British working class girl marrying Austrian toff

[Blon]

I am going to get married to my partner who was born in Austria but has been in the UK for 5 years. His family is an old aristocratic family whilst my parents are working class. DP's visits to my family so far always caused mutual embarrassment in spite of the good intentions on both sides. With DP you can have an interesting conversation about the war in Libya or Beethoven's symphonies, but has no idea about football, sitcoms that is my dad's and mum's favourite topics. They all try very hard, but just can't get it right.

Now, I really don't know how to organize the wedding. DP's parents speak a flawless English, but are even more "toffish". They are also devoted Roman Catholis. My dad used to be a union leader, and is a proud atheist. His parents want a religious ceremony, wearing traditional outfits etc.

How could we sort this mess out? Maybe 2 separate weddings? The civil one in England and the religious in Austria?

[MmeLindt]

Decide what you want - you and your fiance. Not his parents, or your parents.

Then decide where you want to get married.

And how you want the wedding to be.

DH is German and we got married in UK, as I prefer the British style weddings.

[maypole1]

I had the same problem my oh family are upper class I a lower working class just arrange the wedding you and he would like because other wise you end up pleasing no one


My inlaws expected me to have a big fat gypsy wedding lol my wedding turned out just how I wanted it vintage chic

We don't see them much and when we do I keep myself to my self.

[suburbophobe]

Personally, I'd elope to the Caribbean, just the two of you and tell the lot after the fact.

It's your day, not theirs.

Jamaica does weddings within a few days, google for the info (birth certificates, whatever), and register it when you get back home.

Met a lovely couple (mixed EU) there who did it, brought their two respective best friends as witnesses. Their (separate) honeymoon/friends' holiday on the island was an extra blessing.

[Broodzilla]

Suburbophobe beat me to it... DH and I are from similar backgrounds socioeconomically, but different countries and for us the problem was partly logistics but mainly the fact that both sets of parents are divorced, remarried and don't get on AT ALL. Had we gone the traditional way with a "proper" wedding, it would've been just to please everyone else... We'd have spent the day hoping that it's not too awkward and uncomfortable and although I'm absolutely sure they'd have all been civil and wanted to be there to share the day...

We eloped. Just the two of us. Flew over to America, did the roadtrip of our dreams, went to Vegas and had a drive-thru wedding in a limo (we stood up through the sunroof so there was only room for the two of us anyway :) ). Just so that the whole thing would't feel too much like a joke, we then went out to a really amazing restaurant and spent almost as much money on our meal as we had on the flights...

All in all, AMAZING. Almost everyone understood why we did what we did, and 3 years down the line, we'd do it all over.

Think about it... ;)

[MagdalenaAlec]

2 separate weddings is your best option. Try to keep the civil one informal (close friends and family) and the religious one formal (not everyone is going to come to Austria anyway).

This is exactly what we did and it worked perfectly well. I am from a very uptight aristocratic Catholic French/Polish family whilst my DH comes from a pretty crazy artsy aristocratic one (picture Wallis Simpson and Prince Edward's hypothetical descendants and you get the idea). Basically identical backgrounds which have gone completely opposite ways... :)
We had a civil wedding in NY (where we live) followed by 2 days of BBQs and beach games in the Hamptons where we had rented 3 houses. Not everyone could make it, so it kept the most "unmixeable" guests away. There were just our close friends and family and idk if it was because there were just 40 of us but it worked really well, everyone got along with the others and the atmosphere was very relaxed (I did not even have a "proper wedding dress", as my mother likes to point out).
2 months later we had a very formal Catholic wedding in France: huge gown for me, a cortege, 400 people in the church, an horrible red carpet (thank you Mum)... followed by an exceptionally boring long seated dinner (250 people). In the end, the crowd was so big that everyone managed to find people they liked to talk to and avoid the others despite my mother's "protocolary correct" seating chart.

At the end of the day, everyone was happy, even though our best memories were during our civil wedding where everyone who mattered and really wanted to be there actually were present. The other one was a bit of a freak show but it satisfied my inner Cinderella. :o