What a stylist actually does
Midlands Wedding Styling What a stylist actually does
The word "stylist" covers four distinct jobs. Quotes from two people using the same title can describe completely different work, which is why they are so hard to compare.
Ask three suppliers for a styling quote and you will get three documents that are not comparable, because they are pricing different combinations of the same four jobs.
Design
Deciding what the room will look like: palette, materials, scale, how the space is used, what goes where. Delivered as a scheme, mood board or drawing, sometimes with a mock table set up for you to see.
Sold as a standalone fee by some, absorbed into the hire cost by others, and skipped entirely if you arrive with your own plan. It is the part with the least visible output and the most influence on the result.
Hire
Supplying the physical items: linen, glassware, candelabra, chairs or chair treatments, backdrops, furniture, signage frames. This is usually the bulk of the money and it comes with a contract. See hiring décor.
Many businesses that call themselves stylists are principally hire companies with a design service attached, which is not a criticism, but it changes what you are paying for and what happens if you cancel.
Dressing
The physical work on the day: laying linen, placing centrepieces, dressing chairs, hanging things, positioning signage, then taking it all down again. Charged by the hour, by the head, or included above a minimum spend.
This is the job most often underestimated by couples doing it themselves. Dressing a hundred and twenty covers properly takes two people several hours, and it has to happen inside the venue's setup window.
On-the-day coordination
Running the day: managing suppliers, keeping the timeline, handling the turnaround between ceremony and reception, being the person the venue calls when something is wrong.
A genuinely different job from the three above, frequently bundled with them and frequently assumed to be included when it is not. If nobody is doing it, the default is that the venue duty manager does the bits that affect the venue and your family does everything else.
Reading a quote
Establish, in writing, which of the four you are buying. Then establish four more things.
Whether delivery and collection are included, and whether collection is same night or next morning. Same-night collection means somebody is packing down while your guests are still dancing.
Whether the price assumes a single delivery slot. A supplier who has to come back because the ceremony room was not clear will usually charge for it.
What the breakage and loss terms are, itemised. See hiring décor.
Whether the quantity is fixed at quote or adjustable, and by when. Final numbers move, and a supplier who cannot absorb a change of eight covers a fortnight out is worth knowing about early.
Doing it yourself
Entirely possible and frequently the right answer for a smaller wedding. The realistic version involves collecting the hire yourself, storing it somewhere dry, dressing the room within the venue's window, and returning everything clean and counted the next day, on a morning when nobody wants to.
It works best when the room is small, the scheme is simple, and one person who is not the couple has agreed in advance to own it. It works badly when the plan depends on candles the venue will not allow, or on a setup window nobody confirmed. See venue restrictions.
The honest comparison is not the hire fee against the stylist's fee. It is the hire fee plus four people's Saturday morning, against a quote.
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