Throwing A Mountain Wedding: All The Tips & Tricks For The Perfect Day

Considering having your wedding on a mountaintop? What a great idea! After all, a mountain makes a beautiful, dramatic location for a wedding, and because it’s not the most common wedding location, it will make your ceremony and celebrations extra memorable for both yourself and your guests.

To help you plan your mountain wedding, we at Peerspace have gathered together all our most useful tips and tricks regarding venue selection, decoration, bridalwear, and photography.

Finding the right mountain wedding venue

Naturally, one of the most important aspects of planning a mountain wedding is finding a mountain with a wedding venue on it, and making sure it’s the right venue. But don’t worry, this task isn’t as difficult as you might expect.

With the help of Peerspace, the largest marketplace on the internet for event venue rentals (for weddings as well as just about anything else, too), the process can be downright simple. There are hundreds of wedding venues located on or near mountains throughout the United States that you can rent by the hour through Peerspace.

How to get started? Go to the Peerspace homepage and input “wedding” for the event you’re planning as well as entering the location (city or state, depending on how specific you want to get) where you intend to have the ceremony.

You can then limit these search results to only include results with “mountain” mentioned in the description by going to “More filters” and entering “mountain” in the “Keywords” box.

We’ve selected two of our top choices in this category to help you get an idea of what’s available on the site:

Romantic Event Space in Luxury Loudoun B&B

This beautiful bed and breakfast in a custom-built ranch manor “sits on historic Short Hill Mountain with spectacular breathtaking views of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Loudoun Valley, and the neighboring vineyard”. It’s no wonder that readers of Virginia Living Magazine voted for this location’s inclusion on the list of the “Best of Virginia 2019”!

In addition to beautiful views of the mountains, you’ll also have access to local Loudoun County wine and craft beers. Even more convenient is the associated bed and breakfast where you and other guests can stay, which has “five spacious guest room suites each with private ensuite bathroom and fireplace; beautifully landscaped resort-like grounds with gardens, pavilion, pool, fire pits, pond and fountains; and many social spaces and private places for guests to relax and enjoy”. Come have your small-to-medium-sized mountain wedding of up to 50 guests at this beautiful bed and breakfast!

Spectacular Smoky Mountain Event Venue

If you’d rather have your mountain wedding in the Smoky Mountains, this event venue in Maggie Valley, North Carolina is hard to beat. It’s located right near Asheville, NC and the hosts call it “a landmark of [their] community” as the venue “has been family owned and operated for over 40 years”.

In terms of the property itself, it has “200 feet of gently sloping creek frontage” and is “a picturesque venue with 2000 sq ft pavilion + motel with resort-like amenities.” The property measures four acres in total with a ¾-acre rec area, deck, kitchen, fireplace, and BBQ pit, as well as conveniences like restrooms and parking. At the reasonable cost of only $75 per hour, this can be the destination for your perfect mountain wedding.

Are you planning your wedding with little time to spare? No worries, just check out our last-minute wedding ideas to make it work!

Decorating for a mountain wedding

Although the gorgeous views of the mountain itself are a fabulous start, you may be wondering about the right decor to complement and bring out the beauty of the scenery without distracting from or overpowering it. We’d recommend a somewhat minimal, natural, rustic decoration style, which will let the scenery really shine. This will likely mean a lot of wood, use of greenery, pinecones, and more in your decor.

For instance, you might choose to exchange vows under a wedding arch made of white birch, like this one from AnniesCreek on Etsy (or you can choose to make one yourself out of your choice of wood). Another example of where you can bring in wood decor is for your wedding cake topper. A mountain-themed wedding cake topper like this one from ThistleAndLaceDesign is a great choice.

Flowers are also always a welcome addition. Instead of traditional highly bred flowers, though, consider using wildflowers for your bouquet, centerpieces, and other decor. For inspiration, check out this list of 27 wildflower bouquets from Brides Magazine.

What to wear at your mountain wedding

We’d recommend choosing muted earth tones such as sage, blue-gray, and other such shades for your bridalwear, as they won’t clash with the scenery and will be more casual than a traditional white wedding gown.

Ensure you pick a dress that is not overly constricting or limiting your movement since your mountain wedding will likely require you to do a little bit of hiking through natural terrain and you don’t want to be overly encumbered!

Check out this guide to the perfect wedding dress for a mountain wedding from Dreamers and Lovers to start brainstorming what would work best for you.

Want to add a decorative touch to your mountainside wedding? Then you need to read our guide on throwing an Art Deco wedding, too!

Mountain wedding photography

One of the top benefits of having your wedding on a mountain is the abundance of incredible photo opportunities! Being high on a mountain virtually guarantees that you’ll be in close proximity to plenty of gorgeous natural vistas viewed from above. They make a wonderful backdrop for photos, so be sure to take advantage of their presence and plan to take lots of wedding photos with the views from the mountain behind you.

We’d also strongly recommend planning out your wedding day so that you are able to take these photos closer to sunset, during the so-called “golden hour” or “magic hour”. It “is roughly the first hour of light after sunrise, and the last hour of light before sunset, although the exact duration varies between seasons.

During these times, the sun is low in the sky, producing a soft, diffused light which is much more flattering than the harsh midday sun that so many of us are used to shooting in”. This will add a magical glow to your wedding photos that will make them that much more special and romantic.

Find unique wedding venues on Peerspace