To scrap ‘evening’ invitations to weddings

That was my point. Lesson learned - never doing it again.

Knowing my cousin like I do, I actually think she was trying to be helpful, thinking a shorter time =less childcare.
The logistics probably didn't enter her head.

I did the same - but then neither my DH nor I were “locals” to where we lived (if that makes sense!). But my DDs have lived in the same house all their lives; I could easily imagine a scenario where, if they wanted a traditional “from home” wedding, it’d be a nice thing to ask the neighbours or some of the older people in the community/parents of friends she’s known all her life to come for a drink and a buffet in the evening. As I’ve said, where people are local, they know others also joining the party at that point (and there is actually a party laid on for them, not just the dregs of the day “do”), it can be a really nice thing to do.

You can’t just decide something like evening guests should be scrapped because it’s not the done thing in your culture and you personally don’t like it.

That would be as silly as me saying all weddings should have evening only guests because that’s how weddings were when I grew up. Used to love it as a teenager when someone from the villages invitation arrived and it was evening only - got the dancing and nice frock bit, but didn’t have to do the boring hanging about bits or the inevitable chicken with either white wine or mushroom sauce.

Evening invitations have a totally different thought process in some places. To me I was always brought up with them being “we can’t afford and don’t have the space for everyone but we’d love you to come to the bit we can afford to have everyone” rather than some sort of insult.

Now that is just thoughtless but pretty extreme!

I don't think there is anything wrong with more guests in the evening per se as long as they are catered for and are local. It doesn't work as a model for country house type weddings where people are having guests to pay to stay somewhere. We went to one recently where there was no adequate food food in the evening g and people were paying for all their own drinks.

An evening invitation is no more insulting than no invitation at all. Less so in fact.

Unless you have a high sense of self importance.

I was once invited to a family wedding - evening only.
It was an adults only destination wedding.
Yes of course I am going to fly for a couple of hours to go to a 3 hr party without my children and nobody to look after them because all my child free relatives got whole day invites.
I didn't go.

Politicking at there being 'tiers' of guests is silly when there are 'tiers' of acquaintance. Immediate family, distant family, bury a body friends, close friends, good friends, work and hobby pals etc.

if you are 'evening tier' to one couple it isn't a comment on your intrinsic value or anything, you simply aren't close enough to be offered a day invitation (and that could be because they're having a tiny, family only, wedding, ceremony and breakfast).

I was an evening guest at a local wedding last year and whilst l was delighted to be there, would have felt quite intrusive being at the speeches and vows as I really didn't know the couple that well (it wasn't a church wedding which I know is open to the public).

If it hadn't been local I would have either declined or made a weekend of it if it had been somewhere I was interested in going anyway.

I think threads on the matter usually happen when people felt they were close enough to merit a full invitation (or invited the couple to their own full day). I don't think it's when local mates are asked to the evening party.

Why should there be a standard issue tradition?

Everyone invited to my wedding was invited to the whole day - ceremony, reception and meal, evening do. We said from the get go that we would do it that way and that was it. I find the two tier system quite insulting and I wouldn't accept an evening only invite unless it was very local.

In fairness, this was a bit mad from you. An evening invitation is for cake and a dance, sometimes some form of buffet — it was really ever going to have been ‘worth’ driving halfway up the country, paying for accommodation, taxis etc, even if they’d given you sandwiches and wine!

eventually you have a generation who have never been to a wedding as a guest and have no preconceptions of what it should be like so do something completely different and therefore much cheaper.

Gosh - that’s such an interesting point. In all the “no kids at weddings” palaver you read about on here, that had never occurred to me: no kids at weddings means kids not growing up with that idea of “a proper wedding has x, y or z”. And if you’re not wedded to tradition, presumably a lot of the aspects of a wedding go down the pan. Interesting.

I always think evening guests liven up a tired party , there is no saying your day guest are going to stay on in the evening . It could be a wash out in the evening ,granny is not going to be the life and soul of the party .
Evening guests are usually young and bring a new fun element to the evening .
Your wedding could easily be a wash out without young fun guests .

I agree with you OP and we had no evening-only invites at our wedding as I hated the idea of classifying our friends into typeA who get a meal etc and typeB who only get a sausage roll ar 10pm. But I don't have any idea whether the practice is dying out.

I'd like to think the wedding industry will kill itself off eventually. All the traditional trummings are getting so expensive and guest lists get smaller to fit a limited budget and eventually you have a generation who have never been to a wedding as a guest and have no preconceptions of what it should be like so do something completely different and therefore much cheaper.

I'm getting married. The only people who are invited in the evening (and to the church) are local to us eg work colleagues, people we know through a hobby. The actual ceremony is open anyway as it's in a church (not everyone realises that) then as the venue has a far higher capacity than we need as a max, to be honest anyone we know is welcome.

I was once invited to an evening do 4 hours from home while my partner was invited to the whole day. That was a decline from me.

Yep, I got invited to an evening do in North Yorkshire at a golf club in the middle of nowhere by a colleague I work with in Central London. I drove up with another colleague to save costs, but that was several hours driving each way, hotel in the nearest village, taxis, and when we got there they hadn't organised any food or drinks for the evening "guests", literally just let the 2nd-tier acquaintances in once the bit they were paying for "per person' was done. Most of the people who'd been there all day were already inebriated to a point that made conversation difficult and I think we spoke to the groom for about 3 minutes.
I will never travel more than an hour for an evening do again.

Yes, I’ve had fun at them too. Or declined the invitation if it was going to be too expensive or troublesome to attend, but appreciated the thought.

I hate evening only invites - by the time you arrive everyone is both shitfaced and exhausted. My solution is to just not accept them. I don’t. Begrudge anyone wanting to send them though - it’s entirely up to them.

No! I invited work frolleagues, not so close friends etc to the evening part. Was a long time ago but it was about a third of the cost and they got lovely platters of food and fruit and a free bar. I would imagine it was around 8pm start and everyone was relatively local. The party bit is the best part 😝
I also travelled for an evening so years ago (pre my wedding) and it was crappy sandwiches and a paid bar )and we stayed over with another couple). We were young (20s) and we had a nice mini break!
As they say, it’s an invite not a summons.

What an odd thread, seriously odd. Like let’s all get together and decide what the world should do.

i am fine with an evening invite, i enjoy a party, and often find weddings a very long day, so unless I was especially close then I’d be happy to turn up and help them celebrate in the evening. I don’t need to sit there and watch them get married or have the wedding breakfast.

Oh, is that what Mn thinks this is about — someone trying to make a ‘small wedding’ look ‘big’? That’s very ‘aspirational LMC/what will the neighbours think?’ Probably not surprising it’s so controversial on Mn, home of the socially aspirational and insecure about friendships, then. It hadn’t occurred to me in that light.

A ‘normal’ sized wedding where I grew up would be 200-250 people, but you still can’t invite everyone in your life to the whole thing. If I’d done a traditional wedding in the parish I grew up in, where my parents still live, we’d have issued evening invitations to elderly neighbours of my parents (who would have come down to the church to see the bride coming out), cousins I only see at weddings and funerals, colleagues from a past job, old school friends who’d stayed local etc. These are ‘second tier’, sure, but that’s hardly controversial.

An ex work colleague is different to a good friend, don’t you think?

I would be happy for an evening invite, but if it was a good friend I spoke to weekly went out with helped etc, then an evening invite would be a slap in the face!

I don't understand why people get offended if they only get invited to the evening part. I went to a lovely evening do a few months ago. It was the wedding of an ex work colleague, and we were all delighted to be invited to both the hen do (an afternoon tea) and the evening do. Both were local BTW.

It must be exhausting to be so full of self importance and so easily offended all the time.

Evening invite only weddings are the height of bad manners. Invite people or don't bother.