Some Unusual Finds - Why You Should Cast A Wide Net When Shopping for Wedding Decorations

One of the traps people fall into when planning their wedding is thinking everything should be sourced from wedding-specific suppliers. This will firstly lead to spending more money than necessary - a 'love' sign from a high street shop still says love, but will be a lot cheaper than the one from an online wedding store. It will also mean you miss out on potentially finding those little quirky bits and pieces that add such a personal touch to your big day decorations. 

When you pick up a wedding magazine, the first thing that will happen is a load of inserts fall out and land on your feet. These brochures will often be for companies promising a 'one stop shop' for wedding decorations and accessories - place cards, table confetti, bunting etc etc. There's nothing wrong with these companies, but the lure of getting everything from one place means you will pay a premium on the price. It also means your wedding decorations will need to fit with the ranges they have on offer - the silver range, the purple range etc. If you want a more 'eclectic' feel to your day, or simply if your colours are not available, then these decoration sets are unlikely to prove useful. 

When thinking about your wedding decorations, it helps to cast a wide net and source individual pieces from a variety of places. Not only will this mean you can shop around for the best deal, but it also means you're more likely to find things meaningful to you and the look you're going for. It's also good to have an open mind on where decorations can come from. For example, you can find a huge variety of tea light holders in home furnishing shops. They might not have been designed specifically for weddings, but if they're the style you want then it doesn't matter. 

Whilst doing some shopping today, I popped into Paperchase to look at the pretty displays and found they stock a range of wedding supplies, from cup cake cases to place cards to confettti:  http://www.paperchase.co.uk/collections/wedding/icat/oewedding/. I also stopped off at Next, and saw that their home department had a huge variety of 'inspired by vintage' accessories that could be used to decorate a wedding. 

I found this wooden 'love' sign for £5.

I also got two of these very sturdy glass tea light holders at £3 each.

As you can probably tell, there's nowhere suitable in my flat to take pictures, so I resorted to using a cushion as a backdrop! I will be using both these pieces to style my wedding, most probably as decorations for the cake table. Next is not a shop many people would consider when choosing their wedding decorations, but the selection of accessories they had proves that you can find pretty things in the most unusual of places if you're willing to look hard enough.