All Things Wedding Seating

We’ve often heard people complaining about how tiring, stressful and difficult creating a wedding seating plan is, and we know that it’s the one task likely to take longer than almost any other. Perhaps it’s because it looks at first glance as though it should be terribly easy to do. After all, you invite 100 guests, you grab 100 chairs and stick them round a few tables, scattering names of loved ones, friends, and even family members across the whole room. Couldn’t be easier, right?

Wrong. And so many people have said this that we decided to carry out a little research, Facebook style. After all, if there’s one place where people like to gather in order to have a good moan and share in the misery of planning a wedding, it’s Facebook.

Take A Seat… It’s The Seating Plan Survey Results

So, we took to Facebook, and after a mere twenty minutes of leaving comments on the latest hilarious cat memes, we posed the question,

Almost two hundred people responded, with a resounding 65% agreeing wholeheartedly, (130 people out of 198). Given the vast number of other potentially stressful aspects of wedding planning, this really does underline just how awful this element can be.

Interestingly we got quite a few comments posted too, including:

Why Is Creating A Seating Plan So Darned Stressful?

You’d think that a wedding would bring out the best in people, and that since everyone attending is a friend or family member they’d all get on and help support a spirit of harmony and peace.

Not so. Get the seating plan wrong and it could very well be a disaster that haunts you for years to come. Don’t you dare sit Aunt Belinda next to that frightful bore Uncle Gerald, always remember that Mildred can’t stand children and needs to be seated well away from anyone under four foot, and of course Grandpa Derek must be situated close to the loo.

Then there’s the whole ‘hierarchy’ issue. Everyone attending will consider themselves your closest friend or most loved family member, and will therefore expect one of the best tables. Number them at your peril.

Oh, and of course matchmaking tables are out, as are tables where people could potentially end up hurling the favours at each other before the second course.

Trying to sort out a suitable seating plan where everyone will be happy and have a good time is a little like playing Tetris with a dozen haddock whilst following the rules of chess. Blindfolded.

Top Tips On Creating A Top Seating Plan

Whether you call them ‘tips’, or ‘rules’, these are the things you really need to keep in mind when creating a successful seating plan for a wedding, or indeed any other event where guests need to be seated.

• Don’t leave it until the last minute! Start working out your seating plan as soon as you can, perhaps even before your RSVPs have come back.
• Start with the top table as this can often be the trickiest. If the traditional top table layout doesn’t work for you, don’t be afraid to try something different.
• Keep groups together where you can – family, friends, colleagues.
• Ask your venue if they can accommodate a few different sized tables. It’ll make arranging the seating a lot simpler!
• Use table names rather than numbers as that eliminates any perceived hierarchy.

Another tip we’d add is ‘be flexible’. Even if you’ve had all of your replies back, and you know exactly who is and who isn’t able to come, inevitably this will change. We’ve even known people having to make changes to their seating plan the day before the wedding!

Don’t go to all the trouble of creating a complicated, detailed and beautiful seating plan too far ahead of the Big Day, so that if Auntie Mary and Uncle Dave divorce, you can place them on different tables, and if Cousin Margaret is now married, you might want to extend an additional invitation. Oh, and if your friend Alf ends up marrying a wombat and emigrating to the South Pole, you can remove him from the seating plan without causing too many problems.

How To Create A Seating Plan Without The Stress

We launched TopTablePlanner back in 2007 (gosh, six years ago!) when we realised just how frustrating creating a seating plan can be, with scraps of paper all over the place, and many changes required along the way. We realised that instead of bits of paper on the kitchen table, any one of which could be blown off or eaten by the dog, it would be a great deal simpler to create an online seating plan solution.

With TopTablePlanner you simply add in your guests (or even import them from a text file), add in your tables, and then re-arrange them on the screen until you’re happy.

Plans are saved online too which makes it easy to view and edit them from pretty much any computer, tablet or smartphone with an internet connection – perfect for quickly making changes whilst you’re at work or even when meeting to discuss plans with your venue.

When you’re done, simply print out the seating plan, along with name cards too if you wish, and wonder what all the fuss was about.

A fully functioning free trial is available right now, so try it today and stick your family and friends exactly where you want!

Try TopTablePlanner FREE today! »

Rustic wedding receptions could be in a barn or on a farm, up a mountain or by the lake, in a marquee or a stately country home – wherever you choose your country wedding, rustic chic is the perfect décor.

Table plans and escort cards

Perfect if you have chosen apple green as a highlight colour, these charming apple escort cards are a tasty way to let your guests know where they are sitting.

Easy to make at home if you are handy with a saw, these escort cards are placed in slots carved into branches and could double as a favour for guests to use as a photo or memo holder.

Simple pine cones make great escort card holders, and these lovely basil seedlings in moss covered pots, with escort card labels, are a tasty memento of your big day.

Combining rustic with pretty vintage, this lovely birdcage wedding seating plan could be used by the happy couple as a decorative noticeboard for years to come.

To add a sprinkle of good luck charm for your guests, how about using lucky horseshoes to hold your escort cards?

Rustic charm is a key part of some of our previous blog posts – have a look at these posts about creating wedding seating plans using chalkboards, mirrors and frames, escort card trees, garden weddings and shabby chic for more ideas.

Table names and numbers

Table names could comprise of local beauty spots, or be drawn from the bride and groom’s favourite countryside locations at home or abroad.

This hessian table runner has the table numbers handpainted in white onto the ends, and these shabby chic wooden table numbers would complement the theme perfectly.

Decor and colours

Hessian (or, as the US calls it, burlap) is a great material for adding a little rustic vintage twist to your décor. It could be used as everything from table cloths to napkins, or more subtly by using it to make pretty table centrepieces or bunting. Other rustic touches to the table could include:

• Tying hessian around napkins;
• A little posy of flowers or fragrant herbs to each place setting;
• Jars wrapped in hessian and tied with rafia to make vases for flower arrangement centrepieces;
• Red and white checked tablecloths and decorations of dried corn and wheat, carved pumpkins, apples and cinnamon sticks for an autumnal rustic feel;
• Wild seed favours;
• Bowls of beautiful, fresh, in-season fruit placed in the centre of every table;
• Adding sparkle with decorative butterflies, dragonflies and peacock feathers.

Watch this short tutorial to discover how you can make your own fragrant lavender rustic table centrepieces:

Finishing touches

Read more on this website dedicated to all things to do with rustic weddings.

Round your evening off with an energetic, fun filled barn dance or ceilidh. If you think this would be far too old fashioned then think again – do a bit of searching and you can find some very funky contemporary barn dance bands with excellent callers to make your evening fun for all ages.

Remember to have a look at our rustic wedding seating plan Pinterest board for plenty of further inspiration!

We love it when our readers get in touch with their fantastic comments and ideas. Music teacher Christine from Southern Maryland, USA has told us of her musical masterpiece wedding table plan:

“When guests walk into the reception hall’s hallway, I will have a yellow (one of my colors) music stand with a chalk board on it reading “Please Find Your Seats”. Hanging from the stand will be 5 long strands of silver (other color) ribbon, with escort cards pinned on the ribbon going down the ribbon. (I have mini clothing pins for pin each card.)”

“Guests will then go find their seats by composer names, which I made up using scrapbooking paper and placing in cute treble clef holders that I found online. Some composers will be classical, some country artists for my fiance, some rock artists, a nice mix for variety (and fitted for the guests sitting at their tables).”

What a great idea! It not only caters for all of the guest’s varying musical tastes but it also provides a colour coordinated musical theme.

After reading this, we decided to investigate how music can make your wedding seating plan really go with a swing.

Seating plans and escort cards

• Create personalised concert ticket escort cards.
• Use names of music festivals as table names for your seating plan, with the happy couple on the main stage.
• Put on your very own Love Story on the big screen, with this cinematic wedding seating plan.
• Learn calligraphy, and use the lines on musical manuscript paper as guides to draw up a beautiful sheet music seating plan.
• Finally, look at this intricately created display of orchestral escort cards. The bride and groom are conductors, and I would guess that the table names are the different sections of the orchestra (1st violin, second violin, cellos, brass, woodwind etc).

Table names and numbers

These treble clef table numbers are simple and stylish, as are these lovely violin cut out table numbers.

This is a great vintage retro style wedding seating plan, with each table names after a favourite vinyl record. An extra special touch would be to have an actual copy of the record on each table, and a retro record player in the corner to play it on!

You can add a musical touch to so many other themes, for example:

• Vintage sheet music clothespins to clip escort cards to your rustic or shabby chic themed seating plan.
• Musical bunting for your wedding reception venue.

Don’t forget to look at our musical wedding seating plan Pinterest board for more fabulous musical ideas.

Table Decorations and favours

Table decorations with musical motifs are easy to find in many online and high street shops, and the black and white sheet music and piano keys are ideal to use alongside your chosen accent colour.

If you are looking for musical ways to wrap your favours, you could use printed sheet music to create your own boxes, or buy these vintage style distressed music paper cups – which also could double up as beautiful escort cards.

Live Music

Live musicians, of course, can instantly create any ambience that you want, from a serene and elegant classical quartet to a foot tapping rock and roll band. If you focus on a particular era or musical style, you can use that to generate the whole reception décor – for example swinging sixties or the smooth, elegant sounds of traditional jazz.

And finally…

Throwing a great surprise for the unsuspecting new bride, this groom has obviously done a lot of secret planning with guests to organise a tuneful wedding flashmob musical!

Immediately recognizable, the style of Art Deco is characterised by geometric designs, bold colours and stylized images. Emerging from the spirit of optimism immediately following the first World War, its distinctive shapes, decorative embellishments and artwork make it an exceptionally striking motif for a wedding theme.

Imagine Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, boogy on down to the sounds of the Charleston, put on your top hat and tails and you will be swinging to the sounds of the Art Deco 1920′s era.

Art Deco wedding seating plans

To bring Art Deco into your wedding seating plan, use the ‘Parisian’ typeface (or similar). Have a look at the work of famous artist Charles Renee Mackintosh to draw inspiration for the Art Deco geometrically elegant pattern work. Our Pinterest board has many other ideas to inspire you, including:

• This wedding seating plan is typical of Art Deco style in colour as well as typography;
• This seating plan uses a border and font typical of Art Deco, successfully moving away from the black and white colour scheme;
• These Art Deco escort cards are pinned into delicious truffles;
• These escort cards move away from the common colour scheme of black and white, using Art Deco font and pattern to great effect;
• Drawing inspiration from 20′s ballrooms, these escort cards are smart and stylish.

Table numbers and names

A lot of the effect of Art Deco comes from the simplicity of style, combined with geometric patterns and fonts. For this reason, choosing simple numbers for tables could work incredibly well.

Other great ideas could build on themes from the 20′s, for example the Great Gatsby or Breakfast at Tiffany’s, or use Art Deco images from the 20′s like this Chicago table name. Use ornate card holders, such as this glittering place card holder, to add a little sparkle to the table.

Art Deco venues

Art Deco can be found in much architecture of the 1920′s – famous London buildings which have an Art Deco architecture are the Savoy and Claridge’s. A scout around your local area for theatres or hotels that have survived in good condition and will act as a wedding venue could yield some amazing results.

Art Deco colour schemes

Use a black and white colour scheme for your reception décor, maybe with a silver accent, to replicate the black and white films of the 1920′s era. Dress tables either in white linen with sparkling sliver beaded candle lamps, or in black satin with crystal glasses filled with Calla Lillies or white roses.

Place decorations on circular or rectangular mirrors, which will reflect light around the room and add a feeling of space.

An alternative centrepiece has to be perhaps the most iconic art deco form – that of the ‘lady lamp’. It is a nude or elegantly clothed woman in a striking and elegant pose, holding an incandescent orb with a bulb behind it. These lamps would add superb dramatic lighting at a bar or table.

Finishing touches

To finish off your evening, hire a classy jazz band who can play jazz, swing and Charleston music by the likes of Cole Porter, George Gershwin or Rodgers and Hart. For an added touch of opulence and iconic style, use a vintage Rolls Royce to whisk the bride and groom away at the end of the perfect Art Deco inspired evening.

Of course, the most important part of planning for rain on your wedding day is to make sure that, if you have an outside reception planned, you arrange an alternative location with your venue, in case of inclement weather. We’ve also researched some more ideas to make your wedding reception go according to plan, from weather-proof wedding seating plans to colour coordinated wellies.

Wedding seating plan

If you are planning an outdoors wedding reception, it would be sensible to make sure that your wedding seating plan is showerproof. Make sure any designs are created with waterproof ink, and if at all possible make sure that the backing board is heavy weight card or plastic coated. Some wedding seating plan designs lend themselves perfectly to a Rainy Day Plan, being inherently waterproof, for example:

• Mirror and glass frame seating plans, drawn in waterproof glass pens;
• Chalk board plans, using waterproof chalkboard paints.

Other seating plans use wet weather as their theme:

• Cocktail umbrellas make great little escort cards;
• Use umbrella and raindrop rubber stamps to coordinate and personalise your wedding stationery with your table plan.

Venue and table decor

• Collect together as many umbrellas as you can, either in cheerful bright colours or to coordinate with your colour scheme. Create a colourful and funky décor by hanging them upside down from the ceiling of your venue, or from trees if you are outside;



• Centrepieces of flowers either planted or arranged in Wellington boots;
• Flower arrangements using little coloured parasols to reflect your colour scheme.

Umbrellas and wellington boots

Whatever your theme, search for umbrellas to complement it – from Victorian lace umbrellas for a tea party or Steampunk wedding to or a LightSabre umbrella for a Star Wars wedding!

Buy some colour coordinating umbrellas for the wedding party, and offer some to guests. If your reception is in the country, consider doing the same with funky colourful wellington boots! Don’t hide them away – put the brollies in a large basket, line the wellingtons up in a stylish coordinating line and they will add to your reception décor.

Other

• Choreograph a Singing in the Rain first dance!
• There are even shops that specialise in Rainy Day bridal wear!
• Look at our ‘Singing in the Rain’ Pinterest board for more inspiration and rainy day ideas!
• For a little musical humour at your reception, ask the DJ or band to be playing ‘Singing in the Rain’ tune as guests walk in to the room, and welcome them with a drink complete with coloured cocktail umbrella.

So, don’t live in fear of the rain ruining your day, embrace the great British weather and plan for the event instead! Just be careful swinging round those lampposts…

Every Sunday night on Twitter, Theo Paphitis, multi-millionaire retail magnate and former star of BBC’s Dragons’ Den, offers small businesses a potentially huge business boost.

In what he calls “Small Business Sunday”, he invites small business owners to tell him about their company in less than 140 characters and then retweets his favourite six to his 330,000+ Twitter followers the next evening.

This week, TopTablePlanner was one of the lucky six businesses to be chosen!

Around 1,000 great small businesses are trying to get the attention of Theo every week. To be chosen from that number is simply fantastic!

We’ve welcomed a lot of new Twitter followers as a result and have seen a huge boost in the number of people visiting the website.

Businesses looking for a Small Business Sunday retweet should tweet Theo between 5pm and 7:30pm on a Sunday evening, making sure they include the hashtag #SBS in their tweet.

Here’s the link to my original tweet and to our press release.

Make a statement with your Gothic wedding seating plan! Colour schemes of black, crimson and purple, with black lace and red roses, Victorian lace and intricate damask – we take a look at everything you’ll need to turn your seating plan into a Gothic work of art!

Gothic inspired seating plans and escort cards

Using a large chalkboard, this seating plan uses a rich black design of hibiscus around the edge to add elegant Gothic charm. Shabby chic glass doors are the unusual and effective choice for this one, which would be perfect for a vintage Gothic reception décor. An old English calligraphy font is perfect for this plan in the style of a Gothic scroll, based on Harry Potter school house names. Opting for the link with Halloween, these escort cards use miniature pumpkins! These black, white and red escort cards ooze elegance with a subtle Gothic theme.

Alternatively, erring on the macabre aspect of Gothic style, these escort cards are mounted against a headstone and skull backdrop!

Table numbers and names

Choose rich and opulent styles for your table names or numbers. Alternatively, reflect your loe of all things Gothic by choosing table names as characters or places from your favourite Gothic novel or film, or a favourite goth band / musician.

These wedding tables are numbered simply, but the black, red and white colour scheme accentuate the elegant romance of gothic style. These table numbers use silhouettes of Victorian candelabra, whilst the Victorian black and white style of these escort cards, table numbers and menu really add to the Gothic charm. This place name card has a hint of the old black and white horror film to it, whilst these table numbers are framed with ornate Gothic picture frames.

Centrepieces

Just because you want a deep, dark and delicious Gothic theme to your décor does not mean that you need to do away with the idea of traditional floral centrepieces to your tables. However, you can swap pastel pink posies for deep black magic roses, pretty white daisies for crimson/green trails of love-lies-bleeding, or white lilies for the deep purple cala lilies. Use velvet, satin and lace ribbons and instead of pretty glass vases, go for black glass vases or ornate wrought iron bowls.

Other Gothic inspired centrepieces or table décor could include peacock feathers, candelabras and large pillar candles – plus any other gothic curiosities you may find in dark corners of your local antique shop!

Other ideas

With a Gothic wedding, venue is a hugely important choice. Find a Bram Stoker style medieval castle, a (haunted?) stately mansion, or a shadowy twilight reception in a hall with nigh, vaulted ceilings.

Remember that there are more fantastically gothic ideas on our Pinterest board, and of course our recent steampunk article is closely related in many ways.

Last week TopTablePlanner celebrated its 6th birthday. In the past six years we’ve helped thousands of people plan their event seating in over 90 countries around the world! This is something we’re incredibly proud of, and if we’ve helped prevent a few seating plan headaches along the way then we’ve done our job.

Updates

We’re always making tweaks and improvements to TopTablePlanner and have just updated the software with some great new features as well as improvements to existing ones.

New Features

Rows of seats
As well as adding tables, you can now add rows of seats too. This is really handy for planning events such as wedding ceremonies or for conference/theatre style seating where there are no tables.

Guest types
We’ve added a couple of new guest types – VIPs and Infants. Customer feedback has told us that event planners would find it really useful to see at a glance where highchairs should be placed, hence we’ve added the new “Infant” option. Similarly it’s great to see at a glance where those important VIP guests are sitting.

Updates

Editing guests – Rather than opening up a separate pop-up window, this is now completely done within the “Guests” menu and vastly speeds up the process of editing a guest.

Stats menu – You can now see a greater range of statistics as well as an improved tabbed design.

Table editing – The table edit menu has been redesigned to offer a number of improvements.

Design – We’ve given TopTablePlanner a minor redesign to keep it looking fresh and modern.

Load times – We’ve improved the way the browser opens the software, resulting in plans opening significantly quicker.

Feedback

We’re always trying to make TopTablePlanner the best it can possibly be. Feedback on the software is always welcomed, whether it’s good or bad, and if you’ve got any thoughts we’d love to hear them!

Are you a fan of Star Trek, Doctor Who or Lord of the Rings? We’ve travelled to far flung distant galaxies and braved hordes of blood sucking aliens (well, ok, we’ve trawled the internet) to bring you the very best ideas for your cult sci-fi wedding seating plans. Follow the links for examples of the ideas mentioned.

Doctor Who

The Tardis is an iconic image that guests will recognise even if they do not share your love of all things Doctor. Look at this great wedding seating plan, which uses luggage labels hung in a Tardis style frame, with past doctors used as table names (there were 11 ‘official’ doctors).

Get creative and make your very own ‘Cardis‘ – a Tardis shaped box for guests’ cards. These Tardis boxes are perfect to put your chosen favours in. These wedding invitations would lend themselves perfectly to Tardis escort cards.

Star Trek

For all the Trekkies among you, a Star Trek wedding seating plan can be based around your favourite part of the saga, for example:

• Starfleet starships, i.e. Enterprise, Voyager, Nautilus – see the complete list.
• Characters – Spock, Kirk, Scottie… The one shown here is a great example – here is a complete list of characters.
• Races, i.e. Klingon, Borg, Romulan… Here is a complete list.

Use a Star Trek design to create your own Star Trek place cards, and use engraved Star Trek champagne flutes at the tables, which can also double up as favours. For a great photo opportunity, a life size cut out of your favourite Star Trek captain behind the top table will be the talking point of the evening!

Hitchhiker’s guide to the Galaxy

Full of obscure humour and quirky references, fans of the Hitchhiker’s Guide will undoubtedly call their wedding seating plan ‘The Hitchhikers Guide to the Wedding‘, give each guest a towel as a favour, number the top table as 42 and place bowls of petunias at the centre of each table. Leave copies of the book at each table and challenge your guests to spot as many obscure references to the book as they can!

Lord of the Rings / Hobbit

Perfect for a woodland or farm theme, a Shire wedding reception includes rustic barrels of ale, fireworks and hog roasts.

This fantastic Tolkien style map make a great seating plan. Table names could be famous Tolkien places such as Hobbiton, or based on the main characters, for example Frodo Baggins, Samwise Gangee and Peregrin Took. Alternatively, use this translator to translate your chosen table names into runes!

Other Ideas

Here is a seating plan based on the bride and groom’s favourite sci-fi, fantasy and cult books – can you guess them all?

Of course, there is no need to stick to the four examples in this blog, choose your own favourite cult sci-fi book or film – for example, Buffy, Dark Star, Back to the Future, Star Wars, Starship Troopers, Ghostbusters, Fifth Element, Minority Report, 2001: A Space Odyssey or Game of Thrones – the list is endless!

Don’t forget to browse our Pinterest board for plenty of sci-fi and fantasy themed wedding seating plans and table décor!

Steampunk style is a glorious mix of Victoriana and fantasy, clockwork cogs and top hats, all mixed together with a good helping of funky attitude – a spectacular theme for a wedding seating plan. If you have never come across steampunk before, have a look at this wedding photo shoot to see how steampunk’s whimsical take on Victorian industrialism and Gothic romance can create a unique and enchanting wedding. We have collected together some fantastic ideas for your seating plan and table décor, with some great links to steampunk images to inspire you!

Wedding Seating Plans

There are so many elements of steampunk that lend themselves to a seating plan. Steampunk style incorporates many of our previous blog topics, such as shabby chic, calligraphy, suitcases, chalkboards, frames and paper flowers.

Table names can be chosen from many different areas, for example:

• Victorian sci-fi authors and characters. Steampunk style has evolved from the elaborate, imaginative images of the future as described by authors such as Jules Verne and HG Wells. It draws on the style of characters such as Sherlock Holmes, Jekyll and Hyde. These table names use Victorian images and are printed with an antique finish.
• Steampunk role playing games such as Space 1889, World of Warcraft, and Dungeons & Dragons are full of fantastic characters that would make great table names.
• Steampunk imagery – these escort cards use a different shaped cog for each table.

If you choose to simply number your tables, how about using some steampunk imagery to make your plan unique. The table number sign shown here uses very elegant images of cogs, while this escort card display uses Victorian silhouettes pinned in an ornate frame. Luggage tags and keys are used to create this wedding seating plan, and this one uses beautiful calligraphy and a set of antique keys. Here is a great use of an antique suitcase, and this seating plan uses Victorian fonts and imagery.

Table Décor

Visit your local antique shop and let your imagination run riot! Steampunk style includes anything featuring Victorian industrialism – cogs, keys, wheels, clocks or clockwork innards. Look for any shabby chic Victoriana – aged silk or paper flowers, vintage lace and pearl necklaces. Pick up any ornate frames, chalkboards and suitcases. It is impossible to go over the top. Look – here is the result!

On a slightly simpler note, this table, with decorated chairs, uses a deep Gothic red cloth which matches the heavy red curtains in the room. Keys and antique lace feature in this steampunk table décor.

Cards and Favours

Continue the steampunk theme throughout your reception! Have a go at making card boxes from a vintage suitcase or covered with steampunk paper. Wrap your favours in paper printed with black and white vintage images, with steampunk labels.

Remember, have a look at our page on Pinterest for some unique, original and funky steampunk designs for your very own Steampunk wedding seating plan.