What are your venue's covid restrictions?

My wedding isn't until next year, but I have my first planning meeting with the venue this Sunday and I plan to ask questions about this. Especially regarding the guest count. Although the restrictions may possibly be less by the time my wedding gets here, I feel like I need to prepare myself for the possibility of needing to cut my guest list. It's already been heard cutting it down just stay within our budget, so I'm not looking forward to it.

My venue is also a hotel/ ballroom. They have a 50% capacity, but this didn't really apply to us because the max capacity is 800 so 50% would be 400. We only have 160 invited. The servers will masks and gloves. The buffet will now be served, where the guests go to the buffet but the server will dish out the food for each guest instead of self serve. Same goes with desserts. The dance floor will have marks of 6 feet apart but they are allowing guests to decide if they want to dance closer to one another. My ceremony space can fit 250 w/ social distancing so I'm not worried about that one either. We can decide how we want the tables to be, we want to wait on this one to see what September looks like but we will probably have some distance between tables.

Hey girl! Our postpone date is also September 5, 2020. As of right now we can have up to 50 people, until our state, Virginia, goes into phase 3 which would be no limit on the number of guests. Only thing is we don’t know when or if that will happen before August 5, which is when I need to get the final headcount.


If we keep it to 50, that obviously gives our venue a lot of space to spread out tables, and we will probably have tables upstairs and downstairs, our venue is a old Italian Villa with a bar upstairs and a bar downstairs. So that part will be easy. We are also planning on changing the buffet to a served buffet. I absolutely don’t want guests to have to wear masks. Our ceremony is outdoors, so that shouldn’t be an issue. Reception is indoors, so I think just spreading everything out will be fine

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Thanks Kelsey this is super helpful! I will use your suggestion for the dance floor!!

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Sounds lovely! Thanks for info!!

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I"m hoping things will work out for you!

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Thanks! I hope the same for you. The comment on here are very helpful so thanks for posting this question.

Thats great! my venue hasnt given me any guidelines yet because our governor has not released restrictions or capacity for phase 4 which includes weddings. Im glad to hear the restrictions are kind of up to you.

I'm in VA. Currently in phase 2 (50 ppl gatherings max) but by wedding in September, hopefully phase 3 (250 ppl max - guidelines came out very recently.)


My venue has been.... more optimistic than I am. Ceremony and reception are both set to be indoors right now. My original invited count was 150, but now I'm comfortable with 100 *tops*.
We made a FB page to add "yes" responders to provide updates in real time. The staff will wear masks, and I plan to encourage (cough cough strongly) that guests wear them for everyone's safety and comfort. Take it off to eat/ drink, then put it back on. If they'd like to dance anywhere near me, it'll be a hard pass with no mask.
I was concerned that maybe it would rub people the wrong way, but a friend pointed out that brides ask for insane stuff all the time. If I told everyone to paint their pinkies gold to match our colors, most people would do it. I'm asking them to take a pretty low effort precaution to keep us, our families and our friends safe. I'll also ask them not to drive drunk - I know, I'm a bridezilla! 😂
I hope everyone is able to marry their person - whatever form that ends up taking.