Getting legally married before having a wedding

[RC10]

It's something I've been thinking about doing myself and wondered if anyone has any experience or opinions on getting married legally in a registry office (possibly even a year) before having an actual wedding?

It’s normal in many countries to have the legal wedding at the local registry or town hall, and a proper celebration some time later, whether it be a religious event or purely secular. We live in Germany and will do it that way.

I know people who have done it but usually the legal wedding is only a few days before the other ceremony. Not a year. Why are you thinking of doing it that way? Won't it be more like a vow renewal, celebration If that's what you want then do it but I'm not really sure you can call it a wedding.

Thank you for opinions, it's so interesting to hear what people think! It's really something I've been toying with in the past few days as opposed to planning. I think if we were to do it, it would perhaps be more of a vow renewal ceremony as opposed to having "traditional wedding" especially if it were to be as long as a year later.

It might seem silly because I do care more about being married than having a wedding but if I'm being honest, I suppose a bit of it is that I worry I'd regret not having "a big day" with lots of our family and friends if we just got married at the registry office. Financially it's just not viable for us at the moment to do the traditional wedding with lots of people and a decent budget but we do want to get married sooner rather than later.

My thinking with it being more of a vow renewal was that we would be less likely to spend as much and it would give us more time and money to organise a vow renewal (seeing as we would like to get married soon) and it would take a lot of the stress and pressure out of having a "traditional wedding" as we were already married but we still get some kind of ceremony and celebration.

It might sound ridiculous to but I hope it makes sense.

I know a couple who did this for visa issues. He's American and they wanted to live over there, so they had a quick legal wedding here so she could get a green card and then a blow out white wedding over a year later in the States. To be honest, we were all a bit but it worked for them. She never considered the legal wedding as her real wedding, even though they were married for months before the second one.

My friends did this. They got married quickly for visa/job/housing requirements m then had a wedding a couple of years later

I wouldn’t tell people though because they might not be interested in attending the wedding as much if they know you’re already married

Do people really attend weddings based on the purity of the vows? Don’t they attend for the free booze and celebration?

I’ve been to plenty of weddings overseas which they couple has got married in the UK first, all good

No Shirley I just think it might lead people to forget about it a bit and not place as much importance on it if they know the deed is already done, that’s all

People will wonder why you need to renew your vows,. I thought people only did that if they had broken them, ie one cheated.

If you want to be married just do it and forget the delayed party. Weddings cost guests enough to attend without going to ones where the couple married a year ago.

We wanted a humanist wedding outdoors so we had a quick legal registry office wedding beforehand. We don't count the registry office ceremony as our wedding at all (although do have to remember for official paperwork!).

@TigerJoy: I think you're right that the priest will not have known. I had a civil ceremony in a register office the day before a church blessing and reception. Our vicar was very clear that the blessing was not a marriage and there were several differences between the service and a traditional wedding ceremony (though many of our guests didn't notice). The most obvious difference was that the vicar didn't ask anyone if there was any just cause or impediment to our marriage (because obviously by then we were already married).

Our invitations we were clear that we were inviting people to a blessing following our marriage.

More recently I went to a humanist hand-fasting ceremony to celebrate a wedding that had taken place the previous week.

Personally, I think a big celebration a year after is a big odd. I also wouldn't renew vows after only a year. Why not just have a big 1st anniversary party?

My late DH and I had a registry office ceremony and then 9 days later had our marriage blessed by a friend who was a vicar in the eye of the White Horse at Uffington. We went to our local, played Aunt Sally all day and had bangers and mash and bucks fizz. I consider my wedding anniversary to be the later date especially as it's a very memorable number.

It is very common for couples to do exactly this. Either a very cheap and simple statutory ceremony, one at the local register office or an early morning legal ceremony at the venue on the day if your ceremony so you get the legal bit out of the way and can then have the religious/humanist ceremony of your choice layer the same day.
I'm not keen when couples lie about what they have done, it seems weird to lie to your closest family and friends, but the idea of splitting the legal bit and the celebration bit does make sense for lots of people.