Best Tulsa Wedding Reception Venue
Choosing a wedding reception venue is a task that shouldn’t be taken likely! While the venue for the wedding ceremony itself is certainly important, the venue of your wedding reception will be the setting for a party that you remember for the rest of your life.
If you live in Tulsa, Stokely Event Center is the best place to have a wedding reception. Our wedding reception venue has unique and memorable decor, an easily expandable space for wedding receptions of all sizes, a convenient location with plenty of parking, free audio and video solutions, and much more.
If you’re interested in exploring our venue for yourself to see if we might be the right fit for your Tulsa wedding reception, you can schedule a tour with us by going here. Our friendly staff are always more than happy to show off our incredible space!
Some of the most fun things to plan for your wedding reception are the theme and the decorations. However, since most of us don’t have much experience planning for and decorating large events, we thought we’d put together some of our top wedding reception theme and decoration tips for you here.
Choose A Theme For Your Wedding Reception Venue
When it comes to planning the decorations for your venue, the first order of business should aways be to determine your theme. The theme that you choose should impact the rest of your decor decisions, so the early you figure one out, the earlier you’ll be able to begin collecting the various materials that you’ll need in order to bring your theme to life.
Here are a few of the most popular wedding reception venue themes that you might consider for your wedding reception:
Under the Sea – Love the ocean? Then this theme is for you! The possibilities are endless when it comes to decorating for an underwater-themed wedding reception.
Black And White – Black and white are the most iconic colors representing weddings! Why not go all out by having a black and white themed wedding reception?
Bohemian – Bohemian wedding receptions are stunning! Decorate with all types of flora and fauna, gem stones, and marble.
Retro – Have a favorite decade? Make it your wedding reception theme! 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, there are TONS of fun ways to take things with a retro wedding reception.
Determine Your Wedding Reception Budget
Once you’ve determined the theme that you’ll use for your wedding reception, one of the next things you should be clear on is how much you have to spend on your wedding reception venue, decorations, food, and entertainment.
One of our best tips for stretching your wedding reception budget as far as possible is to choose a venue that includes most of the things that you might pay extra for elsewhere.
If a venue has amazing decor and free entertainment, than that’s potentially thousands of dollars you can save by choosing them. If you plan on having a music or slideshows and videos of any type, it’s also helpful to choose a venue that includes these as well.
As you start making purchases for your wedding reception, make sure that you carefully track your expenses so that you don’t accidentally spend too much! We recommend keeping receipts and starting a spreadsheet to help you manage your budget as easily as possible.
Once you have your theme and your budget figured out, it’s time for the fun part. Decorating your wedding reception venue!
Decorate With Photos
One of our favorite wedding reception decoration ideas is to go crazy with photo! At the end of the day, wedding receptions are a celebration of your new marriage and all the people from your journey. What better way to show that then displaying large prints of your friends, family, and all the hilarious baby pictures of your spouse around the room?
If you have the budget for it, printing out and framing photos to put on each of the tables at your wedding reception venue is a fun way to let your guests learn a little more about you. Not to mention, after the wedding is over, you can take all your favorite pictures and display them in your home.
There is no shortage of online websites that offer great deals for printing photos in bulk, so do a little poking around and make your wedding reception picture perfect.
Use Fabric to Decorate Your Wedding Reception Venue
Another ideas we’re obsessed with is using tons of fabric to decorate your wedding reception venue. Why stop at the table cloths? If your venue allows it, nothing is more beautiful than creating unique spaces with cloth draped from the ceiling.
Even if your venue doesn’t allow this, there are tons of other creative ways that you can make use of cloth for your wedding reception. Turn a simple wooden frame into a beautiful photo spot simply by wrapping it or draping it in your favorite materials. Or maybe consider hanging cloth all around the perimeter of your venue if there’s a particular color pallet in your mind that you want to reinforce with your decor.
As with most things, you can usually get cloth for far less when you buy it in bulk, so go big or go home with your fabric-themed wedding reception.
Decorate With Flowers And Other Greenery
When it comes to wedding decor, an option that never gets old is good ol’ fashioned flowers and greenery. Adding a touch of natural color to a decorated space makes it feel both sophisticated and friendly. The ideal combination for most wedding receptions!
Decorate Your Wedding Reception With Christmas Lights!
Now lets talk about lighting! Of all the decor decisions that you make for your wedding reception venue, the lighting that you choose will have the biggest impact on the overall aesthetic.
And when it comes to affordable but elegant lighting, look no farther than Christmas lights! Who says Christmas lights are only for Christmas? These inexpensive lights are great because they’re easy to purchase in bulk, they won’t break the bank, and they’re incredibly versatile.
Another benefit of Christmas lights is that they’re available in a wide variety of colors, meaning you’ll be able to find some that match your theme. Something to keep in mind is that not all venues will allow you to go wild putting Christmas lights everywhere. Christmas lights have been known to leave scorch marks on lightly colored walls and surfaces, so you’ll want to be careful where you put them.
If done right, Christmas lights can help create the perfect setting for your friends and family to celebrate your happy occasion.
Use Candles To Decorate Your Wedding Reception
Interested in a slightly more sophisticated lighting option for your wedding reception? Then candles are a great way to go. Candles are timeless, elegant, and create warm and inviting atmosphere that can help everyone let loose have have a great time at your wedding reception.
However, if you needed to be careful with Christmas lights, then you most definitely need to use caution when it comes to candles! Flames plus alcohol consumption aren’t the best mix, and depending on the wedding reception venue you choose and the city of your wedding, there may be codes and rules in place that won’t allow you to use candles to decorate.
The good news is that there’s an easy work around that you’ve probably seen coming. Electric candles! It’s easy to purchase hundreds of small electric candles to decorate your venue. If you still want to recreate an authentic candle lit ambiance, there are more expensive electric candles that are hard to tell apart from the fakes.
Decorate Your Wedding Reception Venue With Lamps
Another creative way to light your wedding reception venue is by using lamps on all of the tables. There are a few different routes you can go with this option. On the one hand, you can buy a large amount of lamps that all match. This option is nice if you have a very particular vision in your mind that you’re trying to match, but it can easily cost several thousand dollars to get all of the lamps that you’ll need.
Another option is to simply visit every thrift store in your area and clean out their lamp section! While you’ll still be spending a decent amount of money, we can guarantee it’ll be far less than purchasing dozens of brand new lamps.
The end results of lighting a wedding reception with lamplight are well worth the effort it takes to bring them all together. Just don’t forget to have a few extra light bulbs on hand in case you need them!
Thank you for reading though our wedding reception venue decor tips and ideas! We wish you all the best with the rest of your wedding preparations. If you live in or around Tulsa, Oklahoma, we invite you to come and check out Stokely Event Center to see if we’re the right fit for your wedding reception. You can get in touch with us here to learn more about our venue.