Seating by weddings

Alternative

Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:13 am

shabbatiscoming wrote:

I havent seen place cards in at least 2 decades.

They are actually very common in Israel, in order to avoid paying for wasted seats.
As for knowing who will come, most secular and even dati leumi couples marrying today use an app that sends the invite. No one needs to send out a response in the mail, you just click on ‘attending’ or not and with how many.
For a few more shekels per guest, the app has live people call those guests who haven’t responded in order to make sure they get a reply.
Usually people are just assigned a table. Never seen the table itself arranged in order of guests (x beside y).

salt

Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:14 am

In Israel the weddings are much more informal.
Just sit in an empty chair and say to the person next to you "hi I'm X, how do you know the chatan and kalla?", or pull up a chair from another table and squash in if there are certain people you want to sit next to and the table is already full.
Or just stand and watch and join in the dancing.
At some weddings I've been to, 1 seat is used by 3 people - one for first course, another person for main course, and a third for dessert!

DrMom

Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:18 am

salt wrote:

I guess it is community-dependent.
Almost every Israeli wedding I've attended uses assigned tables.

I like this because I am under no pressure to grab a seat after the huppah. I can just stroll in and take a seat. We are almost always seated with friends.

I haven't seen individual place cards (assigning a guest a specific seat instead of just a specific table) here ever.

Last edited by DrMom on Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:21 am; edited 1 time in total

Alternative

Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:19 am

salt wrote:

It depends on what circles.
People do move around. But they should realize the moment you sit down somewhere, in most halls, it’s counted as a plate and costs a plate. Even if you didn’t actually eat there.
So if three people sat in the same seat, it cost the hosts only one plate. But if one person randomly sat at three different tables, sipping water here, tasting the salad there and not even eating at the third table- it could in many cases count as three plates. Depends on the system the hall has in place for counting plates (to see how much to charge couple).

heidi

Wed, Mar 29 2023, 2:53 am

amother Bluebonnet wrote:

This must be a charedi problem. We have mishpacha spanning the spectrum from Conservadox or dati lite to Lubavitch, and they all use placecards except the ones in Israel. The only US simcha I attended that lacked place cards was in Williamsburg, a Satmar business associate of dh.

I live in Israel and have never been to a simcha without some sort of seating plan. Posterboard, greeter checking on a tablet and telling me, signs on tables. I appreciate it. I feel uncomfortable trying to figure out where to sit.