So your best friend has just got engaged and as her best friend / sister or close family member she has asked you to be her chief bridesmaid. Amazing! This is a great role in the wedding party, but it is also one of responsibility. To make sure you enjoy the lead up to the big day and the wedding itself, here are some great tips on what you should know as the chief bridesmaids or maid of honor.
1. Know your role
It’s so exciting to be chief bridesmaid and it makes the preparations all the more fun, so it’s best to know what you’re the bride to be is expecting you to help with. Maybe have a chat over coffee and ask her what she would like you to organise, help with or be there for. It could be she only really wants you to plan the hen party, or it could be she expects you to attend all her dress fittings and be her right hand women in all aspects of the wedding planning. Having a list of your responsibilities that you and the bride to be have agreed is a nice way of getting involved without overstepping the line.
2. To Hen party or not to Hen party
Usually one of the main roles of the chief bridesmaid is to organise hen weekends, so you will want to be able to answer the question ‘what kind or hen party would she like? There is so much choice out there from chocolate making to seduction classes. If you want to plan it as a surprise, a great tip is to create a hen do scale with activities from hot to cold. Hot being a stripper show and clubbing night and cold being a spa weekend away. Get the bride to score where she would like the hen party to sit, which will give you an indication of what she has in mind, but keeping the exact details until the day.
If you’re feeling super creative, then consider making a few hen party mood boards, based on the themes you think she will like the most. Cut out photos from magazines with décor designs, food and drink recipes and color patches and let the bride to be pick the one she likes the most. Why not get all the hens involved and see what everyone comes up with?
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Photo credit Geoff Kirby Photography http://www.geoffkirbyphotography.co.uk/ — click to see the full wedding
3. WWBD
As the chief bridesmaid you might be expected to make decisions on behalf of the bride, especially on the wedding day. There will be lots going on and there may be wedding suppliers asking where to place flowers or what time you want the canapés ready. This is when you want to be thinking WWBD (what would the bride do) and help to make decisions that she may be too busy or not want to have to deal with.
I hope these questions and ideas will help you to be a super chief bridesmaid if you are already one or if in the near future you become one. Also If you have any ideas you can suggest please leave a comment below , I would love to hear them.
Rebecca is an event organiser at Chillisauce.co.uk who speaks to thousands of brides to be, maids of honour and chief bridesmaids, and is well equipped to offer advice and ideas on hen parties