No more two tier weddings solution

[Pingiop]

MN stirs up a wide variety of opinions when it comes to weddings. Recent thread was a poster saying they weren’t going to attend evening invites anymore as they viewed it as a diss.

Not all people invited will be close to the couple and not everyone will invited to the day and night celebrations. People on these threads have suggested that the couple only have the wedding they can afford. Not to have the nice fancy dream wedding they have saved years for but to downgrade the venue so that this D list acquaintances can attend.

So in the solution of only having the wedding you can afford, it can be proposed that all couples only invite their chosen guests to both day and night celebrations, this will of course mean most people who aren’t regarded as close friends and family, so D list acquaintances, will never attend a wedding again unless the couple are rich and can afford to invite everyone. Is this a sensible solution to unreasonable entitled behaviour?

I lived/worked in 2 countries before moving to the UK 20yrs and had never heard of an evening only invite till I moved here. It reminds me of the British class system- you aren't good enough for the whole day, but you can come along later and creep in during darkness! 😆

DH is British and both his brother and sister that got married in England didn't have evening guests. Everyone invited came to the whole thing, so its not that every, British person does this 2 tier wedding thing.

I do laugh at the idea British weddings are long though when lasting less than 24 hours! Other countries they r at least three days if not a week.

In a church yes, but what if its in a hotel/country house. You can't just waltz in and take a seat

I think family is more complicated. Some families might not be close or some might move away and you don’t see them that often. Some might even live close by but you might not really be in each other's lives. Then you have great aunt and uncles and second cousins etc. I grew up in a huge family, my nana was one of ten so we have lots of extended relatives. Just from my nana and grandad there are 37 kids, grandchildren and great grandchildren that’s not including partners or spouses. So that’s just from my side of the family and not even including my husband or both lots of friends. So if I wanted a small wedding I wouldn’t be inviting all my great aunts and uncles and second cousins. I don’t even think they would fit in the church 😂

Most British people can’t afford the time off work or allowed it off most probably.

Wedding ceremonies are open to the public, wherever they are held. Church, hotel, country house, it doesn’t matter.

For me, the important part of a wedding is the ceremony.

I wouldn’t bother going to an evening do, but I wouldn’t particularly be offended either (unless it was my brother or something!). I just wouldn’t see the point of going, I’m not that desperate for a night out.

We had a smaller wedding. No B list and no evening do. It was perfect for us. Our day started at 12 and finished at 6pm

That’s simply untrue

My sister and I were recently invited to the evening reception of my step niece - we’ve known her since she was about 8 and welcomed her into our family, sharing all family events etc. The wedding was at a lovely hotel about 50 miles from us and all the rooms were reserved for wedding guests.

We decided to make a weekend of it and booked rooms at the hotel overnight, we ware fortunate to be able to afford such luxuries now our own children have grown up. We got there at 4 ish and had a few drinks in our rooms then joined the rest of the guests at 7 pm for the bride and grooms first dance and cutting of the cake. The evening buffet was excellent, very good quality and varied selection so it felt as if we were welcomed rather than just offered a few cold beige snacks.

Most people had breakfast together then gathered in a lounge for coffee before checking out. At which point we were told we could take the table flowers home with us if we wanted. All in all, we had a wonderful time and it was a privilege to spend time with the young couple. We did not feel like second class guests, we were not related to the bride ( my brother is not even married to her mum even though they have been together for years!) and we had a great time.

Whether it’s true or not, what kind of psychopath turns up to a hotel 300 miles away to see Bob from Sales get married, when you know you haven’t actually been invited?

We invited all our friends from work,other friends who were not ‘close friends’ but people who we really liked and wanted to share a part of our day with for the evening party . It was absolutely great and we organised a coach to ferry everyone to the party. Cannot remember any sour grapes back in the 90s 🤷‍♀️People just enjoyed a party . Nowadays people are just so uptight about a wedding rather than just enjoying the occasion.

That's what we did. But I'm American. We don't do two-tiered weddings in the US. It's ceremony and then reception and seldom goes on all day. Many weddings are in the evening followed by a nighttime reception.

I had a two tier wedding as you call it. I actually only wanted 40 guests in the day. The venue said we had to pay for 50 guests either way. We upped it to 50 in the day and some additional evening guests.

None of our evening guests were offended that they had not been invited to the day. They were more distant colleagues. They were offered a non-alcoholic cocktail on arrival, cheese board, freshly cooked pizza, live singer & disco, an extra fun Photobooth, wedding cake and the opportunity to attend an exclusive venue.

The catering bill for 50 guests was £6000 then another £1000 just for the evening food. If we could have afforded another £2000 on the additional guests we would have done.

There were no gifts expected either as stated on all invitations just the pleasure of their company.

So you wouldn’t be offended then if you had a friend at work who didn’t invite you to their wedding but invited your other work friends?

But as someone earlier posted saying only invite your real friends? So what if I don’t see my spouses partner as a real friend? Surely that should mean they shouldn’t be invited as I don’t see them as my friend?

If you are in a team of 60 people are you expected to be friends with everyone? There are people at the place I was working with who I did not like. Why would I invite them to my wedding? I am glad I did not read this thread before my wedding. The other wedding threads had my autistic brain in overdrive as it was.

I've been to lots of evening dos as well as lots of full weddings, it's completely normal IME and I have never heard anyone complain about evening dos in real life. But generally my friends are a very sociable bunch who are up for a party. Everyone we invited to ours came.

Take it you get mainly evening only invites?

I can’t imagine any sane person would just crash a wedding ceremony they weren’t invited too.

I’d happily avoid all wedding invites if at all possible. They are tedious events.

I tend to make sure I’m unavoidably double booked as soon as I get wind of one.

There are a million better ways I would like to spend a day than attending a wedding.

I think most people IRL would feel this way but many people on here would disagree with you 🤭

And this is my whole point. Not everyone will be invited to the actual wedding so those that are being huffy about it are being unreasonable and entitled.

I think the only time I've felt a bit discomfited by an evening only invitation, was when, out of a group of six couples who were friends, two had full invitations and four of us evening only. When we arrived to see the other couples well in and chatting away about the ceremony and wedding breakfast speeches, it was a bit crap. We evening people hadn't known until that point, that the others had full day invites

So while I think evening invitations are fine, if you're the bride or groom, please treat everyone in the hobby/colleague/whatever group, equally.

I agree, one of our guests (on-my side of the list). Had gotten married about 18 months before my wedding. I was delighted to receive an evening invitation for myself and then fiancé. We even drove 2 hours for the evening reception.
She was invited to our wedding for the whole day. We understood that I had only been working with her for a short time before her wedding and the expense of weddings. There was never a tit-for-tat debate on it.