How to Plan Your Wedding Day Timeline
We always recommend having a planner for your wedding for the most stress-free day possible! However, if you aren’t working with a planner, it can be overwhelming to start planning your wedding day timeline. The wedding day has lots of events, and you’ll be thinking about how to fit them all in. Today, we’ve put together 5 things to keep in mind when planning your own timeline.
1. YOUR VENDORS
If you booked your venue for a certain amount of time, build your timeline within these hours. It’s helpful to talk with each of your vendors to see how much time they’ll need to set up. Your DJ will need some time to set up before the ceremony + reception, and your florist will want to arrive early, especially if they are creating any installations in the reception or ceremony site.
Don’t forget to consider tear down times! If you have to be out of your venue by a certain time, make sure you play your last song or have your grand exit with enough time for your vendors to clean up, tear down, and pack up all of their equipment. Check-in with them to see how much time they’ll need for this and schedule accordingly.
Each of your vendors will need a break to eat dinner and get ready for the rest of the reception. Especially for us as photographers/videographers, it’s helpful for us to take a break and eat around the time your guests will be eating. If you are eating buffet style, we may hop in line near the beginning to make sure we get a chance to eat before toasts and dances!
2. CEREMONY TIME
This is the most important moment of the day! You will say your vows to each other with your family and friends supporting you, and officially become husband + wife! We would recommend starting your timeline with the ceremony time, and fitting everything else around it.
If you would like to have time to take photos after the ceremony while it’s still light outside, we recommend scheduling it 2-3 hours before sunset. This way, you will have nice golden light for the ceremony, and still have time afterward for your family photos and some portraits. Consider adding a 10-15 min buffer time to the end of the ceremony in case you need to start a few minutes late.
3. HAIR + MAKE UP
As a general rule of thumb, you should allow at least 30 minutes per person, per service as you plan your timeline. You can work directly with your hair and make up artist to see how long they will need. If each bridesmaid is getting their hair and make up professionally done, be sure you have enough time to get through each of them or hire a team so that multiple people can be getting ready at once.
Give plenty of buffer time / start a bit earlier than you think you’ll need to! Since this is the first part of the day, if this part gets behind, it often means the rest of the day will run slightly behind. Allotting a little extra time here will start your day off on a stress-free note.
Let your bridal party know what time they need to be ready. Aim to have them ready and dressed 15-30 minutes before you are. This will ensure that they are ready to help you put your dress on and take care of any last minute touch-ups before photos.
4. BRIDAL PARTY + FAMILY PHOTOS
We recommend designating 30 minutes for the bridal party, and 30 minutes for family photos. Depending on the size of your bridal party/family, we often finish this early, however, it’s always helpful to have a bit of extra time to round everyone up.
Whether we decide to do these before the ceremony or after, please have a designated place for everyone to meet for family photos. If you hired me as your photographer, I will have the list of family photo groups we created in your questionnaire so we can get these photos taken care of efficiently. Having this list keeps everyone moving so that this portion doesn’t interrupt the flow of your day!
If we finish early, you’ll have time to relax (before the ceremony), or get to your cocktail hour/reception quicker!
5. THE RECEPTION
Have fun!! By this time, all of the other events are behind you, so take the reception to relax! You can have your reception in any order that works for you. Whatever you decide, be sure to communicate with your DJ or MC to make sure that they know when they’ll need to announce the next events.
The sunset will likely happen during the reception. Setting aside 10-15 minutes after you’ve eaten to enjoy a few moments in the sunset as newlyweds can be a great way to take a breath from the busyness of the day! If you’d like to add this time during your day, we can get a few sunset photographs. We are pretty hands-off during this time and let you enjoy a quiet moment alone before getting back to the party.
Remember that this is your day! Don’t feel pressured to do all of the wedding traditions if they are not you. You can do as many or as few as you want to. This is your time to spend with all of your guests and most of all, to have fun!
BONUS TIP:
Should we have a first look? We’ve written a whole blog post with our thoughts on a first look, and sample timelines with and without one. Take a look:
We are happy to answer any questions as you plan your timeline, and give our input based on lighting, locations, etc! Reach out to us if you’re interested in talking more about hiring us as your photographer/videographer!
