Just Getting Started Planning A Quintessential English Party?

Just Getting Started Planning A Quintessential English Party?

 

Just Getting Started Planning A Quintessential English Party?

There is no better way to hold an event like a birthday, wedding anniversary or milestone celebration, than to host it outdoors in your very own gorgeous English garden.

kent garden parties

Garden party ideas can be such fun. Decide whether your party will have a theme and then you can plan with this in mind. So for example, a typical summer party could be filled with home-made décor, like bunting draped around the garden, trestle tables clothed in coloured or crisp white linen and decorated with a mix of old and new drinking glasses found in your local charity shops. Then add seasonal garden flowers, ideally picked from your own garden, and place in jam jars either decorated with tied ribbon around the neck, or if you have more time why not paint the inside of them, the colour or colours you like.  They look incredible.  Then serve your food on vintage crockery – we recommend http://www.atyourserviceplatehire.co.uk to save you going through your grandparents’ cupboards and attic.

Holding a summer garden party is a British classic, but there is no reason to brave it and gamble with the weather.  If you hire in a marquee, we recommend one with windows and easy lift/unlace sides, so that if the weather is kind to you, it still feels like you are dinning alfresco, but you will ensure your event is perfect, as it will take off any pressure or concern about interruptions from a shower, unpredictable wind or even a scorching hot sun.  With a marquee hired from us at Five Star Marquee Hire – along with tables, chairs and even a dance floor – no amount of rain will dampen your spirit to party outside.

What food should you serve at a garden party?

The main attraction of any summer garden party is undoubtedly the food and drink. At Five Star Marquee Hire, we love a buffet, as it means you can prep a lot in advance and it helps to achieve a really relaxed vibe, enabling your guests to ‘graze’ pretty much all day.

As an alternative to a buffet you could host a BBQ – it means all you have to prep is some salad and sides, but bear in mind someone will get tied to the barbie pretty much all day.

If you are bringing in outside caterers (we recommend an award winning Kent based catering company http://touchays.com, who’s food is featured in the photos), you could opt for a traditional afternoon tea, with scones, jam and cream and delicious cooling Pimms served from jugs, followed by a decadent free-range hog roast in the evening – it is a real winner.

Or if you fancy something less English, we recently set up a large aluminum-framed marquee for an 18th birthday (the client just couldn’t find a local venue happy to host an eighteenth birthday party), where they were serving tapas and Champagne – it all looked like great fun, especially after they’d had such a stressful time trying to find a venue, when they had the perfect pitch sight right outside their own back door all along.

Here are our, Five Star Marquee Hire tips, for a stress-free Garden Party

For a truly stress-free outdoor party, where all the guests are happy, we have five (of course) top tips:

  1. You won’t be surprised to learn, but we recommend hiring in an aluminum-framed marquee as they offer you great value for money, whilst giving you the perfect opportunity to really stamp your own personality on your event. This style of marquee also enables you to push the sides up if the sun decides it’s going to turn up the heat.  Please note if you haven’t hired a marquee but if the weather forecast is looking ominous, we can turn around a quality marquee in just 48 hours.  Just ring to avoid unnecessary delay!
  2. Use outside caterers, as they will bring all the equipment they’ll need. But should you choose to do the catering yourself, for a stress-less party, prepare as much as you can in advance.  We can help you here, by setting up a couple of days before your event so you can decorate the space leaving you time to prepare the food.  However, if you do choose to make your own food, never underestimate how long it can take to do the food shop, especially if the shop you have targeted has sold out of your must have ingredient!  We recommend shopping for as much as you can the day before, whilst we are busy putting up your marquee
  3. Within your invitations, advise your guests on what to wear – not only to give them a sense of the vibe but also to advise them to bring layers. Don’t forget to tell your guests about your wet weather contingency – that way if they get up and see the weathers not great, they won’t bail.   You could write something like “come rain or shine our garden party is going to happen: as we’ve got it covered!”
  4. Make sure there’s room in your freezer for bags of ice for those all-important signature cocktails. We recommend an English Garden Cocktail – a sophisticated, elegant and refreshing gin-based cocktail that’s perfect for garden parties or DIY wedding receptions.  Oh, and don’t forget the mint for your Pimms and Mojitos and for the non-drinkers, why not make a refreshing seasonal mocktail? 
  5. Buy a supply of sunblock (different factors) and put in a place where it’s at hand and don’t forget your outdoor games – ideally they should be just as good played indoors like giant Jenga and noughts n’ crosses. And recycle with style.  Buy some colourful enamelled bins and then label. It will save you hours the next day.

Looking for a relaxed summer wedding?

If you are planning a traditional, classic, and yet, really relaxed summer DIY Wedding, an English Garden Party themed wedding in a marquee doesn’t get much prettier.

Relaxed garden party DIY weddings have become hugely popular over the last five years.  With a completely blank canvas to work with, it’s no wonder more and more couples are embracing this pretty trend and unleashing their creativity.

There are many benefits of having a garden party wedding at home especially.  Here our five reasons why you will fall in love with a marquee for your wedding:

  1. Your venue will be designed and built around you, your needs and your space. In terms of colours, with a blank canvas all colour schemes work, however, we love lots of pastel colours, like soft greens, purples and pinks, as they all work beautifully in a marquee.
  2. A marquee offers you flexible layout allowing you to section off areas
  3. A marquee offers great value for money all year round without any curfew, and see our package prices to give you even better value for money!
  4. We offer a choice of tables, chairs, and lighting – allowing you to create your dream wedding without any compromise
  5. We won’t disappoint, we can also supply all of the trimmings including heating and of course posh loos!

Garden Party This Way

If you’re the type of person that loves to entertain, now is the time to organise a traditional English garden party.  At Five Star Marquee Hire we specialise in marquees and gazebos, for all of your garden party plans, formal or informal, large or small.

We are sure you have something to celebrate this summer, whether it be: a wedding or a recent engagement, a birthday party, a baby shower, Prom (as so few venues will host them), or simply because you just want to have your nearest and dearest, around for a garden party.  Just tell us a bit about your aspirations and we can provide you with a quote tailored to your needs.

Then all you have to do is invite your guests, evoke your chosen theme and book a photographer to capture all those precious details, we love http://fleurchallisphotography.com who kindly agreed we could use her images in this post.  Don’t forget to check out Etsy, Folksy and Pinterest for ideas and to help you, we have launched our very own Pinterest boards on all thing marquee and inspiration for garden parties.

Contact Us For Help Planning Your Garden Party In Kent


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