Starting with. . . Selecting the Season for your Wedding

1 Written by natasha on May 12, 2010 – 5:00 am

The other day, Jenny shared the story of how she and her fiance have started out their wedding planning process. She brought up two really great topics: selecting the season for your wedding (as opposed to a specific wedding date) and formulating a guest list. Since I’ve covered the topic of guest lists repeatedly (check out the posts here: How to Handle the Guest List, Should I Invite Someone Because She Invited Me? and How to Handle the Guest List when You’re Not Paying for the wedding – just to start) I thought I would address the “selecting the wedding season” topic.

First, in case you missed Jenny’s post, she said that after getting engaged, she and her fiance decided that they would try to pick the season to get married. Why? Because that way when everyone started asking “When’s the big day?” They could say “Oh, next Spring!” And the questions stop. Good thinking!

So, there are a few aspects to selecting the season. There are colors, weather, venues, and costs that play into the season selection.

Spring: Light colors, weather warming (usually), venue might be able to be outside (depending on location it might be cold/raining/snowing or allergy season), and not peak wedding season, so costs are a little less.

Summer: Bolder colors, warm weather, venue can be outside, peak wedding season, so costs are higher.

Fall: Darker colors, weather getting colder, venue might be able to be outside (depending on location it might be colder and /raining), and some places it’s peak season, so costs might be higher.

Winter: Dark colors, cold weather, venue can’t be outside (in most places), and not peak season, so costs will be less.

Remember that if you’re basing your season on weather, remember that the seasons aren’t always so strict. I remember Springs in New York that were colder than Winters and Summers in San Francisco that may as well have been Fall or Winter — and vice versa.

One of the considerations in selecting seasons might be flowers. Some people have particular flowers that they love and that aren’t always in season. If you’re one of those people, check out our list of which flowers are in season when. The list is organized by color, so once you’ve selected your wedding season, you’ll be able to figure out which flowers to pick in the color you want.

Once you’ve selected the season, consider the particular days. I’ve written a post on how to pick a wedding date and some considerations include: when the venue is available, when other crucial parts of the wedding are free, holidays, and religious beliefs.

Good luck!

~ Natasha