Large Reception Venue and Ceremony Venue - Small Guest Count - Help please!

Maybe you could have a photo booth area, cigar bar, lounge area with plush chairs, etc taking up an area in the back??

I agree with Melinda. Create a fun area (photo booth), relax and chill (lounge/drink area) this will help utilize any empty area.
Also don't fret or worry about it, as we booked our venue space (for both ceremony and reception) which can host a wedding with up to 500 guests. At that time we were expecting a maximum of 130 people and now our count is down to 90 people, so now we have a lot more space/room than we expected. We've had the outlook on it as, it gives more room for people to move/dance freely and feel safe with Covid still being a factor.

I don't think it'll be that empty. Ours is a pretty similar set up. Our venue holds 400 and we're inviting 200, anticipating about 150-160 people to attend. The dessert/cake table, DJ area, and card table will all take up room. You could add a photo booth if you want. But I really don't think you have much to worry about.

One thing to consider is if you have guests flying in, airline rates may be high around a holiday.
We purposely avoided holidays because of this.

View Quoted Comment

The venue is already booked so I cannot go back now.

View Quoted Comment

Thank you! This makes me feel better

View Quoted Comment

Such a good point with covid!

Our venue held up to 350 or 400 people an our guestlist was at 100 including the bride and groom. It gave ample space between tables, people were dancing on both the dance floor and the empty space between the tables. We had a photo booth set up and our bar had enough space in front and around it that people were hanging near it and talking. It definitely did not seem empty to me on the contrary we had good space to just be and have fun.

I love the ideas of the photo booth, lounge area, etc. we had high top tables in our reception space that were intended for cocktail hour rather than having cocktail hour in a separate space and a photo booth, and it worked well! It was a bit spaced out but I liked that rather than it feeling crammed. Guests actually utilized the high tops, etc.

So we have a similar problem with our 60 guest wedding in a venue that holds 130, we are putting 6 people at each table, instead of 8, to spread them out more. It will use up more tables and help to fill the space!