Ideas For a Tea Party Themed Bridal Shower
Tea and cupcakes are perfect for an afternoon bridal shower.
A tea party is such a perfect theme for a bridal shower. It’s super flexible too. Whether your bride is elegant, casual, traditional or colorful - you can plan tea party that suits her perfectly. No matter what style you’re after, you can choose your menu and decorations to get exactly the look you want.
If your bride is traditional, you can plan a classic tea party. Or maybe the bride loves Bridgerton or Downton Abbey - a regency inspired tea party would be perfect for her. Maybe she’s colorful and would go crazy for a Mad Hatter tea party. A Jane Austen fan would love a literary tea party with books as the decor. If she’s elegant, you can plan a garden bridal shower with floral decorations, edible flowers and tea themed favors.
If you don’t want to have an extra theme, you can choose a color scheme or color palette to pull the look together. If you’re stuck for a color scheme, an easy way to choose one is by looking at bridal shower invitations. Once you find your favorite, use the same color scheme to choose your flowers and decorations.
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Tea Party Bridal Shower Ideas
Once you’ve decided on a tea party, think more specifically about how you want it to look. Are you picturing a formal, elegant party? Or a fun and colorful style? If you decide on certain type of tea party, it’ll be easier to choose the decorations, invitations and games to match. Some popular types of tea parties are:
Elegant
Vintage
Autumn
Floral
Roses
Strawberries
Literature
Paris
French
England
High tea
Bridgerton
Jane Austen
Downton Abbey
Alice in Wonderland
Mad Hatter
“Let’s Par-tea” Rose Gold Balloon Bunting - Decoration For a Tea Party Bridal Shower. By: Super Sweet Party
For more about choosing a tea party bridal shower venue, guest list, games and activities, read this next: Bridal Shower Ideas: Planning Themes, Activities and Food
What Time Should a Tea Party Bridal Shower Start?
If you’re British, teatime is 4:00 pm. No exceptions. If you’re not British (or if you’re the easy going type) you can serve tea any time you’d like. Food served at tea is usually finger sandwiches, scones and sweets. This type of food is delicious at any meal and you can start your bridal shower whenever time suit you best. If you want to start early, plan a breakfast or brunch shower and start at 9:30 in the morning. A lunchtime party could start at 11:30. Or if you want your shower later in the day, start your party at 2:30 pm.
Timeline For a Breakfast or Brunch Bridal Shower
9:30 Guests arrive
9:45 - 10:30 Serve tea and breakfast or brunch
10:30 - 10:40 Thank your guests for coming, toast the bride
10:40 - 11:30 Start the games
11:30 - 12:45 Cut and serve cake
12:45 - 1:45 Opening presents
1:45 Groom arrives, greets guests
3:00 Hand out favors to departing guests
Timeline For a Lunch Bridal Shower
11:30 Guests arrive
11:45 - 12:30 Serve tea and lunch
12:30 - 12:40 Thank your guests for coming, toast the bride
12:40 - 1:30 Start the games
1:30 - 1:45 Cut and serve cake
1:45 - 2:45 Opening presents
2:45 Groom arrives, greets guests
3:00 Hand out favors to departing guests
Timeline For an Afternoon Tea Party Bridal Shower
2:30 Guests arrive
2:45 - 3:30 Serve tea and finger sandwiches
3:30 - 3:40 Thank your guests for coming, toast the bride
3:40 - 4:30 Start the games
4:30 - 4:45 Cut and serve cake
4:45 - 5:45 Opening presents
5:45 Groom arrives, greets guests
6:00 Hand out favors to departing guests
Food For a Tea Party Themed Bridal Shower
A traditional afternoon tea is 3 courses, ideally served on a 3 tier stand. The bottom tier is sandwiches, the second tier is scones and the top tier is sweets. Include butter, clotted cream, jam and marmalade. If you don’t have 3 tier serving stands, you can set up the food buffet style. Line your serving platters with paper doilies and arrange your sandwiches, scones and sweets so your guests can help themselves.
Traditional Tea Sandwiches:
Cucumber
Egg and cress
Cheese and chive
Smoked salmon
Shrimp salad
Chicken salad
Tea Party Scones:
Classic scones
Raspberry scones
Walnut scones
Tea Party Sweets:
Petit fours
Macaroons
Madeleines
Vintage Floral 3 Tier Cake Stand - For Sandwiches, Scones and Sweets at a Bridal Shower Tea Party. By: Luck and Luck
Planning Your Tea Party Bridal Shower Menu
When you plan your menu, allow 4 to 6 sandwiches per guest. Plus 1 to 2 scones and 1 to 2 cakes or sweets per person.
If you’re offering tea as a full meal, consider adding some side dishes. To fill out the meal you could add green salad, pasta salad, potato salad, crudités, fruit trays or cheese trays.
For the bridal shower cake, you can choose a traditional Victoria sponge cake. Or you could choose a delicious flavor like walnut, lemon, chocolate or vanilla and have it decorated to match your theme or decor.
If you’re planning a champagne toast, one bottle of champagne will fill 4 to 6 glasses, depending on how generous you pour them.
How to Make Finger Sandwiches For Your Tea Party Bridal Shower
If you’re doing DIY for your shower food, finger sandwiches are perfect. They’re inexpensive and easy to make, but they look beautiful when they’re set up on trays. See how delicious they look in this video from Tasty Recipes: How to Host a Bridgerton Inspired Afternoon Tea
If you make your sandwiches too early, the bread will dry out. You can assemble all your ingredients and make your salads the day before. Wait until a few hours before the shower to put the sandwiches together. Once they’re ready, cover them with plastic wrap and keep them in the fridge until it’s time to serve them.
Choose light, thinly sliced bread. Most sandwich filling goes with soft white or brown bread. Some recipes with stronger flavors, like dill or salmon will use pumpernickel or rye bread.
When you make the fillings, cut the ingredients very small. That way your sandwiches will be easier to fill. Plus they’ll look nicer and be easy for your guests to eat.
Put a bit of softened butter on each slice of bread, then add the filling and close the sandwiches.
Cut off the crusts, then cut each sandwich into 4 squares, rectangles or triangles. It’s easier to arrange if you make the same fillings all the same shapes. For example, all the egg salad sandwiches can be cut into squares and all the cucumber sandwiches can be cut into long rectangles.
If you’d like to decorate your sandwich arrangements, you can use edible flowers, herbs or small toothpicks.
Try some delicious recipes from the Oh How Civilized website Tea Sandwiches: 24 Recipes, Tips, & How to Make Them Ahead of Time
How to Serve Tea at Your Tea Party Bridal Shower
Depending on the size of your guest list, you can choose one of two ways to serve the tea. If your guest list is small, you can use loose tea leaves in a traditional teapot. If you’ve got a bigger guest list, you might prefer to set up a drink station with an electric kettle and teabags.
If you have enough teapots for your entire guest list, it’ll really make your theme. Teapots usually hold 4 to 6 cups of tea. You’ll need one or two teapots for each table, depending on how many guests you have. Check the size of your teapots and compare it to the number of guests you’re inviting. If you don’t own that many teapots, see if you can borrow some. Or visit a dollar store or thrift shop to pick up a few more.
If your venue or guest list won’t work with individual teapots, set up a drink station. You can set up an electric kettle or an urn filled with hot water. Plus tea leaves and infusers or a variety of teabags. Add some milk, cream, sugar and lemon to the table and you’ll have everything you need.
What Kind of Tea to Serve at a Tea Party Bridal Shower
Once you have your teapots, kettle or urn, decide what kind of tea you’ll serve. Black tea blends, like English Breakfast or Earl Grey are traditional types of tea that most guests will enjoy. If you want to add a lighter flavored tea, you can also offer white tea or green tea. As well as the regular tea, offer a caffeine free or herbal option for guests who are sensitive to too much caffeine. Mint, peppermint and chamomile tea are all caffeine free.
For more tea ideas, visit the Destination Tea website: 8 Tea Pairings For Afternoon Tea
How to Make the Tea at Your Bridal Shower Tea Party
You’ll need to warm the teapots and measure the tea, so start with all your pots in the kitchen. If you’re using loose leaves, make sure you have your strainer or infuser ready for each pot and start boiling water.
Pour some boiling water into the teapot and swish it around to warm the teapot.
Place the teabags, strainer or infuser into the teapot.
Pour boiling water over the tea.
Let the tea steep for 3 to 5 minutes.
Remove the tea leaves.
Serve the tea to your guests.
Tea Party Bridal Shower Invitations
A bridal shower is usually held at least 3 weeks before the wedding. Shower invitations should go out 4 to 6 weeks ahead of time. Remember to include the date, time and location. If there’s a gift theme, like kitchen items, include it on the invitation. If the bride is registered for gifts, it’s usually included on the shower invitation.
Floral Teapot - Invitation For a Tea Party Themed Bridal Shower. By: Minty Paperie Shop
Tea Party Bridal Shower Decorations
If you don’t own china for 20, head to your local charity shop for pretty tea cups and saucers. Don’t worry if they don’t match - it’ll look charming once you set them all up. If you don’t want to be the owner of all that china, you can let your guests take them home as their favor at the end of the shower. Put one at each place setting with a “Thank You” tag to make it clear that they are the favor.
While you’re at the thrift shop, look for serving pieces, as well. Tiered cake stands, platters and tea pots are all items you can find at low prices. If you don’t want to purchase china, you can buy pretty disposable cups in every style - from Mad Hatter to floral prints.
Favors For a Tea Party Bridal Shower
Thank your guests for coming with a small gift. Tea or tea accessories are great options for favors. Or you can offer a sweet treat of shortbread cookies or macaroons.
Tea cup and saucer
Tea infuser
Herbal tea
Breakfast tea
Mini jars of honey
Cookies
Macaroons
Petit fours
Sugar cookie
Love is Brewing - Tea Pouch For a Bridal Shower Favor. By: The Paper Shoppe
The Perfect Blend Tea Bags - Favors For a Tea Party Bridal Shower. By: Best Day Ever Spot
Want more ideas and inspiration? Follow my bridal shower board on Pinterest: Bridal Shower | Wedding Shower Ideas & Inspiration
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