If you are currently planning a wedding, in a totally upside down world, you might find yourself thinking an intimate wedding is a great alternative to an over the top traditional wedding. It is a way to keep your wedding day special for you and those in attendance. It’s a way to actually feel present during your wedding and it can help to reduce a lot of the wedding planning stress because smaller intimate weddings have a much easier go-with-the-flow vibe.

What Is an Intimate Wedding?

An intimate wedding is usually considered one with under 75 guests, but elopement weddings are considered an intimate wedding as well. This leaves the actual headcount pretty open to interpretation.

Why Do Couples Opt for Smaller Weddings?

There are many different reasons to choose a smaller and more intimate wedding as opposed to a larger or more extravagant one.

Some of the biggest reasons can involve:

• Budget and overall costs. Smaller weddings tend to cost less money. Think guest headcount affects the size of venue and resources such as food+beverage.

• Small family sizes. If both parties have a smaller family and friends list then there isn’t a reason to hold such a large wedding.

• To keep the wedding private. By limiting the guest list you’re only sharing your big day with those that matter most, which helps to make the wedding that much more meaningful.

• It saves on a lot of stress. With a smaller group of people, everything becomes easier to manage from the invites and RSVPs to the thank you favors at the end. 

• It’s more eco-friendly. If you’re looking to reduce wedding waste and remain minimalistic, keeping your wedding small can be a great way to do this! Read more about how to have a sustainable wedding here.

What to Consider When Planning a Small Intimate Wedding

Decide if you will be keeping it local, eloping or having a small destination wedding. 

You can choose to elope with just a few of your closest family and friends. Or set up a destination wedding to somewhere unique or exotic and keep the invites minimal.

Choosing to have an elopement wedding can be an ideal way to reduce stress and costs. While there are still plenty of things that must be planned for an elopement, it’s still a lot less of a headache than planning a larger scale wedding. An elopement can be as simple as just you and your fiance or include a handful of close guests. You can do a destination elopement or stay close by, you can even have a simple courthouse wedding in your city. There are no real rules to this beyond making sure that you file the proper legal paperwork and get someone who is qualified to perform the ceremony.

A destination wedding can seem expensive but when you consider the costs of a large wedding and then compare that to the costs of a small vacation with a few of the most important people in your life, it often turns out to cost about the same, if not cheaper. Even if you don’t end up saving money, consider the fact that you’re making a ton of new memories with the people that you love the most and that’s priceless. The memories, emotions and wonder of taking a trip to somewhere new together, are all things that you’ll hold dear for the rest of your life. 

Book a small wedding venue that has lodging nearby or onsite.

With so many different small wedding venues available these days, you will find many with lodging in the same location, or relatively close-by.  By having the overnight accommodations so accessible, you allow your guests to have a more fun and relaxed experience throughout the weekend. They no longer have to worry about drinking too much and trying to find a ride home, or about work the following day because you will have made arrangements for the overnighter weeks (if not months) in advance. This means that they can devote more time to having fun and celebrating with you. Giving you a more intimate and meaningful reception.

Work with your photographer to choose a getting ready space at your venue/location.

Another way to make your day more meaningful is by choosing a proper+bright space to get ready in. The area in which you get dressed and pampered in will help to set the tone for the rest of the day, so you want it to be comfortable as well as relaxing. Even if your wedding party is small and your plans aren’t extravagant, you can still get a lot out of having the right getting ready spot. By starting your day in a space that you vibe well in, you will feel much more at ease. Keeping the day on course to being intentional+thoughtful.

Plan to have first look photographs taken, they allow for us to capture lots of emotion between just the two of you. 

Having first look photos taken of you and your fiance dressed up before the wedding ceremony is a beautiful way to bring a little more intimacy to the day. While planning and preparing for a wedding can be exhausting and rather lackluster, choosing to set aside a few minutes before the ceremony to be with your partner is a way to recenter your nerves and focus on each other. You not only get a few moments of alone time to settle your anxiety but you also get what possibly might be your only alone time with your fiance until much later that night. 

Write your own vows, your day is going to be very personal. Your vows should be too. 

You can create a much more intimate wedding ceremony by using your own written vows. These not only make the atmosphere feel more romantic and heartfelt but it also helps to add personal touches to your ceremony. Your vows can be about the past, present, and future together, including your hopes and dreams. Written vows are such powerful and private messages to one another and if shared in front of others they solidify your commitment to one another even more so.  

Bonus tip:

Use your smaller wedding as a way to give back by choosing to do charity work with your wedding party or small group of friends. Skip the bachelorette/bachelor parties and volunteer instead. This not only creates a unique bonding experience for everyone but also helps to create a bigger connection within your local community.

By choosing to have a small intimate wedding you are almost guaranteed a much more relaxed wedding experience all while spending your time with the people that you truly care for the most. And if we have learned anything in the past few weeks, it is that human connection+relationships are at the core of our lives each and every day. 

If you are a couple that is in the midst of planning your wedding and you feel like you could use a little extra help or encouragement please just drop an email into my inbox. We are all in this together and I am here to help in any way that I possibly can.