Keen to throw the perfect jubilee garden party?
The official celebration day for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, marking 70 years of Her Majesty’s reign, is Sunday 5th June. Millions of us are set to celebrate, by hosting or attending street and private parties. Here’s our guide to making sure your event goes with a hip, hip hooray.
While street parties require you to have a licence from the council (normally along with a separate licence if you want to play music), private garden parties are not normally subject to restriction. If you’re planning to invite a lot of people, though, make sure that includes the neighbours as well – particularly if you might have to infringe on their parking!
There are lots of ideas available on the official Queen’s Platinum Jubilee website, including a toolkit with recipes and children’s activities to help your party go with a swing.
Catering your event
If you’re holding a fairly big event, then catering for it could be a headache. Instead, ask each guest to bring something as a contribution – for example, their favourite bake. That way, if your guest list fluctuates up and down then it won’t affect the catering levels. As host/ess, you can either ask everyone to bring their own plates or provide crockery and cutlery yourself. We like these Best of British paper plates from Talking Tables, £4.50 for a pack of eight. There are also paper tablecloths and napkins in the same range.
For drinks, you could ask guests to bring a bottle of something or invent your own non-alcoholic Jubilee cocktail and give it a suitable regal name!
Decorating the space for a perfect jubilee garden party
At a Jubilee party, red, white and blue bunting is surely de rigeur! We like this reusable fabric bunting with tassels which handmade from sustainably sourced 100% cotton and is washable. £16.95, available from Annabel James.
If you have several tables holding food and drink, you could also cover them with red, white and blue tablecloths, and put bunches of red, white and blue flowers in jam jars. Tealights in glass holders always make a space look special, and if you have trees in your garden you can hang them up in the branches where they’ll be out of the way and not at risk of getting knocked over.
Tying red, white and blue ribbons to the back to chairs will not only help guests remember which is their seat but will also help with the festive feel. Remember to do a quick guest/seat count beforehand, and ask people to bring their own seats if necessary!
For added atmosphere, you could listen to the Platinum Jubilee Pageant on the BBC.
Planning ahead for the perfect jubilee garden party
Obviously we’re 100% sure that the weather will be fine on 5th June, but…erm….just in case, it might be worth thinking about what you’ll do if it rains. Does one of your neighbours have a roomy garage they could be persuaded to vacate for the occasion? Could you beg, borrow or hire a marquee? Do you have any really big parasols? If you plan for bad weather in advance, it’s less likely to happen!
Position lots of bins around the party area to help guests clear up as they go along. If people have brought along their own dishes, crockery or chairs, ask them to put a label on the bottom so that items can be easily returned if they forget to take them.
Above all, keep it simple, let other people do at least some of the work and remember to enjoy yourself on this right royal occasion.
Main image (c) 2022 Pixabay
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