Couples are making their special day just as memorable for their guests as themselves with engaging wedding trends, both before and during wedding celebrations.
Weddings bring people together—not only the couple being united in marital bliss, but also friends from different groups and stages of life, the couple’s families, and other loved ones from near and far. With as much careful planning as weddings take, many couples want to ensure their guests have as much fun attending the big day as they’ll have getting hitched. In addition to live painters, typewriter poets-for-hire and dancers, couples are electing for all sorts of fun, interactive activities before, during and after the wedding to give their loved ones an experience they’ll never forget.
Help wedding guests break the ice with photo booths and antique photography
“Not everyone likes to dance, so with this, you get to hang out and be involved,” says photographer Chris Heidel, owner of High Life Tin Types.
While modern photo booths are always a crowd-pleaser, for vintage lovers and mindful aesthetes, the opportunity to have your picture taken on glass using wet-plate collodion technology (first invented in the early 1850s) draws them to High Life’s mobile studio. Tintypes are the second-ever form of photography invented, and the process is analog from start to finish.
“When you think of Civil War photography, this is what you’re thinking of,” Heidel says. “With tintypes, I’m locked in on the eyes, so everything else tends to be pretty soft because the depth of field is so shallow. That’s why tintypes are so striking—because it brings you right to the eyes and the rest is soft and blurred in a pleasing way.”
Though most of Heidel’s process is the same as it was in the 1850s, nowadays, the chemistry used to develop the plates is much better, subjects don’t have to sit still for lengthy periods, and he scans all the tintypes, so couples get digital copies as well.
Heidel says it would take a special couple to want all their wedding photos as tintypes, so most have him at the reception, where guests excitedly line up to have their portraits taken.
“It’s an ice breaker. If they’re waiting in line, they’re going to talk to the person next to them. Plus, everyone has an uncle who took photography in high school and wants to talk,” Heidel says. “The entertainment value is just as important, so I try to stress to the couple that their guests are going to have a better time because I’m there doing this, and that matters just as much as getting however many plates.”
For brides wearing wedding dresses passed down through the generations and couples looking to recreate treasured old family photos, tintypes offer a way to capture that old-timey aesthetic that complements the garment’s age and connects family memories through time.
“I also have a studio [in Clintonville], so I’ve also had couples come in after the wedding to do portraits, and a few couples have bought tintype sessions for their wedding parties as thank you gifts,” Heidel says. “So maybe the night before the reception, when the two families are hanging out, they’ll come by here to take photos.”
Get to know the wedding parties by cooking together
Spending time with new family members brought together by a wedding should be a joyful experience, but as Heidel says, sometimes you need to break the ice, and nothing brings people together quite like food.
The Kitchen, located on East Livingston Avenue, takes the camaraderie of cooking to a whole new level. Its participatory dining experience gives guests a meal that’s not only delicious but also full of opportunities for genuine connection—a home-cooked meal without the stress, and with enough room for everyone.
“It’s the idea of bringing people together to create a meal together,” says co-owner Anne Boninsegna. “The thing that makes it special and unique is when people come together—whether they’re not experienced cooks or they’re very experienced and consider themselves a home chef—everyone has a role and everyone can contribute to their own personal comfort level and feel good about the outcome.”
Boninsegna calls it “cooking with training wheels.” Boninsegna and co-owner Jen Lindsey are professional chefs who help ensure the meal will be delicious no matter attendees’ skill level in the kitchen, and that everyone with dietary restrictions will have a complete dining experience (instead of just giving the vegetarians the side dishes or having a single, bland gluten-free option, for example). However, Boninsegna notes, participatory dining isn’t your traditional cooking class.
“Our goal isn’t necessarily for you to learn something in the kitchen unless it’s something you’re learning about the people you’re talking to. Our goal is for you to make a great memory and have some great food along the way, so there’s not as much pressure about what happens if you don’t get the hollandaise sauce right,” Boninsegna says. “We come up with recipes that are simple and delicious but also have some technique to them, so when you leave, you feel like you accomplished something. Anybody can come to a wedding and sit at a table, but how many times do you get to have a hands-on experience?”
The Kitchen has hosted wedding parties, showers and rehearsal dinners where families and loved ones didn’t know each other before and left as friends. They’ve even hosted couples who are passionate about food and who, after the ceremony, donned aprons and cooked their reception dinner alongside their guests.
“It’s a great way to bond. It keeps everyone’s hands busy while you’re meeting and greeting, and getting to know your loved one’s betrothed,” Boninsegna says. “There’s something about standing across from someone while you’re chopping onions that allows you to let your guard down.”
Audio guest books let guests give everlasting advice to newlyweds
Giving wedding guests a chance to be themselves and pour their hearts out to the newlyweds is one of the reasons Nick Wright of Party Pleasers loves offering audio guest books in the style of vintage rotary phones that attendees can’t resist picking up.
“[An audio guest book] eliminates that common question that people have of, ‘What do I write here?’” Wright says. “With a traditional guest book, you would only sign once, [but] with the audio guest book you can keep coming back—creating an archive of messages that only get funnier and more entertaining as the night progresses.”
Wright first noticed demand for audio guest books after the pandemic lockdowns were lifted, and requests have only increased every year since. There’s nothing quite like hearing someone’s voice, especially when it’s captured and can be listened to long after they’re gone, and audio guest books can be a way to preserve pieces of family history for the ears in the same way a wedding album preserves for the eyes.
“Couples often cite how personal and emotionally rich the voice messages are,” Wright says. “Clients love hearing messages from grandparents or friends who live far away—it becomes a time capsule of heartfelt audio messages that they can revisit again and again.”
When it comes to interactive wedding elements, the possibilities are limited only by your imagination, and more vendors offer opportunities for meaningful hands-on experiences than couples might expect. In addition to these unique activities, locally, The Flowerman offers flower arranging classes where the wedding party can make their own bouquets. The Candle Lab in Worthington offers a make-your-own candle experience where couples can choose their signature scent to adorn the reception tables, and multiple drink vendors can help couples design their own special cocktail for the big day. Whatever a couple’s interests, there’s likely a way to get the wedding party and guests involved for a fun and unforgettable gathering.
This story is from the Fall 2025 issue of Columbus Weddings. Sign up for our newsletter here.
This article originally appeared on Columbus Monthly: Share the Fun: Make Your Wedding Memorable with These Interactive Wedding Trends
Reporting by Mandy Shunnarah / Columbus Monthly
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
