This wedding undergraduate rant popped up in my email last week, and it made me grin in recognition. First, how do chairs become this horrible sticking point during wedding planning, for almost everyone? (Oddly, the were not for me. Our venue had those white wood folding chairs, which I thought was a score... and the park rangers weren't exactly up-selling us) But ANYWAY, I think it's a perfect symbol for what happens during planning. During the planning, wedding chairs are their own multi bazillion dollar industry, designed to stress the h*ll out of us. But seriously? People sit in the chairs, not look at the chairs. And on your wedding day? You're not thinking about chairs, for damn sure. Let me show you the perspective you will have on chairs on your wedding day:
Exactly. So now I'm going to let Amber (of Newly Domesticated) take it:
I am that girl who has been planning her wedding since she was three years old. My mother has scrapbooks full of my childhood drawings, almost always of brides. I'm a girly girl and I own it.
I'm also the girl who judged people's weddings. I'd be the one saying, "I can't believe she didn't do assigned seating." "I can't believe they're having it on a Friday." "I can't believe the ceremony was 9 minutes." "I can't believe the ceremony was 30 minutes."
But now that I'm actually going through it, I am so full of remorse. I can't believe I judged people, and I can't believe how entitled people feel to judge me. People have questioned every step of my planning process. Every. Single. Step. And I seriously almost lost it earlier this week, when I had a meeting with an event rental coordinator.
I was explaining to her where I felt we could cut if we had to; my venue offers white folding chairs that feature the logo of the museum where we're getting married. They're not gorgeous, but they are free.
She immediately made a sourpuss face and later, when she was explaining that she's a "big picture" person when it comes to weddings, I said "I am, too." She made a doubtful face and I said, "You don't believe me?" She said, "I just think the chairs are so important." Meaning, if I'm the kind of person who wouldn't pay $160 extra for chairs, how much taste could I have?
She then proceeded to whip out a photo album of events, showing white chairs, white tents, white tableclothes and said, "What stands out?" I said, "That's a lot of white." Clearly, wrong answer. She wanted me to say, "Oh, those are some gorgeous chairs."
She bullied me and bullied me until by the end, I found myself saying, "Listen, I would love for everything to be the prettiest it can be, but that's where I'm willing to cut if we need to." And when I got home, I felt bad for not standing up for myself more.
Because in this wedding planning process, that's the part that's stressful. It's that constant look of skepticism on everyone else's face. I approached wedding planning the way I approach decorating: I don't worry so much about what matches because I figure, if I like it, it will work. Because it's me, and that's what I want to express.
It's very, very hard to remember to be excited about the actual wedding part when people are constantly telling you the whole memory will be ruined if you see the ugly chairs in the pictures. Well you know what? My photographer is talented enough that I bet he can avoid any pictures of the freaking chairs.
In the end, I think two really, really good things will come out of this constant cycle of self-doubt, self-assurance, self-doubt. One, I will be a much more assured person on the other side, with no qualms about expressing what I want. And two, I will never, ever judge another bride again.
Picture: Heather! Jon! One Love Photo! At it again. This is from Sarah's magnificent wedding.
I recently had a friend of mine go on for at least twenty minutes straight about the virtues of chair covers. Mind you, I am at the very beginning of wedding planning, nothing is remotely set in stone/decided/booked yet, and chair covers are something that had never even crossed my mind.
This was among the first websites I found when starting to look at wedding-y things, and I am SO GLAD I did – after briefly browsing all the crazy out there and being on the verge of a breakdown, I vowed to only look at APW for wedding inspiration to keep myself sane. I have since found other like-minded, sane people through this site so I have broadened my “only look at APW” stance, but without you, lets just say I would probably be much more aware of the existence of chair covers. thankyouthankyouthankyou for being here.
Ahem, excuse me, back to the chair covers – after politely listening and nodding while I heard all the reasons chair covers were the best thing ever (“no matter the space, they can just make everything look so much nicer and put together and unified! If there’s anything you’re wavering on, scratch it and put the money towards chair covers instead, they make everything look SO NICE!”), I tried to gently tell her there probably isn’t going to be room in our budget to scratch anything in favor of chair covers, much less have them in addition to everything else. Thankfully, she didn’t push the issue, but this was just one of many instances so far (only been engaged since December), where someone I thought was completely normal and sane went on and on about something I thought was completely unnecessary. It blows my mind how the mere mention of a wedding makes people change so much – people I never thought would care about such things are asking me about my “theme” and “colors” and what flowers I want, and ask for wedding planning updates every time I see them (“sorry, still nothing new…”). It’s as though my friends have been replaced by WIC zombies!!
April 15, 2010 7:53 pm
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Just wait until they all have kids! My friends who are parents seem like pod people!
April 15, 2010 8:10 pm
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I tell all engaged friends to A) Take a honeymoon even if it’s a staycation and B) If they are on the edge, go with a short engagement… it’s just simpler.
And then I tell them that the other side is better.
(That might make me crazy though so shhhhh ;)
April 15, 2010 8:18 pm
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Hahaha – this was a hilariously unnecessary stressor for me. I was logically fine with the white garden chairs that cost half as much as the chivari chairs, but a tiny part of me really wanted the fancy ones. Luckily, my fiance talked me down when I needed it. And we have a great rental vendor and she reminded me how silly it was. She even calculated the total for the pricey chairs to help me put them out of my mind. Thank goodness! I don’t know how I ended up pining after expensive fancy chairs – that’s not me. I blame the wedding madness.
April 15, 2010 8:49 pm
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Chairs are a relative non-issue for me… The chairs at our venue are totally fine, free, and I kind of hate chair covers anyway so that’s not a temptation. That said, linens are an issue. It seems that everyone (by which I mean the non-APW internet) tells me that floor-length linens are a necessity because table legs are just so *ugly*. I think I’ve decided that, you know what, square table cloths on round tables will drape down in corners and sort of hide the legs, and you know what else, it really doesn’t matter anyway.
But now I’m confused over a different dilemma – square cloths where the corners will reach the floor, for maximal table-leg-hiding, or shorter and cheaper square cloths where the last 10″ or so will be visible? I don’t think it’s really the price of the larger squares ($10.49 each to buy) that bothers me, it’s that I think the price went up several dollars during the website’s recent redesign. If only I’d bought them two weeks ago…
April 15, 2010 9:04 pm
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what website? i bought mine online, also.
our legs were not completely hidden, and it was fine. i think uber-long tablecloths are annoying. i alwasys get tangled. but maybe im especially clumsy.
April 16, 2010 9:23 am
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I definitely feel for you on the feeling-bullied-and-wish-you-stood-up-for-yourself-more. I think that’s something this planning process has taught me about myself: that I need to stand up for what matters to me out of the whole thing (having friends & family together) and just block out whatever judgement people may pass on the fact that I don’t want a ceremony or a white dress or bouquets or bridesmaids etc etc. My dad always said to “do your best and F the rest” and this planning process is one of the moments where I like to call upon that motto to guide me through.
April 15, 2010 10:34 pm
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I just talked myself out of renting fancier chairs for our ceremony. It was the look on my Mom’s face when I told her I’d be willing to pay an extra $125 for non-plastic chairs – like she was about to take back every “I’m impressed with how sensible your being about the wedding planning” comment she’d ever made.
But I did just have a long conversation with a friend who is limiting her guest list because the venue only has 140 nice chairs, so if she invited more, she’d have to rent all of her chairs. I suggested having miss-matched chairs, and she gave me the same look my mother just did! They are really comfy chairs though…
April 16, 2010 7:07 am
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Ah, the chairs. This reminds me of something I realized recently (close to one year post-wedding). I was really bummed that we didn’t get to have our wedding outside because it rained– like monsoon rained. My sisters were lobbying to have it outside anyway, even though that meant it might rain on the guests and the mud would ruin everyone’s shoes (how silly, glad I stuck to my guns and moved it inside). I realized recently that the main reason I wanted to have it outside? Was so we could have pretty pictures. And honestly, who gives a crap about pretty pictures during the ceremony itself? I mean, pretty pictures are great, but we have plenty of those from before and after the wedding, and my favorites are getting ready beforehand and the dance party that followed. Our wedding inside the not-so-gorgeous conference room backup location was just as meaningful (and people could probably see and hear us better) as if we’d had it outside. Those ugly pictures? Not such a big deal. We still look blissed out and overjoyed, which is all that really matters.
April 16, 2010 12:45 pm
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We have ugly chairs. It broke my heart for a couple months. I’ve moved on emotionally.
Thank lil baby Jesus.
April 17, 2010 1:20 am
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Can someone please talk some sense into my fiance??? Our venue has pretty horrible, plain, brown chairs but I would rather chew my arm off than have chair covers. They are such an unneccessary thing to spend money on and I think they look WORSE than plain chairs. I have been trying to explain this to him but unfortunately everyone else backs him up! Help!! I really don’t want little ghost chairs!!
April 18, 2010 2:56 am
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show him photos of weddings? feel free to steal my wedding photos as examples of how ugly chair covers can look. and somewhere in the comment thread above, there are gorgeous photos of ugly brown chairs.
he may not realize how bad the covers can look. but he also may really like chair covers. in which case, if it’s not a big deal, get chair covers, right?
April 18, 2010 2:58 pm
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I had the same mental struggles when choosing chairs for our wedding (I “graduated” last October). I wanted those white plastic-but-look-like-wood folding chairs for our backyard wedding, but they were $3 each to rent. I chose regular white folding chairs for $1 each. Then, when the budget was too strained, I went to the bottom-of-the-barrel, icky brown folding chairs for 50 cents each. And know what? No one gave a shit. I was freaking out hoping that I could tell my photographer, don’t get any photos of the chairs! but not-so-surprisingly, I forgot during the excitement of the day, and my favorite photo of my beloved and me is of us in those very chairs.
Chairs are not the big picture. I’m glad we went with the cheapest chairs, honestly. Don’t sweat the small stuff :)
April 19, 2010 12:43 pm
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No chairs.
It’s been an issue, but we have the rental of the Botanical Garden for our ceremony for just 1 hour, and they don’t have chairs, and we don’t have time to set up chairs.
Heck, I have to stand the whole time, they can deal with it. I’ll get a chair for grandma, though.
April 19, 2010 4:25 pm
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I don’t have a venue decided or anything, but I was debating a few that wouldn’t provide enough chairs like a park or my parents house– they’ve got 3 acres, an acre and a half of that is lawn, so that’s work, right? Free? Except when I looked into rental prices of chairs, tables, and tents, we’d be talking the same price as some of the venues I’d seen! That’s how expensive rentals are! So then I was thinking about it. I’d still want a tent. (My best friend got married at her aunt’s home and the weather forecast was rain-free, so they didn’t do a tent… and it poured and the ceremony had to be delayed by an hour, so after the ceremony, a third of the guests just left and didn’t even stay for the reception. Right after pictures, the rain started up again, so those that did stay had to crowd into her aunt’s kitchen, living room and covered porch eating standing up, instead of at the tables and chairs that were getting soaked outside– and were the most expensive thing, aside from the food! And no one used them! So definitely do a tent if you’re doing it outdoors)
I actually don’t want to do it outdoors. I adore climate control, but it’s just cheaper so I’m considering compromising on that.
Anyway, so I was thinking about chairs and tables and thought I could probably get them for free or a small donation if I can borrow them from my church or the fire department (my dad’s a volunteer firefighter). But the ones at my church are the brown plastic type, and the ones at the fire department are sort of metal taupe colored. So I was thinking ‘I’ll need chair covers, right? And renting them probably wouldn’t be any cheaper then just renting cuter chairs in the first place!’
And then I saw this post.
Thank you. I think if I end up picking a venue where I have to supply tables/chairs I’ll just approach either the church or the fire department and not worry about it. :)
August 15, 2010 6:59 pm
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I realize I’m pretty late to the game here (just found the blog!) but:
Event coordinators/planners like that make my blood boil.
And I am a very calm person.
I plan events. Meetings, weddings, showers etc. I love everything about them. But planners that are constantly trying to “upsell” you seriously need to re-examine their priorities. And here’s why:
My first piece of advice to newly engaged brides? Sit down with your fiancé and make a list of the top three places where you want to spend your money. No more then three and you must both agree. (The rhyme was accidental :) ) Now, spend your money there. Because if it’s really important to you to have amazing food, and you could care less about the flowers, you are not going to remember in ten years if the flowers were fake, but you’re sure as heck going to remember that food wasn’t mind-blowing.
It’s a beautiful, amazing day your wedding day. But there is NO reason why it can’t be amazing and in your budget. Period. If you’re planner is trying to bully you into thinking otherwise, find another.
Me for example :)
May 2, 2011 7:54 am
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[...] Wedding Undergraduate: The Chair Rant [A Practical Wedding] • I wish this site had existed when I was wedding planning! Leave a comment [...]
January 27, 2012 5:20 am
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