Sweetheart table or head table?
Updated
A head table puts the wedding party in a line facing the room. A sweetheart table puts the two of you on your own, with everyone else seated among the guests. Both work. The choice usually comes down to how big the wedding party is, and whether their partners would rather sit with them than watch from a round.
The head table
A head table is a row of banquet tables with chairs along one side only, so nobody sits with their back to the room. At 24 in a place, a 12 ft table seats six and a 16 ft table seats eight. It suits a small or medium wedding party and a formal room, and it makes speeches easy: everyone giving one is already at the front. Its weakness is width. A party of fourteen needs a table nearly 30 ft long, which can stretch across the whole end of a hall.
The sweetheart table
A sweetheart table seats the two of you, usually at a small round or a 4 to 6 ft rectangle with both chairs on the side facing the room. It frees the wedding party to sit with their own partners and families, which many of them will prefer. It also gives the two of you a rare quiet moment to actually eat. The trade-off is that the front of the room looks emptier, so it needs a backdrop, flowers or a good wall behind it.
Other options that work
A family table seats the two of you at a large round with both sets of parents, which suits a smaller wedding. A king's table is one long banquet run down the middle of the room with the couple at the centre and guests on both sides. With a very large wedding party, a head table of the core six to eight and the rest at the nearest rounds is often the cleanest answer.
Where it goes
Whichever you choose, place it first, against the long wall facing in, with the dance floor in front of it and nothing behind but a wall or a backdrop. Every other table is placed relative to it, closest family nearest. Leave room behind for people to get in and out without climbing over each other, about 3 ft between the chairs and the wall.
Try both before you decide
It is much easier to choose between the two when you can see them in your own room. Draw the room in the planner, add a head table, and look at how much wall it takes. Then swap it for a sweetheart table and a couple of extra rounds and see which you prefer. The tables are drawn to scale, so what fits on the plan fits in the room.