Prepare your outfits, take care of your speeches. As of May 19, couples will once again be able to "say yes" without having to respect the rule of six guests maximum. Closed for seven months, châteaux and other village halls will also reopen on this date. Provided, however, to respect certain principles, according to the Union of Solidarity Professionals in Events (UPSE). Clearly, it will again be possible to gather guests up to 35% of the room's capacity, indoors and outdoors, including marquees. PCR tests and health passes will not be compulsory. However, indoor seated meals will not be allowed.
“In France, on average, the halls are 200 m2. This therefore means that we will initially be able to bring together around 70 guests, ”explains Mélissa Humbert-Ferrand, spokesperson for UPSE. The second stage will begin on Wednesday, June 9 and will see the gauges evolve: up to 50% of the space can be occupied indoors, 65% outdoors. We will have to wait for the third stage of June 30 to be able to party without restrictions. For the hundreds of couples who had postponed their wedding celebration, sometimes several times, since the start of the epidemic, the time has come for relief.
"We had established a plan B, a plan C and despite everything, we kept a little hope," says Sylvain, future married.
Originally from the Nantes region (Loire-Atlantique), the thirty-something will be able to get married as planned for more than a year with his partner Maëva in the presence of their 70 guests on Saturday May 22.
The couple, whose union must be pronounced at the end of the morning, then planned a secular ceremony and then reserved a private domain with a pond and a large outdoor space for the day and evening.
"We will finally be able to work"
One question remains: can their wedding ball be maintained after 9 p.m.
(Editor's note: new curfew schedule from May 19)
? The government should decide within the week whether being invited to a wedding can serve as a derogatory reason for traveling beyond the curfew until June 9
(Editor's note: on this date, it will pass to 11 p.m.)
. “We have enough space to accommodate all of our guests on site,” acknowledges Sylvain. But it would be more coherent to allow people to come back. Getting dozens of people to sleep on inflatable mattresses in the same room is possible but there is better, in terms of health. We are not going to ask our guests to wear a mask while sleeping! », Launches the future groom.
"The minister is conducting a series of consultations this week with all the representatives of the professional federations concerned to calibrate the framework for their resumption of activity", we say in the entourage of Alain Griset, the minister responsible for SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises). One certainty: the coming months will be festive. “We will finally be able to work. We expect to celebrate around 40,000 weddings in June, ”rejoices Mélissa Humbert-Ferrand from UPSE, which represents around 55,000 professionals.
“The season will resume slowly, nuance Amel Antony, head of the Amel Event Paris agency in Thiais (Val-de-Marne). Many couples had already canceled their party in May and June, but we are preparing to organize a wedding every two days in July-August ”. The latter agency recommends to impose the PCR test - not mandatory - on the guests. “The test can reassure the guests. In addition, this would make it possible to resume in good conditions without having to cancel everything again in three months ”, estimates Amel Antony.
