Why having a Close Up Magician at your wedding is the best thing you can do!
If you are getting married you absolutely want your wedding to be amazing. You want to look back on your wedding day and remember that it was one of the best days of your life. There are obviously many important things to plan in order to ensure that this happens. Picking the perfect dress and the perfect venue alone takes a lot of time, however many brides and grooms forget about how important entertainment is. In 2014 Bridal Magazine did a survey of over 1000 brides asking them to look back at their wedding. 88% of brides stated that they wished that they had spent more money on entertainment. The reason for this is fairly simple - the entertainment is generally over looked even though it is usually the entertainment that lifts the atmosphere of the event and helps make sure everyone has a great time.
There are lots of different options for entertainment - everything from a DJ through to photo booth and all points in between. However we think one of the most important things to book is a close up magician. Now we are obviously biased, as we perform at hundreds of weddings every year and specialise in close up magic. We have won multiple awards including being the current British Magical Society Close Up Magicians of the Year. However we genuinely think that we have a point and to prove it we present to you 5 reasons why we think booking a close up magician for your wedding is the best thing you can do!
1 - Avoid those awkward silences.
The problem with weddings is that you have a lot of people who don't know each other coming together for the first time. A lot of people in this situation can be very shy and once the obvious questions are asked they run out of things to say. This becomes a bigger problem during the wedding breakfast. You will never be able to organise table plans so that everyone knows each other. Having a close up magician can solve this problem almost immediately. A good magician can go from table to
table performing a mini cabaret show at each table. It raises the whole atmosphere in the room as tables are clapping and cheering. Watching a magician performing on a nearby table builds anticipation and gets everyone talking about what they are about to see. Magic also acts as a conversation starter or ice breaker. Once the magician leaves the table everyone instantly has something they can talk about, even if it is only to try and work out how it was done!
Here is an video which shows how close up can really work for a wedding. Pay close attention to the reactions of the spectators.
2 - Get photos that you will remember forever
If you are getting married you want to have the best photos ever. That is after all why you have spent a small fortune on a professional wedding photographer. A lot of couples ask the wedding photographer to walk around during the wedding breakfast and take pictures of guests having fun and smiling. It's a great idea, the only problem is when you point a camera at most people they freeze or do some sort of weird forced smile. That is why wedding photographers love us - they know the best pictures are captured when people look relaxed and natural. Most photographers will follow us
around and take pictures of your guests as we perform. That's the best way to get pictures of people who are smiling, obviously happy and enjoying themselves. You will literally have hundreds of pictures to choose from of your guests reacting in a variety of different ways. We aren't saying if you don't book a magician you won't get any decent pictures. However having a close up magician at your wedding certainly helps! Heres an example of a great picture that is really enhanced by having a close up magician on hand.
3 - Keep people entertained even during the lulls
There are several moments during a wedding that there is little going on. If you are not careful your guests can get bored which really has an impact on the day as a whole. The two moments that spring instantly to mind are during the photos after the ceremony and after the speeches, before the evening guests arrive. The problem with the photos is that it is only immediate family that are involved. Anyone else is standing around waiting for the wedding breakfast and they're probably hungry. Having a magician during this lull period helps immensely. You can have a close up magician mixing and mingling between your guests keeping them entertained and keeping the energy levels up while waiting to go into the wedding breakfast. Likewise after the speeches there is normally an hour or two before evening guests arrive. Normally there is nothing for the guests to do other than wait for the evening reception to start. Again having a magician during this period will keep everyone entertained and energised until the evening reception starts. In both of these situations close up magic acts as not only a form of entertainment but also has a purpose that really has a positive impact on the running of the wedding celebrations.
4 - Avoid being generic and paint by numbers
Weddings have become very generic. Most weddings are the same, in fact during the summer months if you have been invited to three or four weddings it's hard to remember one from the other. Really a wedding should be memorable, it should be remembered by all the the guests for all the right reasons. Having a close up magician at your wedding is different and although more people are hiring magicians than ever before it is still in the minority rather than the majority. As close up
magic is a form of entertainment it is interactive and it means that people get involved and invested in the performances. Also, as the magic by its very nature is close up, a lot of the time it happens in their hands, right in front of their eyes. Imagine the look on your guests' faces when a fork bends in their hands, full sized bottles appear from thin air and borrowed money is made to float inches in front of them. All this is possible and more! It basically means that your wedding will be remembered for a long time to come - for all the right reasons. From our personal experience the most popular piece of feedback we get is clients saying "we made their wedding!" To be honest that says it all!
5 - Do you want your guests to experience the WOW factor?
I imagine the answer to this question is yes! Simply by hiring a close up magician for your wedding it will give your guests the WOW factor from the second they walk through the door. They will not expect to be greeted by a close up magician and in all likelihood they will have never seen close up magic before. Being able to experience something that they have previously only seen on TV is a great way to kick off any event, but especially good for a wedding. It creates a high that will remain for the rest of the night.
Obviously with any of these points you need to ensure that you hire the right close up magician. Unfortunately, like in any industry, there are magicians that are very good and magicians that are very bad. Do your research, check what awards they have won, what experience they have, where they have performed. Watch showreels and live performance videos, check reviews, monitor them on social media and if possible watch them perform live.
