Constructing Wedding Seating Plans: A Tabu Subject

This paper examines an interesting combinatorial optimisation problem that generalises both the graph colouring and k-partition problems. The problem has an interesting practical application in the construction of wedding seating plans, where we seek to assign equal numbers of guests to tables such that they are sat near friends and, perhaps more importantly, kept away from their enemies. We describe an effective two-stage metaheuristic-based approach for this problem which is currently used with the online tool on the commercial website www.weddingseatplanner.com. We also present results on the performance of this algorithm, indicating what factors can influence run time and solution quality.