"Should we have a First Dance?" - From a Wedding Photographer & Former Bride

Weddings are so much more relaxed these days, most things you can personalise to suit you  both and people do have more of a choice when it comes to what actually takes place on their wedding day.

So, to dance or not to dance?
​If I'm being honest, I didn't really enjoy ours...

I am a bubbly chatty person, but  I hate being the centre of attention. So you would have thought given the choice to have a first dance or not, I would have said no thanks.

​We'd both had had a few drinks as our wedding party was well underway and getting to that time of the evening, and so somehow I thought it would be a lovely idea and it made sense. I love my husband very much, but my goodness I did not enjoy doing a slow dance, in front of all our guests and having everyone watching us. ARGH!

BUT, I have to say that I've been to a wedding or two in my time, and I know that a first dance really can work for certain couples, and be a great thing to do.

Do you have "a song"?

Some couples do and some don't, but this clearly is a good question to ask and a great place to start. If you have a live band for the evening and they can play it for you, how great would that be? I don't think the song has to be overly mushy, or sometimes even that romantic, or sung by Ed Sheeran (I seriously don't know how many times I've heard his songs played at weddings now, it's impossible for me to hear one and not feel like I'm at a wedding..), but does it say something about you as a couple and about your wedding day?  

It's something that breaks up the evening, it's kind of like an event.
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I feel when it gets to the evening of a wedding, there isn't so many "events" that happen, apart from the general gist of "drink and dance", which I am totally in support of. But throughout a wedding day, there's usually certain things that happen at different times throughout the day, and it apart from being very obvious things that have to happen (like the ceremony for example?!), it breaks the day up and I think keeps the day going at a healthy pace.

If you have a band, or even a DJ it's a great way to get everyone on the dance floor.
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You really don't have to do it alone for long, and it's definitely not a requirement that the two of you slow dance for the entire song by yourselves. You can fairly quickly call over to your guests and ask them to join in, trust me at least one or two pairs will join you and then others usually feel more comfortable and join in too. It can be such a wonderful way to share a special moment with your family and friends, which are definitely shown in the two photos above.

It doesn't have to be just the two of you.

I've seen couples who have their first dance with members of their wedding party right from the beginning, so no scary dancing on your own at all! I've even shot a wedding where my grooms did a choreographed line dance routine with their groomsmaids to a Madonna song, and it was brilliant!

​I hope you found this helpful and happy wedding planning!
​If you have any questions you'd like me to answer, feel free to get in touch. ​​​​​​

Holly
​xo.