As Spring turns to Summer, the leaves on trees become greener and the days get warmer and brighter, the outdoors becomes increasingly more appealing. Whatever outside space you have, whether a garden, balcony, roof terrace or your local park or field, it can be joyous to host friends and family in the glorious sunshine, gentle breeze, and beautiful nature. There are ways to elevate one’s outdoor dining experience even further though, which is why we’ve brought together our top tips for entertaining outdoors, so a wonderful, sociable summer outside will await you.
Dressing the Table
If you have an outside table, the addition of a few small elements can make all the difference. Flowers are an obvious choice for brightening up your outdoor tablescape and they are in their prime, most available, and most affordable in the spring and summer months. Choose bright colours to visually uplift and enhance your dining table, bringing colour joy to you and your guests.
For a pink colour scheme, we recommend for spring blooming Peonies, Periwinkles, Pink Tulips, Rhododendrons, Azaleas and, if you’re lucky enough to find them, Bleeding Hearts. In summer, choose a seasonal, delightful mix of pink Roses, Sweet Peas, pink Hydrangeas and Dahlias for the ultimate pink tablescape. Amongst the different shades of pink, a bright pop of red in the form of Poppies is a most welcome addition.
If you’d rather go for a neutral white and green colour scheme, in springtime there is an abundance of White Lilacs, Star Magnolias, Lilies of the Valley and beautiful Trillium. And for the summer months, blooming Lilies, and Daisies.
Alternatively, if your event budget doesn’t stretch to buying flowers, it can be a great idea to hunt around your surroundings to find wildflowers, branches, and green foliage for the table. This practice creates a wonderful synergy between the surrounding outdoors and your table, making you feel immersed in the natural space. Some easy-to-come-by items we suggest for your dining table are Cow Parsley, Honeysuckle, and Myrtle. Always check before picking anything wild that you are doing so sparingly, respectfully and within the law, however.
To complement your chosen colour scheme and the low-laying flowers and foliage on your table, solid-coloured dining candles are a must. Our coloured dinner candles come in a variety of colours, so you’ll be sure to find the shade you’re looking for. If you’ve gone with pink flowers, our Rose Blush pink dinner candles will likely be the perfect match, or else keep the flowers the focus and opt for a set of our classic ivory dinner candles, which are a beautifully elegant feature on any tablescape.
Instead of matching your dining candles to the flowers, another option is to choose contrasting coloured dinner candles, like our Jade green dinner candles, which would offset pink flowers beautifully. And if you’re feeling creative, instead of only one colour dining candle, why not mix and match a few? Charles Farris dinner candles are designed in seasonal colour schemes to perfectly complement each other, so no matter which colours you choose, they’ll work together in harmony. To create visual interest across your outdoor dining table, find dinner candleholders for your colourful dining candles that vary in height and dot them sporadically down the table. That way, your candle-lit dinner will glow from all angles.
Creating the Perfect Ambience
Light is a hugely important part of our experience and while hopefully, the sun will shine bright for us this summer, when it goes down come evening time, inevitably the temperature drops and darkness creeps over. With the right outdoor lighting, however, there’s no need to move inside. Solar-powered outdoor table lights have come a long way since their inception and they’re now eco, affordable and an attractive addition to your outdoor space.
There’s nothing quite like candlelight to set the mood, however. Watching a flame on a candle wick dance and flicker is quite simply magical and the warm glow of a candle is like nothing else. Our white pillar candles are a particularly good choice, not only are they thick and sturdy, but they’re exceptionally high-quality pillar candles made in the UK using traditional methods to give you a long-lasting, even burn. If you have outdoor glass lanterns, Farris pillar candles will sit perfectly inside them and will peacefully glow, lighting up your outdoor space for hours. Charles Farris Pillar Candles come in three sizes; Large Pillar Candles, Medium Pillar Candles and Small Pillar Candles. For a perfect arrangement, choose one of each size and place them in a triangle. Because they burn evenly and at the same speed, they will keep the perfect formation you set them up in throughout your summer evening outdoors.
While lanterns are ideal for creating the right lighting from side tables and uplighting if placed on the ground, if you want to include classic white pillar candles along your table for an atmospheric glow, we particularly love glass pillar candleholders. They are elegant and typically raise the pillar candle for a dramatic look, creating a perfect atmospheric glow.
In addition to light, scent plays a hugely important role in our experience, and fragrance is key to creating the perfect ambience outdoors, whether day or night. Lighting a Farris scented candle outside causes the fragrance to expel, remunerate and travel extraordinarily. If there’s a gentle breeze, for example, the scent will undulate, so that now and again the fragrance notes will be noticed in delightful waves. Charles Farris Scented Candles were inspired by nature and, in particular, by the scents of England, which make them perfect fragrances for the outdoors, as they complement the natural scents of your surroundings. Scented Candle scents we particularly love for the summertime include; Garden of Eden, Elizabeth, British Expedition and Rubus.
If you’re looking for all-in-one candles, that offer atmospheric lighting and gorgeous scent, our scented pillar candles are the way forward. They are perfectly shaped; elegant and tall yet sturdy candles and, best of all, they are fragranced with our signature Charles Farris fragrances. Like all our candles, the Scented Pillar Candles are made in the UK and hand-poured in stages over a long period, to achieve a long-lasting, even burn and fragrance release. To perfectly pair your scented pillar candle with the fragrance of your flower selection, read our scent-matching blog here.
To summarise the Art of Entertaining Outside, our first tip is to decorate your table with natural elements to immerse yourself and your guests in the outdoor setting, whether it be through arranging seasonal, colourful branches, foliage, or flowers on the table. To enhance the colour of these natural elements, choose complementing or contrasting coloured dinner candles and arrange them sporadically and at several heights with candleholders to elevate the visual drama. Secondly, create ambience through lighting.
Candlelight provides the optimum atmospheric glow and charm. Our elegant white pillar candles are the perfect choice for their robustness, and longevity and arranging them in triplets using one of each of three different sizes from Large Sized Pillar Candles, Medium Sized Pillar Candles and Small Sized Pillar Candles creates visual interest and maximum glow. Finally, indulge yourself and your guests with delightful scents that complement the natural fragrances of the great outdoors. As Charles Farris Scented Candles are inspired by nature, they are a natural go-to.
We wish you a happy, sunny, and sociable summer filled with joyous events and occasions spent with friends and family in the wonderful outdoors.
