To think it's polite to not do all of this when planning a wedding

[hibbledibble]

When couples plan a wedding, it seems like often there is little thought given to how easy it will be for guests to attend.

There are three things which can make it difficult for guests to attend a wedding:

1. having it in the middle of nowhere (so guests need to travel, and book one or two nights of accomodation as a minimum)
2. having it on a weekday, especially in the middle of the week (so guests need to use annual leave, or take unpaid leave)
3. not inviting children (childcare costs and logistics)

Doing one or two of the above is forgivable, but aibu for thinking it's really inconsiderate to do all three?

I've been to weddings where close family and friends who really felt they had to attend ended up struggling to attend. It was very awkward. (I was lucky in that I had childcare available,l and flexible working arrangements).

I do think in this case it was quite selfish, bride and groom put their wedding photos ahead of their family.

Traditionally weddings weren't photo shoots, they were occasions where friends and family got together to celebrate the couple. I would always put friends and family attending above superficial things like venue and meal choice.

It wouldn't bother me, if it's not possible I would decline the invitation. It would never be possible to suit all the guests, more sensible for the couple to choose what they'd like to do. An individual guest who is upset is making it about them not the B & G

I agree OP, it’s completely rude. We were recently invited to the wedding of one of DHs oldest friends. It was in the middle of nowhere 500 miles from where we, the couple and all of their guests live, with no relevance to the couple at all. No accommodation nearby (the closest was a campsite 11 miles from the venue) and it was childfree - and they were annoyed that we declined the invitation. I don’t mind telling you I was praying for rain on their wedding day.

A family member did this last summer. I was fine with it and enjoyed the long weekend and a night in a hotel. However my sister had a 10 month old at the time. With all her partners family abroad and it being a family wedding there was no one to do childcare overnight or even for 10 hours. I know you are not obliged to accept an invitation however I assume the couple do want the people they've invited to actually attend. Therefore I think it's nice to consider how accessible it is for your guests.

This is exactly why when we get married it will be in a registry office with very few people. You just cannot please everybody & somebody will always moan! It isn't anybody else's day bar the bride & groom's, simple as that. If they want it child free, fine. If they want a mid week wedding which is usually cheaper then that's their choice. They could spend ages trying to organise the 'perfect' wedding regarding ease for guests & still end up pissing somebody off.
The only caveat is don't get upset when guests decline. Have the wedding you want & let everybody else come or not

Having had a big, considerate wedding once before...

IF (ie never) I was to get married again.... I would consider my future wife and myself ... everyone else has a choice to "fit in, or Fxck off"

;-)

My BF told me I was selfish and hurtful and hasn’t spoken to us since. This was two years ago.

Weddings, eh? An opportunity for previously reasonable people to behave badly, and be surrounded by "you do it your way, hun" enablers.

A relative of mine got married last year. My parents politely declined and just sent a card with 50 pounds in. My mums sister went and I think she felt a little sick afterwards at how much money she ended up spending on accommodation, travel, food, etc. It really ended up adding up. Not the bride and grooms fault as the wedding was near where they lived, but just generally these days weddings can be so expensive for people to attend. I think it’s a shame really.

We planned our wedding around what would work for the people we wanted to be there.

We have a huge family (DH has over 100 first cousins) as well as my family and good friends. We were young and self funding our wedding so we couldn’t possibly afford to entertain them all. By having the wedding on a weekday and in a not particularly convenient venue it both reduced the costs considerably for us and had the added advantage of giving the many people who ‘had’ to be invited for family politics reasons the perfect, acceptable reason to decline. The people who did attend were the ones who really, really wanted wanted to be there which happily broadly matched the people we really, really wanted to come. Win win.

And PIL were happy as by inviting so many relations they didn’t have to be having awkward conversations with their brothers and sisters.

We had our wedding in the village in which we lived which is close to my mum and our local friends but a 90 minute drive for my dad and in-laws and our childhood friends. Kids were invited and it was a late afternoon wedding on a Saturday with no formal meal afterwards so if people wanted to just come to the service they could.

A few people didn't come and I had no issues with that. The only relationship affected as result is my supposed best friend from school who:

I asked to be a bridesmaid and she declined as she "might have to work and it's her aunts birthday". Asked if she could come as a regular guest instead (which didn't tally with the reasons she declined being a bridesmaid but ok) which I was fine with.

Suddenly realised on the morning of my wedding that she did have to work actually. Said she would post on her card, never arrived, said she would pop up and see us soon, never happened.

Tl;dr - weddings bring out the crazy in people.

I actually agree with these, people say that the wedding is for the couple and not for the guests but it’s not it is? A wedding is really meant to be about having all your closest and cared about family and friends to help celebrate your marriage.....which is kind of hard to do if you can’t get these people to attend as you’ve chosen to hold your wedding on a Wednesday- which is a work day for the high majority of the population.
If you don’t care about having many or any guests then why have a full on wedding reception at all?
I’ve always thought if you can’t afford to make the day accessible to your guests (and also throw in a few drinks etc.) then either just do it yourself with only a few select guests or wait and save up some more....weddings cost a huge amount for a guest to attend usually, the least you can do when your inviting them to attend to celebrate YOUR day is consider them in the planning.
Attending a wedding where the room is half empty, there’s no atmosphere due to lack of guests and no one can enjoy a drink because the bar is extortionate or everyone had to drive to get there, is rubbish!

The phrase it's an invitation not a summons is grossly overused in this type of thread. Because it's really not that simple.

Sure, if a colleague who you don't know that well or an old neighbour or a distant cousin invites you to a Wednesday childfree ceremony in the middle of nowhere, you can probably get out of it easily enough. That's true.

But the reality is that most of us have people we're sufficiently close to that we cannot realistically refuse an invitation without causing a great deal of upset. Particularly if it's a choice, something you could do but would just prefer not to, and the host knows that.

So for example if your sister is getting married rurally 300 miles away and you do have the 2 days of annual leave and £500+ it's going to rush you, but you'd just rather use them for something else, for many people refusal is going to result in a large family row (my Dsis had would never do something like this and had an extremely considerate and guest friendly wedding, was just an example). In a way that's more difficult than someone choosing a destination wedding that would cost you 5k to attend because then for most people it just won't be an option.

So actually OP, yes you have a point. It's polite to take some notice of your guests needs and bear this in mind when planning. Obviously some people don't know anyone with small DC, have a guest list primarily comprising nightclub staff etc, so weekend and kids allowed doesn't necessarily make life easier for everyone.

I do think the immediate family (those who can't get out of it) should be taken into consideration. We had to go to a midweek wedding, travel, stay in a hotel and the couple couldn't be bothered to provide anything for the evening, the reception finished mid-afternoon!

I don't object to taking time off work for a wedding but it should be worth my time

The fall-out from declining a wedding invitation can be massive, and I think it's disingenuous to pretend say otherwise.

Disingenuous as fuck. Some of them actually are closer to a summons than an invite, in terms of the recipient's ability to refuse attendance without facing negative consequences.

When we were younger we went to several weddings where the ceremony and reception were in different counties. Fine for us with a car, those without not so much. We gave people lifts but it was so badly organised and people should have been told before that this would happen. There were quite a few worried guests who also had to spend a fortune on transport back.

DHs cousin got married on a Wednesday in his home town, 5 hours away. We didn’t go. It was the 3 days Holiday that did it for us (which would have turned into 4 as DH family would have expected us to stay the weekend).
In fact a lot of family didn’t go as they couldn’t get a Wednesday off work (including teachers).
They were really pissed about it. Ironically the venue and reception place was no cost to them (without outing myself) so why a Wednesday?

This is what is wrong with weddings these days. It's all about ME ( sometimes maybe us) Why do you want guests? To be the audience for your big fest, or to celebrate your union. 2 different things. Its all getting to be a performance again. Yes, destination weddings are selfish, cheaper for the couple, expensive for the guest, similar midweek.
Children? Well, the way some children behave who would want them at a serious ceremony? Sit quietly at a table for an hour? They can't even manage 20 mins eating out. If you want a bunfest lets all race around shouting

I think people should consider these issues if they want everyone they are inviting to attend.

I'm having my wedding back in London even though we now live 1.5-2hrs away, but everyone else is back there. If we had it here everyone would need to book a hotel or not drink.

I'm also torn over the day/date. The date I want is a Sunday, but obviously a Saturday is a more convenient day to have a wedding.

@jessstan2 Not everyone gets paid leave.

We had a 15 minute drive between the ceremony and reception. It wasn't what we wanted. The plan was for a local walkable hotel however when we went to their wedding open day they hadn't even cleaned the carpet, the entire place was filthy and we got bad vibes.

That said if both addresses are on the invitation I would expect grown adults to put them into Google maps and plan accordingly.

We planned our wedding round what suited our guests. In our case it was a midweek wedding (cheaper flights from N Ireland), in the school holidays (teachers), childfree (friends with children were delighted). The spin off benefits for us were that we didn't have to arrange everything years in advance and it was cheaper. Win/win.

If half of your guest list work in Social Care and getting mid week off is easier, then added up with those that don't work (retired etc), then a mid week Wedding makes sense.

You gave to think if you want the destination or certain guests. A friend of mine had her Wedding all arranged. Two weeks before and her Father had an accident. He couldn't attend, she was gutted. Had it been in the UK, he could have been there.

She's talking about a vow renewal, so he will be there. She said she feels like she's had a big holiday with family and friends, but not a Wedding because, besides the Groom, the one person she wanted there, couldn't go.

The Weddings that I've been to have been well thought out. An old fashioned bus, but with disabled access, to ferry people about. Entertainment in between, for Adults and children.

You can't cater for everyone and the tightening of school attendance doesn't help. But I think you have to plan it around your main guest list. But everyone is entitled to the Wedding that they want.

The wedding is not held for the guests, it's held for the couple.

People who think like this should be more than happy to get married with no guests then.

Each to their own, I guess all these things are up to the couple. They just need to be prepared that people won’t come if it doesn’t work for them.

We have been to weddings that are in the middle of nowhere and stayed if we could afford to, if not one of us doesn’t drink and drives home if possible. Mid week weddings are fine if plenty of notice, but we did have to decline one as meant we would have had to pull DD out of school which we weren’t prepared to do. I am not bothered if the couple don’t want kids there, if we can get babysitters then great (we have been to many weddings where kids have been invited but we chose to leave them with family anyway!) if not we don’t go.

We are planning our wedding at the moment. Our venue is in the country but a 10 minute drive to local town so cheaper accommodation is available. We are planning a Friday but it’s in the school holidays with plenty of notice. And are inviting kids but putting on plenty of entertainment for them. As we have 2 young children and nieces/nephews we want them to be a part of our day.