Planning Your 2027 Wedding? Why now is a good time to start
As summer begins to draw to a close, September often marks a change of pace in the wedding world.
For many newly engaged couples, the summer months have been filled with celebrations of their own, attending weddings of friends and family, or simply enjoying being engaged without feeling the need to start planning immediately.
Then September arrives, and thoughts naturally begin to turn towards the year ahead.
If you’re planning a 2027 wedding, now is a very good time to start — particularly if you’re hoping to marry during the popular spring and summer months.
After helping many couples plan their weddings here at Nettlestead Place, our advice is to concentrate initially on the decisions that will shape your day — and allow the smaller details to come later.
Start with how you want your wedding to feel
Before becoming too absorbed in dates, colour schemes or table decorations, think about the wedding you truly want.
Would you love an outdoor ceremony surrounded by beautiful gardens? A relaxed drinks reception in the sunshine? A beautiful Wedding Breakfast followed by a joyous evening celebration? Perhaps something smaller and more intimate?
Think about your guests too. Would you prefer everything to take place in one location? Is plenty of outdoor space important? And, importantly, what happens if the weather doesn’t behave itself?
Getting these fundamentals right will make many of the decisions that follow considerably easier.
Choose your venue before planning too much else
Your venue is one of the few decisions that influences almost everything else — your date, guest numbers, style of wedding and the natural flow of the day.
For that reason, we’d resist planning your wedding in too much detail before finding the right place.
A good venue website should give you a genuine feel for a venue before you enquire. Once you’ve made contact, there should also be an opportunity to understand considerably more before deciding whether it’s somewhere you’d like to visit.
That’s very much our approach at Nettlestead Place. Our website provides a taste of what we offer and, following an enquiry, we send couples much more detailed information about the venue and how our weddings work before arranging a private showround.
It means that when you do come to see us, you already have a good understanding of Nettlestead Place and can concentrate on something rather more important – how it feels.
Can you imagine your family and friends there? Does the wedding day flow naturally? And do you feel comfortable with the people who will be helping you organise it?
Don't choose a date simply because it's available
It’s easy to begin wedding planning with a particular date already circled on the calendar. Sometimes there’s a good reason for that, but if there isn’t, keeping an open mind can give you much greater choice.
Instead, think about the experience you’d like.
At Nettlestead Place, the gardens are an important part of that experience — and they don’t stand still throughout our wedding season. The estate transforms with the seasons: spring brings vibrant new growth and fresh blossom, while early summer sees the gardens mature into full bloom, filling the air with rich fragrance. High summer introduces a captivating, sun-drenched atmosphere, leading gracefully into the softer light and rich, changing palette of early autumn.
Our wedding season runs from April to October and each part has a character of its own. There isn’t really a single ‘best’ time to marry here — just different versions of Nettlestead Place.
Sometimes choosing the right time of year is more important than choosing a particular date.
Think about the memories — and the photographs
Long after the flowers have gone and the last glass has been raised, your photographs will remain.
When viewing a venue, therefore, consider the variety of settings it can offer your photographer throughout the day.
We may be a little biased, but Nettlestead is something of a photographer’s dream. The historic house and 13th-century Undercroft, Rose Garden, mature trees, lawns, borders, water, architectural details and far-reaching countryside views provide an extraordinary number of possibilities.
Better still, they’re all here. You don’t need to disappear from your guests for long periods simply to find somewhere beautiful for photographs.
And because the gardens change throughout the season, so do the photographic opportunities. It’s one reason we still love seeing each new wedding gallery — photographers continually find perspectives we’ve never noticed ourselves.
Look beyond the headline venue price
Wedding venues structure their pricing in very different ways, so comparing headline venue-hire figures rarely tells the whole story.
What matters is understanding what your wedding is realistically likely to cost for the experience you actually want.
Consider the overall proposition: what’s included, the quality and flexibility of the food and drink offering, how the day is staffed, the spaces available to you and what you may need to arrange separately.
A venue should be open about its pricing and provide enough information for you to make a sensible comparison before investing your time in a visit.
Ultimately, understanding what you’re actually getting is far more useful than comparing headline figures.
Secure the things where choice really matters
Once you’ve found your venue and secured your date, you can begin booking suppliers who are particularly important to you.
Photographers, videographers, musicians, DJs, florists and other specialists can be booked well in advance, particularly if you have someone specific in mind.
It’s also worth understanding how a venue selects the suppliers it suggests.
Some venues operate formal recommended-supplier arrangements that can include commercial or commission-based relationships. At Nettlestead Place, we take a different approach. We don’t operate a commissioned recommended-supplier list. Instead, we’re happy to suggest suppliers who have worked here previously and whose quality and approach we have experienced first-hand.
Equally, we’re very happy to welcome new suppliers chosen by our couples. Ultimately, your photographer, florist or entertainer should be someone whose work you love and who feels right for your wedding.
Give your ideas room to change
One of the pleasures of planning a wedding is that ideas develop.
A food tasting may change your thoughts about the menu. You might discover a local wine you hadn’t previously considered, find a florist whose style inspires you or decide that something you originally thought essential really isn’t important after all.
Allow some space for those ideas to evolve.
There is a big difference between securing the important elements of your wedding and trying to organise every last detail eighteen months beforehand.
Wedding planning shouldn't become a second job
There is an extraordinary amount of wedding inspiration available today. That’s wonderful — but it can also make planning feel unnecessarily complicated.
You don’t need to make hundreds of decisions immediately.
Start with the big ones. Find somewhere you love. Understand what it will realistically cost. Secure your date and the suppliers who matter most.
Then enjoy being engaged for a while.
At Nettlestead Place, we deliberately host a limited number of weddings during our April to October season, with just one wedding taking place each day. It gives us the opportunity to get to know our couples and help make the planning process feel exciting rather than overwhelming.
After all, planning your wedding should be stress free and part of the enjoyment — not simply something to get through before the day itself.
“Sharon was absolutely incredible from beginning to end. She was so helpful, attentive and reassuring throughout the whole process and made everything feel so easy. Nothing was ever too much trouble.”
— Lee & Laura Hall
Thinking about a 2027 wedding in Kent?
If you’re considering a 2027 wedding, September is a lovely time to start exploring.
Our website will give you a taste of Nettlestead Place, its history, gardens and the weddings we host. If what you see feels right, give us a call or send us an enquiry and we’ll share further information to help you understand in much more detail what a wedding here can look like.
Then comes the best bit.
A private showround gives you the opportunity to walk through the gardens, stand beneath the ancient lime tree in the Rose Garden, step inside the Undercroft and begin imagining your own family and friends here.
By then, hopefully the question is no longer simply – “Do we like this venue?”
It’s beginning to become – “Can we see ourselves getting married here?”
And if the answer is ‘Yes’, we’d be delighted to help you make it happen.