January 31, 2024Entertaining

A Complete Guide to Spring Entertaining

Once the holiday dinner parties and Christmas celebrations have passed, it's time to welcome the joys of spring. What better way to do that than hosting your friends and family? Whether you're looking forward to your family's Easter traditions or searching for inspiration for a brunch to welcome the equinox, we have you covered with our tips and tricks in this guide to hosting during springtime. 

Spring: The Perfect Season for Hosting

After being cooped up all winter long and enjoying cozy at-home gatherings, the new season gives us the perfect opportunity to switch things up. Springtime offers renewed energy and a fresh excitement for hosting, and whether you're in charge of cooking your family's annual Easter dinner or hosting the first alfresco dinner party of the new year, there are endless reasons to gather your loved ones during this season. Lean into the feeling of spring and enjoy the warmer weather with various events.

With the spring comes a new assortment of entertaining essentials, from patterned dinnerware to colorful serveware. It also brings fresh inspiration to play with new tablescape looks using different greenery and florals.

Switching your dishes out for the season and introducing new dinner plates, serving platters, and boards that feature holiday icons, fashionable pastels, and a refreshing vibe is part of the fun of hosting. Serve up a unique and exciting menu full of seasonal favorites on your newly rotated dish sets. 

The Many Reasons to Host During Springtime 

Over the years, our family has hosted many gatherings during the spring. Check out our published Curated Gatherings to find inspiration for your own, all season long: 

What is a Curated Gathering?

Want to host but feeling uninspired? A Curated Gathering shares an inside look at one of our real-life gatherings, providing the list of products used, guidelines for setting up, and recipes required to host it on your own. 

From party prep to clean-up, we walk you through the full story of a gathering, complete with pictures and advice from our family, encouraging you to take excuses off the table and set your own table with dinnerware, serveware, and table linens you love. Each of our curated gatherings is drawn from a real-life event we have hosted, and whether you copy one dish-by-dish or use it as a starting point for your own design, we're happy to provide a sneak peek into our process. 

7 Steps to Designing the Perfect Springtime Gathering

If you're looking to host a memorable party as spring begins to bloom, follow these seven easy steps: 

Step 1: Determine the Purpose

The first step in designing a perfect springtime gathering is determining the purpose of your party. Are you inviting loved ones to celebrate the biblical story of Jesus this Easter? Creating a whimsical egg hunt for the children in your life? Maybe setting the patio up for the first outdoor dinner party of the season? The reason for a gathering inspires every decision you make as you plan a party—so choose one wisely. 

Step 2: Find a Theme

No party is complete without a memorable theme. Use the season around you as inspiration for any event, whether hosting an intimate brunch for your friends or a lavish soiree to celebrate the newly warmed weather. 

Consider what's blossoming in nature, the beautiful weather, what's growing in your garden, and even the inspiration for your ideal menu. Whatever you decide, your guests will love lingering around a carefully themed tablescape that you created. 

For our Something Blue Bridal Shower, we drew from classic chinoiserie jars and leaned into a beautiful tonal white and blue palette, laying the Iris Blue Collection as a foundational dinnerware layer and adding florals to bring the whole look together. For our Spring Awakening gathering, we featured classic Easter icons to carry the feel of spring into our tablescape design, adding the pastel rabbit pattern from our Easter dinnerware collection. Solidifying a theme for a springtime event is effortless when you use the beautiful hues around us and your favorite dinnerware and serveware sets. 

Potential Spring Theme Ideas:

  • Seasonal ingredients
  • Color palettes
  • Cultural cuisine
  • Texture
  • Flavor profile
  • Icon or pattern
  • Holiday decorations

Step 3: Choose a Color Scheme

A color scheme brings together every detail of a springtime gathering. From table linens to dinner plate sets to the dress code and more, each color helps to create the perfect overall look to fit your themed event. 

We recommend keeping the color scheme light and bright for spring, saving dark and moody hues for the autumn and winter months. Traditionally, pastels, whites, blues, and creamy neutrals start popping up around this season, so start by pulling out dishes and linens within your color palette to bring the theme to life. 

Step 4: Decide Where the Event will Take Place

With the warmer spring weather comes a world of possibilities for where your gathering can take place—why not take your party outside? Consider setting up your springtime gathering on your back porch, patio, or in a rentable tent to enjoy the serene sounds of spring as you enjoy your company and menu. 

As for inside gatherings, any entertaining room will do. Set the dining room table for a full sit-down meal inspired by your favorite in-season vegetables, or design a large charcuterie board in your living room for your guests to nibble on at a more informal event. If you serve buffet-style, make sure you have a separate space in the home for your food set up.

Step 5: Pick a Serving Style

Choosing a serving style is a necessary step for any gathering, and setting a table you love in the springtime is no exception. With both outdoor and indoor spaces available to you, you can use any of the three popular serving styles to suit the tone of your event. 

Family-style serving, with the server set in the center of the table and guests passing to fill up their plates, is the perfect way to host a more laidback, intimate event, such as brunch or dinner with family. We recommend buffet-style serving for large-scale events, such as weddings or backyard potlucks, so that everyone can serve themselves on their own time. A plated, sit-down style elevates the atmosphere at any springtime party.  

Step 6: Bring Out The Dinnerware

With this season comes spring cleaning, so you may as well comb through your collection, swap out any dishes that are chipped or incomplete sets, and add some fresh designs. The key to curating a unique, themed tablescape for spring is stocking up on versatile, colorful, and delightful dishes. Whether you invest in a new pastel collection or a few mix-and-match designs that pair with your go-to set, you’ll be ready to bring the themes of spring to any table. 

We recommend owning a few different dinner plate sets for versatile styling. Set your favorite everyday dish sets or Easter dinner plates as the first layer at any event, switching out different salad plates to create new and bold looks. Add a seasonal set of mugs with Easter bunnies and pastel colors to add an extra accessory and dimension to your table. Our dinnerware is designed to fit everywhere—so unlock your inner designer and get creative with plate pairings to suit each of your spring events.    

Step 7: Plan a Spring-Inspired Menu

Whether we’re creating an Easter table setting or a bridal shower luncheon, planning a menu can pull a spring theme together. That’s why we love using seasonal ingredients and produce when planning a menu for our springtime gatherings. 

With new fruits and vegetables entering the market at their prime, creating a fresh, tasty, and festive menu for any occasion is easy. Use Brightland's seasonal produce guide to see the monthly updates and find inspiration for every menu you plan this season. 

Spring Menu Inspiration:

We've been creating menus featuring in-season ingredients for years. Here are some of our favorites to help you plan your twist on our menu for spring: 

The Essentials for Creating Springtime Table Setting

After you've designed your springtime gathering, it's time to make the tablescape a reality — but where to begin? Gather these entertaining essentials to prepare for hosting this season:

Colorful Spring Linens

From flowing tablecloths to stacks of cocktail napkins at your bar cart, owning a collection of home linens is essential for refreshing your home for spring. From Easter hand towels draped in the powder room to sage and brass napkins folded at the dining room table, linens instantly transform the look of any space. Play around with different color combinations and patterned accents with colorful designs, like in the Iris Blue round placemat, to set the perfect foundational layer to the rest of your spring table setting. 

Spring Dinnerware Designs

To be fully prepared for hosting this season, bring out salad plates, dinner plates, and bowls of different sizes. If you don't have enough from one collection, don't worry. Our dinnerware is designed to mix and match with one another, offering endless pairings for your springtime table settings. 

If you're going for a clean dinner plate look, our Signature White dinnerware offers a feminine flair and timeless grace at any table. For a more rustic, textured spin, try the acacia wood Fundamentals dinnerware. For dinner plates, bowls, and salad plates with a seasonal theme, consider the beautiful Iris Blue Collection, designed with patterns loosely inspired by the stages of a plant's life, from seedling to sprout. These three collections work as the perfect standalone pieces—or as a base layer for any creative tablescape concepts you dream up for springtime hosting.

Whether you celebrate Easter with the entire family or love the colors and patterns of the season, lean into spring designs with the Easter collection. With pastel sage and white colors and a speckled rabbit design, every table will be elevated with these seasonal dishes. Use the Easter dinner plates and bowls as a set, or sprinkle in Easter dinnerware favorites with other collections for a pop of festive pattern. 

Spring Serveware Must-Haves

Whether you decide to buy an entire collection of matching Easter serveware or stick to buying accent pieces, there are a few essentials for hosting during the spring. Make sure you have all the usual pieces, such as serving platters, large serving bowls, and serving utensils, to be prepared for any party you may host. Charcuterie boards and trays are an amazing idea for quick small bites and simple gatherings. 

Spring Utensils and Glassware

When setting a spring table, every item can be colorful, so why stick to the same old utensils and glassware everyone has? Whether we need wine glasses or water goblets, we love the vibrant glassware by Estelle for any gathering. If we're not using the family silverware, we would opt to use our go-to Sabre utensils to complete each place setting, 

Spring Table Accessories

Don't forget any thematic tabletop accessories for your spring gatherings! Every design can be switched out for something that matches the season, from butter dishes to a bunny-shaped toothpick holder. Easter bowls or springtime salt and pepper shakers are small ways to make your theme seem larger-than-life, so don't forget these little details when designing your tablescape. 

What Can You Use as a Centerpiece in the Spring?

Setting a table you love wouldn't be complete without striking centerpieces! For springtime tablescapes, drawing inspiration from the nature around you ties everything together. Don't be afraid to add subtle lighting, such as lanterns or candles, and any holiday-themed figurines and shapes, like a gold Easter egg or bunnies. Remember to consider your theme and color palette to find the perfect decorations to grace the center of your tables.

Start thinking about your possible springtime celebrations early, and stock up on all the dinnerware and serveware essentials you may need. With striking pastels and endless opportunities to invite your loved ones over, every tablescape you create matters. When setting a spring table, you'll be ready—no matter the occasion.

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