9 PRO TIPS FOR YOUR THE BEST OUTDOOR CANOPY WEDDING THIS FALL

With a surplus of color and a shortage of heat, the fall wedding is a fan favorite for couples across the world. If you’re planning to tie the knot in fall, it’s never too early to start planning and finding new inspirations for your big day. Not sure where to start for your autumn wedding? Our event experts at Extreme Canopy are here to help. In this guide, we cover 9 professional tips to consider for fall weddings. We’ve seen these tips in action, so we know exactly what makes an autumn wedding great (and what doesn’t). Make your wedding in fall one to top them all, and shop industry-leading event essentials, including wedding canopy, banners and flags from our team today!

BOOK A PHOTOGRAPHER THAT SPECIALIZES IN OUTDOOR WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY

No matter the season, a wedding photographer is an integral part of any wedding. While other wedding roles are important for ensuring that your big day goes off without a hitch, the wedding photographer dictates how the wedding will be remembered. If you’re planning a fall wedding, you likely want to take advantage of the seasonal spectacle: the changing colors, the falling leaves and the brisk blue skies. Make sure you hire a wedding photographer with ample experience in outdoor photography. Sure, most wedding photographers can shoot outside, but you want a photographer that will dazzle you with his or her finished work. If you have a hired wedding planner, ask for photographer recommendations. If not, the internet is your best friend. There, you’ll find photographers’ rates, availabilities and — most importantly — their portfolios. Don’t book a photographer without seeing his or her photos first. Take a look at a photographer’s past work to see if it fits your vision. Take your time to ensure that you make the right choice. You’ll be looking at your wedding photos for the rest of your lives, after all.

SERVE UP HOT SOUPS AND DRINKS

Nothing captures the coziness of autumn like hot, soothing foods and drinks. Whether you’re blessed with an idyllic fall day or premature winter party-crashing your wedding, serving the warm stuff will help keep your guests in great spirits. Speaking of spirits: warm mulled wine, hot hard cider and plenty of tea on hand to make Hot Toddy’s are good options for the drinkers at your wedding. As far as non-alcoholic choices go, hot chocolate and non-alcoholic cider are excellent ideas. Paired with high-end coffee and tea, these warm drinks will hit the spot for your entire guest list. In addition to drinks, consider serving hot seasonal soup to maximize coziness alongside the main course. Some great autumnal choices include potato leek soup, tomato basil soup, lentil soup, chicken noodle soup and wild rice soup.

DON’T SKIMP ON SPACE HEATERS

An outdoor fall wedding can be one of the most beautiful backdrops for the ultimate declaration of love. It can also be one of the coldest backdrops, as fall has an infamous reputation for ushering winter in too early at random. For this reason, you need at least some infrastructure to keep you and your guests warm. To this end, space heaters are an excellent solution. During the ceremony, make sure that there are a few space heaters within arm’s length of each seating section inside your wedding canopy. If you’re dining outdoors or in a tent, set a space heater up within a few feet of each table. While you are at it, get one for the DJ, get a couple to skirt the dance floor, a couple to put behind the bar, and a couple more flung artfully for good measure. Check wedding canopy rental companies in your area for electric and gas-powered heaters to meet your needs.

GET THE PERFECT LARGE EVENT TENT FOR THE BIG DAY

An outdoor wedding lives and dies by its tent(s). The sun sets much earlier in the fall (especially after daylight savings) than it does in the spring or summer. And once the sun starts to set, temperatures start to drop. You have space heaters, but now you need a place to contain the heat. If you’re hosting your wedding outdoors, you need a wedding tent. Great for warmth in the night and protection against sun, rain and wind during the day, wedding tents provide essential shelter for ceremonies, receptions and everything in between. They also provide ample opportunity for amenities and ambiance. Large event tents allow you to hang lights and decorations. They can also be customized with windows, floors and other upgrades.

BUY CUSTOM BLANKETS AS REAL-TIME WEDDING FAVORS

Who doesn’t love a good blanket on a crisp autumn night? Even better is a good blanket that can be used for the upcoming winter and every cold season onward. If you have the room in your budget, consider investing in custom wedding blankets to give out as favors at your wedding. People will use them throughout your special night to stay cozy, and they will make appearances in many of your wedding photos. Best of all, your wedding blankets will give your guests something to keep and remember your wedding whenever they use them. Be sure to make your blankets comfy, and be sure they include some design feature (color or text) that commemorates your wedding and looks great in pictures.

CUT COSTS: DO YOUR OWN PRINTING

In today’s tech-driven age, we have a number of amazing tools at our fingertips. For those of us planning weddings, printing services have big benefits. For one: you no longer need to be a graphic designer to design some great things for your wedding. Save yourself a lot of cash by designing and printing your own placement cards and invitations for your big day. There are tons of templates online for beautiful fall-themed invitations and placement cards that you can easily use for your own wedding. The days of paying a designer or calligrapher for all of your written documents for your wedding are long gone. (Though you can go that route if you have very specific requests.) Check out how simple and affordable it can be to use printing services to design for your own wedding!

DECORATE WITH RUSTIC BOUQUETS AND WHITE ROSES

Your flower choices for a fall wedding are going to be one of the strongest aesthetic statements of the entire event. Choose wisely. Have fun with your bouquets for the wedding and embrace fall foliage and rustic bouquets. You could even consider leaning into an elegant cornucopia aesthetic for your bridesmaid’s and bridal bouquets. If cornucopias aren’t quite your cup of tea, white roses are a great option for matching whatever fall flowers you end up using. White roses are also relatively inexpensive as far as wedding flowers go. When planning your wedding flower arrangements, don’t forget about the boutonnieres. Fall flowers look great pinned onto a groom and his groomsmen’s chests — especially when they match the rest of the wedding décor.

PUT SOME PURPLE IN YOUR COLOR SCHEME.

When thinking of fall colors, most of us are quick to imagine reds, browns, oranges and yellows. However, a true fall landscape is vividly painted with a host of powerful colors. One that is often overlooked is purple. Deep, royal purple goes great with the changing leaves of autumn. If you haven’t decided on the perfect bridesmaid color yet, consider a dark purple. It will surely pop against the fall color palette you already have in place.

DON’T BE AFRAID TO HAVE FALL-THEMED CATERING 

Food is a big factor at any wedding, and fall presents an opportunity for unique cuisine. To celebrate the seasons, consider serving foods that are fall-specific, such as squash or pumpkin soup, a cranberry demi-glaze or savory meat and vegetable pies. You probably don’t want your wedding doubling as a second Thanksgiving dinner, but you do want the fall theme in full swing to create an awesome atmosphere. If your food choices add to your color aesthetic, you know you are doing your wedding right, and your guests will be all the merrier for it. At an outdoor wedding, people want to feel like they’ve just eaten a feast at a mountain lodge. Don’t make your feast too heavy, however — you still want people dancing and playing games after dinner!

OUTFIT YOUR FALL WEDDING WITH THE WORLD’S FINEST TENTS FROM OUR TEAM AT EXTREME CANOPY

Whether you are a professional wedding planner or a bride setting up her DIY fall wedding, you need a wedding canopy you can count on to provide shelter and ambiance for your special day. Since 2003, our team at Extreme Canopy has outfitted outdoor weddings all around the globe with expertly crafted wedding tents and other large event tent products. Made from heavy-duty components — including PVC-coated polyester roofs and sides, hard-pressed extruded aluminum frames and galvanized steel connectors — our large event tents are designed to withstand inclement fall weather and winds up to 50 miles per hour. We offer both standard models and custom wedding tents to help you find the ideal fit.

Hosting a smaller function and need a tent for drinks, gifts or other wedding activities? Check out our line of portable and easy-to-set-up instant canopy tents and inflatable tents. Need doors, curtains, gutters or other accessories for your primary large event tent? We have those, too. Follow the links above to create the perfect tent for your big day, and outfit your fall wedding with the industry’s best from our team here at Extreme Canopy.