Afternoon Tea venue decor ? please flash

We are having afternoon tea purely because it was more affordable. Our caterer charges extra for hire of cake stands and vintage china, we have told her we can't afford that (extra £3.50 per head!) so she is going to serve everything on large square plates, they are quite modern looking and I really like the idea of doing something 'traditional' but with a little modern twist. Can't find any pics, but it looked nice.

To make - i think you need a glue gun and cake pillars, but not sure! have seen some diy cardboard ones. when I read this i immediately thought you could do a 3 tier stand, on the bottom food, in the middle flowers/candles, then more food on the top. OH just said no candles as it'd heat the top plate!

OR to have plates served a cake stand like this, then the caterers can put the plates on them and you can wind flowers around the joining bit

Why not buy some cake stands from charity shops? You can often pick them up faily cheap, and you could always re-sell them after. They would just add some height on the tables. For £3.50 pre head to hire them, I'd just buy a few much for much cheaper.

Even poundland has them.

https://www.poundland.co.uk/product-range/a-z/union-jack-3-tier-cake-stand/

https://www.poundland.co.uk/product-range/a-z/childrens-cake-stand/

Have you looked into hiring vintage crockery and 3 tier cup cake stands? I found these companies the other day:

http://www.thelittlehouseofcupcakes.co.uk/page.aspx?pid=11

http://www.vintageteatimes.co.uk/

There's loads of vintage crockery hire companies out there - source one near to your wedding venue to cut down on delivery costs.

Failing that, ask mums, aunties and friends if they have any 1 tier glass cake stands, tiered cup cake stands and vintage crockery to display the food on. A great place to buy this type of stuff is TK Maxx - then perhaps you could sell them afterwards to re-coup some funds? I'm sure you would have plenty of takers on here!

I had a similar kind of look for my baby shower here:

Could you maybe find the bits in charity shops? You can also then sell them after?

You can often get some modern looking cake stands for reasonable prices from places like TK Maxx & Home bargains. I needed to get hold of a few recently & I had great success at carboot sales & charity shops plus my Mum produced a couple that she had had tucked away in a cupboard somewhere, so asking around relatives is a good idea.

I've also noticed that you can get some stylish cake stands & plates online so try google or ebay,

Good luck. It's going to look fab!

If you want an afternoon tea with a modern twist, how about something this:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tier-Square-Cake-Stand-Classikool%C2%AE/dp/B001URIIL0/ref=sr_1_13?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1338889597&sr=1-13

or this for an idea - NOT to buy!!

http://www.notonthehighstreet.com/coco-male-interiors/product/three-tier-square-glass-cupcake-stand?utm_source=GoogleShopping&utm_medium=Home%20&%20Garden&utm_campaign=97613

Thanks Ladies, I love that cake stand Gemicle (and good point re no candles on it lol) and I love the flowers on the cake stands idea Daffodilwaves love your flowers in glasses on stands, very pretty ! Thanks for the recommendation Chickster, I'll check out tk maxx !

Im wanting to make some of the stands at least as I am a glass artist so it would be quite personal but I want everything to look right and a forest of my stuff I think would be weird !! I think i need to buy some flowers and things and have a play and start looking out for glass cake stands in charity shops too !! ? Thanks again ladies you have been a great help getting my brain going in the right direction !

We bought all our cake stands off ebay, think they were mostly £10-15 each and we used 1 between 4. You can see a selection here:

We had long tables, and running down the middle we had vases with single-stemmed roses, single candlesticks and "sweet trees" like this one:

The whole hall looked like this before everyone arrived:

The staff then put the cake stands down the middle in between the other decorations. Afterwards they cleared all the spare cakes to the side (as you can see in the top picture) and people could nibble for the rest of the day.

Wilkinson do these fab 2 tier cake stands for just £4. I got them for my friends wedding and sold them on straight after.

Why not add a touch of vintage with come sandwhich/canape flags...

Aww how cute is that sweet tree ! ? Im definitely going to have to finish a cake stand and have a play on my kitchen table re other decorations or fitting flowers in I think, I do love the idea of having votives with tea lights in and some flowers in bottles or vases or something but im thinking having tall candles may be better (or some other way of candles so that people cant burn themselves if the reach over them ?)

Hi,

You could put paper doylees on the plates. You can get pretty Cath Kidston type ones or Lakeland sell them, as do sainsburys

Hope that helps.

You could make pretty bunting too

Lynne

Thanks Lynne ! I think you started something, just found a great blog about colouring doilies so i think Im going to have a play ?