طاولات الأعراس والكراسي والسنتربيس: ما الذي يُرى فعلًا

A guest sits in their chair for four hours and looks at the kosha for a few minutes. Yet most of the budget and the discussion goes to the kosha, and the tables are left to the final week. This guide is about the part where your guests actually spend the night.

Centrepiece height is the decision that matters

Two heights work and nothing between them: very low — under thirty centimetres — or tall, above seventy. Anything in between sits exactly at eye level and cuts off conversation across the table.

Low suits family tables where talking is the point. Tall on a slim stem gives presence and lets the eye pass underneath. The common mistake is the middle: a fifty-centimetre arrangement hides faces and separates people all evening.

Round versus long tables is not an aesthetic choice

Round suits conversation: eight to ten people who can all see each other. Long suits photographs and formality, but splits the seated into two separate conversations along each side.

The practical rule: if most guests know each other, choose round. If the occasion is formal, or the photographs matter more than the talking, choose long. Many venues do both — long for close family, round for everyone else.

Calculate space, not chair count

The most expensive mistake is fitting more tables than the hall can carry. Our working rule is at least a metre and a half between the edge of one table and the next, so two people and the service can pass at the same time.

A round table for ten is about two metres across, so with its surrounding clearance it needs close to twelve square metres. Multiply that by the number of tables before you fix the count, not after.

Choose a chair by sitting in it

Chairs look alike in photographs, and the real differences do not show: seat width, foam firmness, how the legs sit on carpet, and whether the back leaves a mark on a dress. Sit in the chair before you order two hundred of them.

Watch the cover too. A fitted cover looks clean all night; a loose one slides and creases within an hour and needs constant straightening. The cost difference is small and the difference in photographs is large.

Styling starts with the tablecloth

The cloth is the background behind every plate, every flower and every hand in close photographs. Start there and choose flowers second, not the other way round. A cloth that reaches the floor hides table legs and makes the wide shot cleaner.

Remember what else goes on the table: glasses, plates and name cards take real space. An arrangement that looks balanced in a showroom may have nowhere to sit once the service is laid.

How we work at Altahany

We have 103 table designs, 100 chair designs and 25 centrepiece arrangements, all photographed at events actually delivered inside the UAE.

Send us the guest count, the hall dimensions and the date, and we will come back with the right number of tables and their layout before we discuss styling — because the layout is what makes the styling work.