Image via Pixabay
Everyone wants to have a memorable wedding, don’t they? Something to tell the kids about, share the photo album with friends and family for years to come, and not least of all, to look back on fondly as the two of you make your way through your lives together.
There are many different ways that a wedding can be conducted, from a traditional ceremony in a church, followed by a reception at your house, to more niche and off-the-wall setups.
Whatever your particular taste in wedding style might be, here are a few ways you can ensure that your wedding is just as memorable as you want it to be.
Hold the ceremony or reception somewhere exciting or particularly meaningful
You could “officially” have your wedding down at the local registry office in your town, and then just have a few friends or relatives over at your place afterwards for a meal, some drinks, and a film.
That would be one way of doing things, and there’s nothing wrong with it if that’s your preference.
For many people, however, a wedding is something that should stand out from the ordinary. It should be big, bright, different, and should reflect the magnitude of the vows you and your partner are making to each other, and reflect positively on the life the two of you are hoping to build in the future.
One great way of achieving this “different” and “larger than life” feel for your wedding or reception, is to host them somewhere you find exciting, exotic, or else particularly meaningful for whatever reason.
This could mean investigating the best Las Vegas outdoor wedding venues on offer, or it could mean returning to your childhood hometown to tie the knot. It could mean taking a trip to the Swiss Alps for a mountainside ceremony, or it could mean jetting off to Australia to enjoy some sun and sand on your big day.
Wherever you decide to hold your wedding, try to ensure that it’s somewhere you enjoy and can feel positively about, at the very least.
Don’t drink too much
Wedding receptions tend to bring with them a boisterous and excitable atmosphere, with plenty of food, dancing, music, laughter, and, yes, alcohol.
While having a drink or two of champagne on your big day isn’t likely to spoil the experience for you, getting too carried away and becoming catastrophically drunk is certainly not the way to forge wedding memories that you can look back on fondly in years to come.
The idea of losing control of your faculties and humiliating yourself on your wedding day is not a thought that anyone would relish, and even if you don’t do anything overtly embarrassing, drinking too much at your reception is still very likely to ruin your memory of the event and the day, even if only because you’ll experience the amnesia caused to differing degrees by alcohol.
Instead of throwing back the drinks like you were a teenager again, going wild in a club, try to pace yourself and enjoy the atmosphere and the company of your loved ones, rather than doing your best to lose control.
Consider a themed wedding in line with your interests
Themed weddings are becoming more and more popular these days, as people apparently tire of the more traditional and formal routine, and opt to turn their weddings into fun, hilarious, artistic expressions of theirs and their partner’s interests.
Choosing a theme for your wedding in line with your interests could certainly be a great way of making it more memorable than it would otherwise be. Just be sure that you aren’t going to regret the potentially gimmicky and lighthearted atmosphere of such a wedding once you’re done.
If you’ve decided that such a wedding is for you, however, your options are virtually limitless.
Are you and your significant other massive Star Trek fans? You could no doubt hire out a hall and have it professionally decorated to look at least something like the inside of the Starship Enterprise. You could dress the part, and try to get the maids of honour and best man to play along. The music could be selected to match the show, and you could even have professional impersonators of the main characters attend the wedding and put on a display.
If, on the other hand, you were obsessed with fairytales and forests, you could hire a treehouse complex for the ceremony, and hire an outdoor area (at ground level) for a reception, complete with bonfire and camping.
Get your friends and family to join in as entertainers
Do you have any friends or relatives with talents or hobbies that you really admire? Well, your wedding reception might be the perfect time to ask them to put on a display for the group.
If one of your friends is a skilled fire-dancer, for example (as well as being confident in front of crowds), you could wait until dusk and then call the other guests outside for a mysterious performance and let them marvel at what takes place before them.
If a relative of yours is especially skilled with the guitar, you could have them perform a few ballads or singalongs on request, or even bring their band down.
Involving the guests in this way can help to make the atmosphere more fun and intimate, just as long as everyone’s having a good time, and no one feels that they’ve been emotionally blackmailed into doing anything they don’t want to.
Hire interactive entertainers
The standard wedding reception entertainment — the DJ — is all well and good (maybe essential, in fact) but when it comes to really livening the festivities up, it’s hard to beat interactive entertainers who engage with the guests one on one.
These interactive entertainers take many forms, ranging from face painters for the children, to caricaturists for those among the guests who like the idea of getting themselves drawn up in unflattering, comical fashion.
Other kinds of interactive entertainers could include group dancing coaches, comics, or anyone who might be involved in a professional capacity in a themed wedding.
The possibilities here are practically limitless, and depend only on your interests, your budget, and the kinds of things your guests would be interested in getting involved with.
Make sure there are good photographers on the job
They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, and while there’s some debate to be had there, it’s definitely true that one of the key ways you’ll get to look back on your wedding in the future is by literally looking through the photo album from the day.
Needless to say, you should make sure that there are good photographers on the job who know what they’re doing, aren’t going to forget to take photos, and will be able to capture the highlights of the day succinctly.
Hiring a professional photographer is certainly a good idea, but encouraging some of your friends and family to adopt amateur photographer duty may also be a good idea. Not only does this provide some backup, and ensure that there are even more pictures to look through later, but it also provides a different perspective on the event.
Maybe your dad will capture elements of the festivities which your professional photographer won’t, and maybe your cousin or best friend will immortalize a funny conversation or anecdote on video, which would otherwise be lost to memory.
With the abundance of technology available today, it’s easy to take thousands of photos and compile them all into shared albums.
