20 Must-try ideas for receptions

Budget-friendly ideas that'll bring your wedding reception to life…

1. Separate rooms - Shut off the room where your evening party is to be held from your guests. If it is the same room as your wedding breakfast, ask your toastmaster to announce that your guests need to take tea and coffee in a separate room! That way they will not see the clearing up, but will be wowed by the reveal of the clean, ready-to-party room.

2. Light the way - Make the entrance to your reception room obvious and inviting to your evening guests by draping fairylights around the door frame. Re-use your ceremony flower pedestals by placing them either side of the door and arranging battery-operated lights in and around them. It is now possible to get multi-coloured lights as well as the traditional white, so even more colour can be added to your celebrations and you can tie everything into your colour scheme.

3. Wallpaper - Use patterned wallpaper as table runners on the buffet tables at your reception and under your flower arrangements, in a different shade of your chosen colour scheme. If you used light pink in the day, use dark pink in the evening and try to find complimentary napkins, too, to change the look from day to night.

4. Coloured linen - Alternatively, you could ask your venue to hire in coloured linen for your evening reception. For a dramatic look, choose a dark shade like black and add colour by scattering brightly coloured petals across all the tables. Most venues will have a known supplier for this who may be able to give you a good deal.

5. Dream themes - Theme your evening reception, but be clever about what you use for this to make it affordable. For example, create a rock and roll feel by serving coke in traditional glass bottles and bring out mini burgers and hot dogs instead of an evening buffet. Use records bought from charity shops as place mats and table centre rests, and write out slips where people can request songs from your DJ like you would with a jukebox.

6. Quiet rooms - If you are having a marquee wedding or your venue has a separate room near to the dance floor, set up a quiet room where people who do not want to be near the music can sit and chat. Leave bowls of sweets out for them and decorate tables with a couple of flower arrangements from your wedding breakfast. You could introduce the patterned wallpaper to this area too.

7. Alternative guest book - For a less traditional guest book, check out Guestbook Store. You choose the style of pages and then just provide pens on each table so guests can write their good luck messages. Each page has fun questions for your guests to answer, like: 'Tell us about how you met the couple.' Or they ask guests to write a funny story that involves them and the happy couple.

8. Photo boards - Make up your own photo boards to be displayed in the evening on an easel or mounted on sturdy cardboard. Make sure you include lots of lovely photos of you as a couple, but also include pictures that show most, if not all, of the people you have invited to share your day with you, so you can all laugh at each other!

9. Glow sticks - Add a disco atmosphere to your table centres by buying glow sticks and incorporating them into the table centres. Ask your co-ordinator to make sure they are snapped and glowing before your guests enter the room and leave some spare for people to take to the dance floor. These are also a great idea if your venue does not allow candles.

10. Giant games - Hire over-sized games to entertain your guests and place them either in your venue grounds, if the weather is good, or in a different part of the evening reception room. This works well for children as well as adults and can keep them entertained for hours at a time. See Dream Occasions.

11. DIY games - Make your own traditional carnival games like hoopla or jam jar shots. Collect together about 20 glass jars of different shapes and sizes and buy some cheap pingpong balls. Add some sweets to the jars and whoever manages to throw a ball into a jar gets the treat. You could also put different prizes in the jars like a lottery ticket or a £2 coin.

12. Pick 'n' Mix - Your guest will love a Pick 'n' Mix table of retro sweets! Buy large lidded jars from Ikea (prices from approx £3 each) and order a selection of sweets from Retro Sweets. Add large spoons and paper bags to the table and your guests will pick 'n' mix until they drop! Make sure you include old favourites like rhubarb and custard and fruit salad, and make sure you don't forget the Love Hearts!

13. Personalised cocktails - Ask your bar staff to mix a large amount of a specific cocktail (perhaps your favourite!) and name it after your new married name. Print a brightly coloured sign announcing the name of the drink and ask everyone to help themselves to a glass. This way you offer your guests a drink on you, but don't have to foot a large free bar bill in the process!

14. Photobooths - Ask your photographers to set up an area with a nice backdrop and inform your guests that they will be available to take family shots throughout the afternoon. Try to get as many photos of guests with the bride and groom as possible so these can be purchased or used as gifts after the wedding day. Most photographers will welcome the opportunity of doing this during what is usually a quiet time during the wedding breakfast. Photobooths are also a great idea if you have a little more cash to spend and are also fab with a retro theme.

15. Choice of desserts - Instead of serving dessert at the tables, give your guests a choice! Ask your venue to lay out three different options and ask people to help themselves. For a more informal celebration, and if your venue allows it, you could even ask guests to bring their own homemade desserts and provide bowls and cutlery so they can share these with everyone else.

16. Say cheese! - Nominate one person from each table (perhaps a trustworthy teenager) to take a photo of each person sitting at their table. Not only does this give you a brilliant record of everyone who was there on the day, you can also use these as thank you cards after the event. Also ask them to catch a few other images like the bride and groom kissing, a child break-dancing on the dance floor and Grandma having a tipple! All great memories that you may have missed.

17. Promise books - Ask your guests to create a promise book for you. Leave slips of paper and a pen on each table and ask everyone to write something down that they think you should share or do together. This should hopefully give you lots of funny and interesting ideas of how to celebrate your wedding anniversary throughout your married life.

18. Tea time! - Tea and coffee are always welcome towards the end of a long day and an enjoyable evening of talking and dancing. Add a couple of mini doughnuts to each saucer or small cup cakes monogrammed with your new initials as snacks at the end of the night.

19. Hand out favours - It is traditional in the UK to lay out favours for each of your guests at their place setting before the wedding breakfast. These are often forgotten or overlooked once the meal is over, so instead hand your specially chosen favours to people as they leave. This way you make sure everyone gets a gift and you are able to say you spoke to everyone on your wedding day.

20. The big exit! - Make a big exit by performing a final dance and asking everyone to join you on the dance floor. Then at the end of the song, introduce the age-old tradition of asking your guests to create an arm arch and provide the younger guests with cones of confetti to throw over you as you leave.

Words: Beverly Pearce

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