This year, wedding trends are being driven by a greater desire for unique experiences customized to the bride and groom. Traditional wedding schedules – ceremony, cocktail hour, main course, dessert, etc. – are going by the wayside as couples plan their big day to better engage their guests throughout the evening and create a more personalized event.
“In 2017, it’s more about the experience than it is for just having a ceremony, a cocktail reception, and a dinner and dance,” Melissa Selmanson, event planner for the Hyatt Regency Long Beach, said. “It’s how you get to each one of those parts of the day or the evening . . . and what are you remembering about each one of those parts.”
Dan D’Sa, director of Grand Food & Beverage, displays trending food items at weddings – smaller bites that guests can grab at tables throughout the reception while they mingle and socialize. (Photograph by the Business Journal’s Larry Duncan)
Erica Noriega, special events manager for the Aquarium of the Pacific, is also noticing a trend of couples looking to create a unique experience rather than a traditional one. “It’s not just the typical ceremony and reception and then you sit down and have dinner and leave,” she said. “People are really trying to give their guests more of an event.”
One way that couples are creating a more engaging, unique atmosphere is through activities and entertainment. “We see a lot more photo booths than we used to,” Noriega said. Couples who marry at the Aquarium are increasingly leveraging the unique venue. Some couples have incorporated live sea otter shows or even had a diver in the Great Hall’s stories-tall tank announce them as they walk down the aisle.
Dan D’Sa, director of Grand Food & Beverage at The Grand Long Beach, observed that couples are creating more social, memorable events by changing up the main course. “Not to say that a traditional wedding or sit-down meal isn’t great, but what’s trending are more walk-around foods, like live-action food stations,” D’Sa said. “We were doing live carving stations with prime rib. We were doing tacos. . . . We did an Indian [food station] with chicken tikka masala and rice. And we dress up each area to go with that theme, so it was really like an experience around the world,” he explained.
Not only does this format give guests more meal options, but it also creates a more social environment, D’Sa pointed out.
Sabine DuBois, director of catering at the Queen Mary, said couples are drawn to the ship for its romantic elegance and Art Deco decor. She has noticed that couples are increasingly budget-conscious, and are having smaller affairs on less popular days of the week. (Photograph by the Business Journal’s Larry Duncan)
“We are starting to see people wanting to be a little more creative and different with their menus and asking for more customized menus,” Lisa Duncan, director of catering and convention services at Hotel Maya, said. For example, a couple that recently wed at the Maya requested fried chicken as the main course because, even though it was not on the typical wedding menu, it was the groom’s favorite dish.
Event planners from multiple local venues, including The Grand, the Aquarium and the Hyatt, pointed out that Millennials are increasingly conscious about incorporating healthy, sustainable foods into their wedding menus.
“People are even more conscious about trying to get on board with things that are organic,” Noriega said. “People are even more aware of sustainable options.”
Mary Carley, director of events at the Hyatt Regency, sees the customization trend as generational. “There is a huge trend in the Millennial generation to go toward craft items. That’s why we’re seeing a lot of custom food requests,” she said. “We are getting requests for craft beers and ciders now and things that are made locally and homemade.”
Nontraditional desserts are also becoming popular. “It’s really popular now to do nitrous ice cream,” Carley said, referring to stations where someone creates ice cream before guests’ eyes using all the ingredients and liquid nitrogen.
“People are doing something a little more individual and unique than a traditional tiered wedding cake,” Noriega said, noting that she often sees candy stations at weddings.
D’Sa said donuts are becoming a popular dessert alternative. “Churros and cinnamon crisps with different toppings are also super popular,” he added.
Cakes are going by the wayside at today’s weddings in place of dessert tables with smaller bites, like the cannolis and chocolate dipped strawberries shown here. (Photograph by Caught In The Moment Photography)
“Candy and dessert stations are really popular still, and it’s not just to fill a bag with jellybeans anymore,” Duncan said. “It’s really elevated, high-end desserts and treats.” When cakes are used as the dessert, Duncan has been seeing a trend of sleek cakes made to look like a slab of marble. “It’s a clean sort of modern look, and it’s very pretty and unique,” she said.
For the most part, wedding themes and decor are fairly specific to the venue, according to interviewed wedding professionals. But some trends are emerging, including using a mix of table sizes – long, square and round – to create visual interest.
Similarly, Selmanson noted that centerpieces are often staggered in height, or each table may have entirely unique centerpieces. “I would say with flowers you are getting more of a mix whether you are doing high and low arrangements, or maybe you have tables that have no arrangements but have candle lighting instead,” she said. “People are enhancing a lot of their events with multiple candles and then using flowers as more of an accent, where it used to be vice versa.”
Sabine DuBois, director of catering at the Queen Mary, said the biggest trend she’s seeing is a move toward smaller, more budget-friendly weddings. “They want a lot of value for the money,” she said. “We are still seeing a lot of smaller weddings, such as 20 to 50 people.”
Many couples are opting to get married on Fridays or Sundays, which are typically cheaper than Saturday wedding packages, DuBois noted. “They want value, but they are looking to make it very elegant,” she said, adding that couples are also focused on customized weddings as well.