I need help with our dessert table

I am thinking of building a backdrop stand for ours, using a cheap clothes rail from Argos and fabric and/or ribbons.

If having a marquee could you use lighting to add a colour backdrop, if not why not buy coloured organza and hang from the marquee rails behind that table x

Hi,

You can buy bunting to decorate yourself in Hobbycraft. My daughter bought sweet jars from ebay and tied ribbons round them. she als bought striped sweetie bags from ebay and scoops for people to serve themselves.

You can buy a piece of fabric from a market or haberdashery shop and cut circles to put onto little jars. Wholesale sweet shops or Bookers or other food wholesaler would be good for sweets. Also look out for bargains in the supermarkets after certain times of year ie. Easter, Christmas when they sell bits cheaply.

Hope this helps

Hi Purple Pixie: I found a tutorial online for how to build a dessert table backdrop frame out of PVC piping. According to this, it's not that difficult: http://www.andersruff.com/custom-printable-parties/uncategorized/diy-tutorial-building-a-dessert-table-backdrop/. I've asked my OH if he can build it for me. Where are you located and when is your wedding? Maybe we can share the backdrop, or at least the frame? (I plan on decorating mine with long flowing ribbons.)

We had a dessert/sweet table but not really such a concerted effort as those above - will try to find a picture. We didn't backdrop it though, as the walls of my venue were decoration enough.

We had a cupcake tower on a clear stand. I had four glass bon bon dishes into which I placed bundles of pale pink and pale gold macarons (more glam looking than doughnuts!). Each pair of macarons was twist wrapped in white tissue paper with a gold cherub pattern. I had four heart shaped, vintage silvered glass dishes which we filled with a mixture of white, ivory and very pale gold pearlescent chocolate dragees (look like sugared almonds but with chocolate in the middle). These sweets came from a variety of online confectionery shops. The pearlescent types look much nicer than matte types. To create the looks above, I think you need to stick with very neat shaped sweets, something like petit fours, which form most of the pink display above.

If you want white china, I imagine you could source most of this at Ikea or similar. I still have my glassware which I am happy to sell on if you think it might work for you.

They're exactly the kind of pictures I've saved as inspiration for our dessert table. What I'm trying to remind myself is that after a couple of people have taken a few bits, it won't look as nice as that! Those pictures are obviously styled for photography and won't look like that for long!

If you're having a marquee, I don't think there's much you can do in terms of backdrop, but the white/ivory backdrop of the marquee will contrast with the colour of the sweets. You could always use some kind of bunting on the front of the table to add some colour.

OMG! You are an absolute star! That looks ideal!

Our wedding is 21st July and we're in the East Midlands.

Ours is 8 July in Glasgow, though we live very close to Oxford. If you don't want to build your own backdrop and want to share and depending on where you live in the East Midlands, could do a few things: (1) we could arrange to meet somewhere off the M6 (or potentially M1) on the 10th of July (when we're driving back to Oxfordshire); (2) you could pick up from where we live (we're probably going on a honeymoon - havent' booked it yet(!!!) - but I'm sure we could figure something out); or (3) I could mail it to you after my wedding, though don't know how expensive it would be . . . not sure how heavy PVC piping is!

The easiest way to do a backdrop in a marquee would be to hang ribbons on a line like:

Then the key thing is to go about collecting your dishes and plates, and ways to create different heights and layers amongst the desserts.

We're doing a desserts table with lots of cakes, cupcakes, buscuits, brownies, etc, etc, and I've started getting different single, double, and triple tier cake plates and vintage crockery bits and bobs for the sweets.

And as a sign:

And to create height for the centrepiece cake to go on top of:

And additional decoration:

Sorry if the pictures are massive!

MAG2FMC - thank you for the offer but I think we'd probably be better off making our own. I think I'd get a bit nervy not having it all sorted before then (control freak? me? ?)

venart - thank you so much for sharing your pictures. You've really inspired me ?

No worries! I completely understand -- I'd want enough time to build it and then try out different decorations myself. ?