How To Plan A Wedding During COVID Times in 2022
When most of us envision our dreamy wedding day, we didn’t foresee a global pandemic being dropped into the mix. With so many people having to postpone or cancel their wedding, we imagine with heavy hearts that it is difficult to pick up where you left off. With COVID still reigning on in 2022, we want to empower you and help you navigate these unpredictable times to make sure your wedding is nothing less than your wildest dreams.
Wedding Venues
Choosing amongst the best luxury wedding venues is an important decision, and even more important in this day and age with COVID. You’ll want to consider details of floor layout when it comes to socially distancing and making sure the venue can accommodate your needs is a must. When it comes to indoor wedding venues, we recommend asking about ventilation to make sure the air you and your guests are breathing is safe. The luckiest part of living in a sunshine state is you have countless options to choose from when it comes to the best wedding venues in California outdoors. Once you have decided on the event space of your dreams, you can focus on other COVID precautions.
Guest List
Once your wedding venue is set, you may want to consider revisiting your guest list and reducing the number of attendees at your wedding to be even more COVID friendly. We recommend first speaking with the venue to see if they have any initial restrictions in place when it comes to guest attendance. From there, you can start to create your guest list in compliance with the venue's regulations and make sure you can maintain social distancing. The one upside to events reducing people in person is a digital alternative. With platforms like Zoom existing now and widely used by so many, no one has to feel completely left out of your special day. You can live stream your entire event and even have stations set up at the event lounges where people can interact with digital attendees.
Communication
Communicating with your guests so they feel in the loop will help reduce fear and worry during these uncertain times. People do not like to be in the dark so letting them know what to expect ahead of time such as seating arrangements, catering, drinks, and so forth, will put your potential attendees at ease. At the end of the day, no one is guaranteed to be safe from COVID, whether you’re a part of the bridal party, the staff, or a guest, so respecting people’s decision to decline an event is necessary and people taking ownership of their decision to go is equally as important.
COVID Friendly Floor Plans
There is a lot you can do with your floor plan to prep when it comes to socially distancing. You can create seating arrangements with smaller groups of people gathered around tables. When it comes to dancing, you can always coordinate different tables going up at a time so you can track how many people are on the dance floor at once. Making sure you’re keeping your floor plan vision in mind when it comes to venue booking will ensure everything goes according to plan.
Catering
Typically when it comes to weddings, we think of self-serve buffets and long lines of people crowding around. Reimagining what this looks like is a step in the right precautionary direction for COVID. We recommend doing plate serving, where wait staff comes around and individually delivers the entrée that you pre-selected before you arrive. You can send out meal option cards with invites, so when guests RSVP, they select what they want as their main course. You can carry this over to bar service as well. Instead of having people stand in long lines to get drinks, you can have cocktail servers walking around and gathering people’s orders and then delivering their drinks to them.
When it comes to re-imagining your special day, we at Ovation are here to help you plan. With an entire staff of event planners on our side, we know we can accomplish anything to make sure the wedding of your dreams can still come true.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Could I require my guests to be vaccinated?
A: Yes. On your special day, you can do anything. You can either require them to be fully vaccinated or you could request that they show a negative COVID test within the last 72 hours.
Q: Do you think Zoom would make people feel awkward?
A: Not at all! As long as you have planned and prepared to make sure Zoom guests are entertained as well, you can create experiences that make them feel front and center when it comes to your day.
Q: How long ahead of time should we communicate with our guests the details of our precautions?
A: We recommend adding a note to the invite that says COVID precautions coming soon and then sending out details about a month before the wedding.