Advice needed ....Time on Invitations

Hi All

What time is everyone putting on their invitations?

Its just our wedding is a Civil Ceremony however weather permitting it will be outside and will take 30 mins to ferry all the guests etc down to the location. I guess what im trying to say is if i put the time of our ceremony 1pm as a guest would you turn up just before 1pm? Or should i put 12:30 on the invites?

If it was a church wedding or inside the hotel then id be happy to put 1pm but due to logistics as above i suppose im worried people will turn up just before and then be late down to the ceremony .....

What would you all do? All advice appreciated!!!

K xx

Morning

How about saying 1pm ceremony, then at the bottom (Please arrive at 12.30pm to allow time to get to location) os something along those lines.

I was worried about that then realised most normal people would arrive in plent of time, that said one wedding I went to I was racing the bride down the aisle because of traffic!

Are you sending information leaflets with your invitations?  If so, you could mention in there that you need people to arrive by 12:15 (don't tell them 12:30 or they'll arrive at 12:45!)  If not, I would suggest you put a line on the invitation to say 'please arrive at least 30 minutes earlier'.

I would put your ceremony time of 1pm on the invitations.  People will generally arrive before this but as others have said, you could put something down at the bottom saying please arrive by 12.30pm to allow time for travel.

Along the same lines the info I have got from my registrar asks guests to be sitting 15 mins earlier.  So i'm getting married at 2pm and according to that all guests should be seated at 1.45 so that we are not running late and do not get charged more!

Would you put 2pm or 1.45?

Sorry to thread butt!!!

xx

i would always put the earlier time - i think 1230 is ok because that is actually the time you want people to be there in order to make it to the ceremony venue in time. alternatively saying ceremony at 1 but please arrive at 1230 is an option, but then closer to the time if ppl recheck the invite they might not look at all the fine print and just see 1. wouldn't want people turning up at say 5 to 1 and throwing it all off schedule?

and LauraJane, i would put 1.45pm because that is when you want them there. no point taking a risk, people won't mind coming in 15 minutes earlier and milling about or finding their seats etc.

dont forget people probably wont have been to these venues before so they also need time to find the right room, drop off coats/presents and say hi to ppl... anyway those are my views xx

I put the actual time of the ceremony on the invitations.  I also included this on my info sheet

Arrival Time

Guests are asked to arrive at the <venue> at 3.15pm and will be seated at 3.50pm ready for the 4.00pm ceremony.

We are getting married @ 2pm but we have put 1.30pm on the invitations.

That gives everyone plenty of time to arrive & get seated & will also make sure no one see's me when I arrive with my dad.

I'm wanting to get there for about 1.45pm so there will be plenty of time for a few pics before we go inside.

Exactly as Keelz said, we blatently lied on our invites (after advice from the Registrar and venue suggesting this) as our venue is notorious for parking on a nice day (it was in Richmond Park) so to get round this we told a bare faced lie and people only clocked on when they saw the order of service and the timing of the day.

Hi All

Thanks for all the advice i think ill put 1pm and then under the RSVP at the bottom of the invite ill put something like - please ensure you arrive at least 30 minutes earlier

Glad its not only me thats been thinking about this !!!

K xx

Our venue asked us to specify that the guests needed to be there before 2pm (so there isn't someone just arriving once Im already on my way into the room!)

I have put on our invitations (after the usual blah about names and date)

1:45pm for a 2pm Ceremony at xxx

Do you think this is ok? OH doesn't like it, he wants me to leave it off!