Choosing Wedding Venue
Choosing a venue is the decision that will have the largest impact on your wedding.
Before you begin your search, there are a few things you’ll want to have a strong understanding of:
• Budget
• Number of guests
• Type of event (formal, traditional, modern, high-tech, etc.)
Once you have an idea of these three things, you can begin your search for a venue. Having the venue booked at least six months in advance will ensure that you have the date of your event set in stone. Finding the right venue for your event can take up quite a bit of your time.
When you’re ready to search for your wedding venue, consider those important factors:
1. Cost
As a cost-conscious organizer, you may want to keep the venue cost down to allow more room in your budget for food and beverages and entertainment.
2. Capacity and Minimums
• You need to know the room capacity of the venues for a few reasons. First, for general and practical reasons, 500 people can’t comfortably fit into a room with a 250-person capacity. And second, there are fire and safety codes that the venue has to abide by.
3. Location
For an event with guest within a limited geographic range, a venue within a reasonable distance from most attendees’ homes may make sense. However, if many attendees will be traveling from out of town, hosting a wedding at a venue near the airport or their hotels will be beneficial.
How to help guest have all the necessary information about venue is another important thing to consider. You could provide gps coordinates and maps to less known locations.
4. Services and Amenities
In addition to the appearance of the site, it is also important to take into consideration the services and amenities that the venue offers. Consider the following:
• Does the venue have a kitchen and can it provide catering to your event? If so, often a venue will waive the facility fee and only charge a down payment along with the cost of food for each attendee. Other venues may not have kitchens. Those venues without kitchen facilities may have a partnership with a food provider that you’re required to use, or you may be free to bring in your own vendors.
• Does it have tables and chairs you can use? If a venue has these items, you can save a great deal of money and effort by using what they have, assuming it matches your theme and ambiance.
• Does it have a setup/clean up crew? If you’ve found a venue which provides a setup and clean up crew, rejoice! This isn’t always the case. If these services aren’t available you’ll need to build your event team. For some venues you might bring your own toilet paper, paper towels and soap.
• Does it have AV capabilities? Some venues have a built in audio-visual equipment for you to use.
• Does it have air-conditioning
• Does it have stage lighting
• Does it provide coordinating of the function
5. Parking
Does the venue have a parking lot. A venue with a parking lot is what dreams are made of. If that’s not the case, are there parking lots nearby which attendees can access and use? If there is no parking available, you’re not completely out of luck as you have a few alternatives:
• You can rent out or reserve nearby parking lots for your guests and either include the cost in the ticket prices, or have guests pay when they park.
• You could offer valet parking for the event, even if the venue doesn’t. Providing a valet may be essential if the event is an upscale event such as a gala.
• You can encourage guest to share a ride.
6. Layout
You want to have a rough idea of what types of activities you’ll be including, the amenities you’ll require, and the needs of your function.
While narrowing down your selection, get an illustrated floor plan of each venue, and walk through your favorites at least once, making note of important things such as where the outlets are and where AV equipment is or can be located.
The layout and floor plan will greatly affect a few different aspects of your event:
• Flow of traffic. Think about the flow of traffic through your wedding. Does it have 2 side entrance to the hall, particularly if it's an Hindi wedding.
• Has it a stage, does it has 2 side entrance, especially if it's a Hindi wedding
• Congratulation and family photographs area, or will it happen on a stage
7. Accessibility
Accessibility refers to the possibility that everyone, especially those with special needs, can access the building and its amenities.
You’ll probably know whether there will be children at your venue, but you may not know if there will be individuals with other special needs.
8. Ambiance
Pay special attention to the existing decor inside the venue. What style is the architecture and what does the building’s interior convey. The less the ambiance matches the desired feeling of your event (upscale, high tech, etc.) the more decorating you’ll need to do to make up for it. Bear in Mind ceiling and floors too
9. Acoustics
Have you ever attended an event at a venue that was so loud, it was hard to hear others, causing you to strain your hearing and lose your voice, all in one night? That’s caused by poor acoustics. Acoustics is just a fancy word for how sound travels through the venue. A low ceiling will make the venue seem cozy, but it will make it louder if it’s packed. Alternatively, a large warehouse-style venue will result in echoes.
Although, acoustics aren’t the be-all and end-all of your event, there are things you can do to improve them such as making good use of patios outside the venue, or as Armstrong Ceilings states in their article written for the American Institute for Architects’ website, you can use acoustical clouds or canopies.
As you can see, there’s a lot to consider when choosing your event’s venue. However, if you take the above into consideration when doing your research, you’ll find the perfect venue for your event.
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Before you begin your search, there are a few things you’ll want to have a strong understanding of:
• Budget
• Number of guests
• Type of event (formal, traditional, modern, high-tech, etc.)
Once you have an idea of these three things, you can begin your search for a venue. Having the venue booked at least six months in advance will ensure that you have the date of your event set in stone. Finding the right venue for your event can take up quite a bit of your time.
When you’re ready to search for your wedding venue, consider those important factors:
1. Cost
As a cost-conscious organizer, you may want to keep the venue cost down to allow more room in your budget for food and beverages and entertainment.
2. Capacity and Minimums
• You need to know the room capacity of the venues for a few reasons. First, for general and practical reasons, 500 people can’t comfortably fit into a room with a 250-person capacity. And second, there are fire and safety codes that the venue has to abide by.
3. Location
For an event with guest within a limited geographic range, a venue within a reasonable distance from most attendees’ homes may make sense. However, if many attendees will be traveling from out of town, hosting a wedding at a venue near the airport or their hotels will be beneficial.
How to help guest have all the necessary information about venue is another important thing to consider. You could provide gps coordinates and maps to less known locations.
4. Services and Amenities
In addition to the appearance of the site, it is also important to take into consideration the services and amenities that the venue offers. Consider the following:
• Does the venue have a kitchen and can it provide catering to your event? If so, often a venue will waive the facility fee and only charge a down payment along with the cost of food for each attendee. Other venues may not have kitchens. Those venues without kitchen facilities may have a partnership with a food provider that you’re required to use, or you may be free to bring in your own vendors.
• Does it have tables and chairs you can use? If a venue has these items, you can save a great deal of money and effort by using what they have, assuming it matches your theme and ambiance.
• Does it have a setup/clean up crew? If you’ve found a venue which provides a setup and clean up crew, rejoice! This isn’t always the case. If these services aren’t available you’ll need to build your event team. For some venues you might bring your own toilet paper, paper towels and soap.
• Does it have AV capabilities? Some venues have a built in audio-visual equipment for you to use.
• Does it have air-conditioning
• Does it have stage lighting
• Does it provide coordinating of the function
5. Parking
Does the venue have a parking lot. A venue with a parking lot is what dreams are made of. If that’s not the case, are there parking lots nearby which attendees can access and use? If there is no parking available, you’re not completely out of luck as you have a few alternatives:
• You can rent out or reserve nearby parking lots for your guests and either include the cost in the ticket prices, or have guests pay when they park.
• You could offer valet parking for the event, even if the venue doesn’t. Providing a valet may be essential if the event is an upscale event such as a gala.
• You can encourage guest to share a ride.
6. Layout
You want to have a rough idea of what types of activities you’ll be including, the amenities you’ll require, and the needs of your function.
While narrowing down your selection, get an illustrated floor plan of each venue, and walk through your favorites at least once, making note of important things such as where the outlets are and where AV equipment is or can be located.
The layout and floor plan will greatly affect a few different aspects of your event:
• Flow of traffic. Think about the flow of traffic through your wedding. Does it have 2 side entrance to the hall, particularly if it's an Hindi wedding.
• Has it a stage, does it has 2 side entrance, especially if it's a Hindi wedding
• Congratulation and family photographs area, or will it happen on a stage
7. Accessibility
Accessibility refers to the possibility that everyone, especially those with special needs, can access the building and its amenities.
You’ll probably know whether there will be children at your venue, but you may not know if there will be individuals with other special needs.
8. Ambiance
Pay special attention to the existing decor inside the venue. What style is the architecture and what does the building’s interior convey. The less the ambiance matches the desired feeling of your event (upscale, high tech, etc.) the more decorating you’ll need to do to make up for it. Bear in Mind ceiling and floors too
9. Acoustics
Have you ever attended an event at a venue that was so loud, it was hard to hear others, causing you to strain your hearing and lose your voice, all in one night? That’s caused by poor acoustics. Acoustics is just a fancy word for how sound travels through the venue. A low ceiling will make the venue seem cozy, but it will make it louder if it’s packed. Alternatively, a large warehouse-style venue will result in echoes.
Although, acoustics aren’t the be-all and end-all of your event, there are things you can do to improve them such as making good use of patios outside the venue, or as Armstrong Ceilings states in their article written for the American Institute for Architects’ website, you can use acoustical clouds or canopies.
As you can see, there’s a lot to consider when choosing your event’s venue. However, if you take the above into consideration when doing your research, you’ll find the perfect venue for your event.
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