitation itself. That way, your guests are prepared to travel, and they already have an idea of where they’re going.

One fun idea is to go to a sports venue and have a ballpark reception. While it may be expensive to rent a place like Bosse Field, this reception can easily be replicated at a hometown ballpark. This also opens up your food choices: you can serve ballpark foods like nachos, hot dogs, and draft beer. If you met while playing softball, and the whole team will be at the reception, this might be a fun way to celebrate not only your union but also what brought you together.

Of course, that’s not the only fun location you could use. Couples who met as actors in community productions have held receptions in theatres, musicians have held receptions at small venues like bars or coffeehouses, and those who met at school have found ways to incorporate part of their college campus in their special day. The ideas are limitless, and most places are willing to talk to you about renting a space for your big day.

By focusing on special memories you share as a couple, you can come up with the perfect location—the first step to a memorable, fun reception.

2. Drinks & desserts

In the last several years, things like candy bars have become wedding favorites. Instead of featuring the typical wedding cake for dessert, you can set up a table with different kinds of candy. This is great in terms of both design and dessert; you can select candy that matches your colors and put it in clear glass vases to create unique centerpieces. It’s also another opportunity to personalize the event. You can order single-color, personalized M&M’s that feature the date, your names, or even—if you want to get very fancy—pictures. The good thing about candy bars is that they offer variety, too—even the pickiest eaters usually have their favorite candy. However, if you’re still sold on pastries but want to offer more than cake, another idea is a Hostess snack bar, featuring dessert favorites like Twinkies, HoHos, Sno Balls, and Ding Dongs. You can even take them out of their wrappers and arrange them in a cupcake tree. This idea adds a casual element to an otherwise formal event, putting your guests and the happy couple at ease and adding a welcome touch of whimsy.
            Some brides and grooms use drinks to showcase their individuality. By selecting a signature drink to feature at the reception, you can create a sensory link to your wedding day. For example, many open bars serve beer and wine, but if you serve beer, wine, and a drink that reflects the season (like Bailey’s and coffee in the winter), you’ll have not only something special for your guests but also a special memory of your wedding reception whenever you have that drink.


3. Ways to remember the day

Most brides and grooms will tell you that they barely remember their wedding day. Between the stress of getting everything together, the joy of saying “I do,” and the relief at finally reaching the reception, the day becomes a blur. That’s one of the reasons people are so willing to pay for professional wedding photographers; those pictures are visual memories of the day.
             This is one reason a guest book is so important. If your reception will include many friends and relatives, it may be difficult to spend time with everyone. A guest book lets each individual sign and leave good wishes for the bride and groom. If you’d like to take it a step further, you can do this with a photo-booth guest book.
            A photo-booth guest book can be as simple as leaving disposable cameras at each table and asking your guests to take pictures of themselves, each other, and anything else they want to record for posterity. This idea has morphed and grown in the last several years, though, and now it’s not uncommon to see actual photo booths at receptions. Some people have incorporated the “guest book” aspect in a new, clever way; by leaving chalkboards or white boards and markers at the tables (or in the photo booth), you give your guests a chance to write something AND leave a picture, all at the same time. And you’ll have a really cool photo book to enjoy and share for years to come.

4. Themes

As much fun as it is to just pick things that you both like and include them, sometimes it is easier, at least for planning, to have a theme. Often, the theme is intuitive: if you’ve selected a special venue, like a theatre, your theme could be plays or movies. Your theme can be incorporated in every aspect of the wedding, starting with your invitations, if you’d like. For example, for a movie theme, just attach a reel of film to each piece of paper associated with the wedding to tie in your theme simply. If you really want to go all out, how about a red carpet at the reception venue, formal place cards at the dinner tables, and announcements that look like playbills. The ways to adapt a theme are limited only by your imagination.
            If you’re having a reception at a slightly less defined venue, like a banquet hall or a church, it’s still easy to come up with something to tie the party together. For example, if you’re close to your heritage, including personal cultural touches to the entire ceremony can make it a special one. One way of doing that is to have all of the announcements and cards in two languages: this will allow your guests to see where you are from (and even learn something, too). If you are both hunters, you can use camouflage for decoration; if you are into rock ’n roll, stop by a thrift store, pick up some old LPs, and use them to create centerpieces and decorations. The possibilities are endless and best defined by the things that define you as a couple.

Once you’ve decided what is most important to you as a couple, it’s easy to start tying ideas together for the reception. Whether you let your location guide the theme or your theme guide everything else, it’s important to remember that your reception should first and foremost be a party that both bride and groom will enjoy and remember with pleasure for years to come.

— Katie Darby-Mullins