Weddings from the West

A page form the marriage colours handbook World of Weddings Digital Book, click here to access

Weddings from the West

Read what Matthew Oliver of Matthew Oliver Events, Destination Wedding specialist based out of UK and Europe says about Dining layouts, Exotic Destinations and the newest trends in the Weddings!

We enjoyed your dining layout for different events, can you give us 5 best layouts for an outdoor sitdown dinner.

1. Mix of long and rounds ?- This creates a more relaxed fun atmosphere, which we love for our weddings. It also means you can do two different, but complimenting, table designs!
2. One or two long tables ? - Long tables with low or tall arrangements allow for a very elegant design, which suits formal or informal events.
3. A big cross? - You cant get away with this look in that many locations, but when it works it really works!
4. Sporadic individual rectangle tables? - In a square courtyard, garden or even a hall this random look softens the edges a creates a fun atmosphere.
5. Round tables ? - The most traditional of the designs, lends itself to a more formal wedding but is tried and tested and it works!

What are the 3 different venues close to your heart for a destination wedding. -

Aman Sveti Stefan (Montenegro)? - We LOVED working at Sveti Stefan, the location is truly a dream with many options to host events in different areas of the Island and estate creating different looks.

Hotel Chateau du Grand-Lu?e (France) ?- A typical beautiful French Chateau, with incredible service. We have worked with them for years and have some wonderful memories of this Chateau.

Atzaro Agroturismo (Ibiza)? - The vibrancy of Ibiza is incredibly represented at Atzaro, they are also the best to work with!

Your favourite decor installation?

This has to be one of the weddings we created at Atzaro Agroturismo in Ibiza, we absolutely love working with colour and we were able to put in an overhead floral installation in a vibrant red, which I reflected in the design of the table. Ibiza and the venue was the inspiration for the design, which the couple loved and it was one of those times where everything came together and it really worked! Its by far not the biggest or most extravagant installation we have done, but it is one of my favourites ...perhaps because red is my favourite colour!

What is the colour of the year 2020??

?For us we dont tend to follow trends as we look to the country, the venue and the couple for inspiration, we create more of a natural style that pulls in all of these aspects together, we then dont want to inject a colour into the design that may not work just because it is on-trend. Possibly controversial, but who wants to be normal! Aha!

What is the future of weddings in UK/Europe post COVID-19? ?

We can only say that the wedding industry bounces back better than ever in 2021, we expect destination weddings throughout Europe to pick up as people want to get back out there travelling again, after being isolated for so long and a destination wedding is an excellent excuse for that! I imagine venues and suppliers in the most affected areas may do some deals to entice tourism back and there will be a number of couples wanting to make the most of it! Further down the line, I think things will return to how they were with suppliers putting in measures within their companies and contracts to be as protected as possible and prepared should something like this ever happen again.

You have travelled extensively, what are your 3 favourite destinations for a budget wedding .

Croatia? - An absolutely beautiful country and the people are just lovely, weddings here dont have the reputation of countries like France and Italy and so the costs are generally lower for venues and suppliers and the standard is still high! Though flights can be a little high compared to other destinations as it has a lot of holidaymakers visiting.

Spain? - It may be odd to find Spain on this list, but our experience has shown planning weddings in Spain to be very reasonable, along with flights there. If you infuse the Spanish culture into your day it is also going to be memorable!

Oman? - Looking outside of Europe, Oman is massively underrated for destination weddings in our opinion, the country is incredible, the people are lovely and if you are putting on an event with a lot of production and creating something truly spectacular it will cost a lot less than countries with greater reputations for weddings.

World of Weddings

A page form the marriage colours handbook World of Weddings Digital Book, click here to access