Wedding lunacy

[TheAmusedQuail]

I just don't get throwing money at weddings. Marriage is the important bit. Not the getting married.

The dress, the suit, diamond rings, bridesmaids, groomsmen, flower girls, pageboys, button holes, bouquet, wedding reception, tablescapes (WTAF), favours, DJ, stag, hen, hair, makeup. Not to mention bridezillas and almost completely detached grooms. It's like a one woman celebration with the man just signing on the dotted line.

I've seen so many weddings where a fortune was spent and 4, 5, 6 years later the couple are either unhappily married or have split up.

WHY as a culture do we participate in this craziness?

Are weddings the new MN chicken? It used to be “I can feed 437 people with one family sized chicken AND have left overs”. Now, it’s performative underspending on weddings? “I spent £1.50 on my wedding and it was fabulous. Anyone who spends more than that is ridiculous”. WTAF? Surely, you recognise that people want different things? it’s not your money or your decision and it doesn’t affect you or anyone else. Don’t go if you don’t want to! Live and let live.

Surely, you recognise that people want different things? it’s not your money or your decision and it doesn’t affect you or anyone else

Its an interesting perspective, bit weeding unlike most other things draw people in, they have to have XYZ - brides out demands on people - remember when they rocked up for a sandwich and not it’s pre hen parties, weekends in foreign countries, Champaign’s receptions. Flower walls, doughnut walls - insta - gift lists, extreme prices for hotels, colour themes, I’ve seen people asked to change their hair colour, cover tattoos, wear dresses they aren’t comfortable in, none of which has an impact on the marriage.

It does impact society and makes social norms - into debt for most young couples.

But you don’t have to do any of those things? If you don’t want to go to the hen or can’t afford it? Don’t. If you don’t want to go to the wedding? Don’t. Ridiculous requests to change hair/clothes/whatever. Don’t. You aren’t obliged.
You will choose what you want for your own wedding. That might be a massive champagne and diamond affair or it might be a registry office and quick drink after. Both are “proper” weddings, neither is a “superior” or better choice, both are equally valid because people are different and want different things.
if they want to get into debt, that is their choice. Again, it doesn’t affect anyone else.

Agree- a friend of mine was so pissy with me because she wanted me to fly to South Africa for her wedding when I was just out of uni. Hard no to that.

Marriage lasted 3 years! Very glad I didn’t go into debt for that shit and stuck to my guns. (She did apologise after the wedding hysteria had died down.)

Recently, my cousin spent about £35k on a wedding. 13 months later she moved out of their house and they’re getting divorce. She said it started going wrong straight after the honeymoon which is wild when you think about it. I want to go and demand my gift back! What a colossal waste of time and money.

If you truly love each other, you don't need a license to prove it. Each to their own of course.

Yeah, it’s madness. All of my friends have done it.

There is nothing wrong with that - but a 'proper wedding' doesn't have to cost tens of thousands. It's actually quite easy to have a simple wedding on a budget, but many are just wanting Instagramable photos and/or to keep up with their friends.

You must live a rather sheltered life. I know several couples who have divorced within a few years. One woman still had her wedding photo on display in the photographer's window after their separation, another was in a 'Bride of the Year' competition one year, and separated the next. As for budgets, it's pretty easy to see who has spent an entire fortune on their wedding.

We got married in a registry office at 10am on a Saturday using a special licence. Today is actually our 28th wedding anniversary. Just my DB2 and his wife as witnesses. DB2 drove us in a borrowed beige Skoda that was full of rust. I wore a short sleeve yellow blouse, a black and white houndstooth skirt and an accidentally shoplifted bra. (I'd used it to try on my new outfit because I'd gone out braless and forgot to take it off. Too embarrassed to go back) Husband didn't even have a suit, just shirt and tie with dark trousers.
DB dropped us off in the high street afterwards and we did the weekly grocery shop. DB2 was pissed off at me for pulling it all together in ten days because he brought me up after my parents died and I didn't give him time to arrange a party and stuff. I had no confidence any family would bother coming and we were near enough broke anyway. We spent the evening in DB2's local shithole pub at his insistence and spent the last of the £200 overdraft we'd used to afford to get married on a taxi home at midnight.
It was as depressing as it sounds.
I say, if you can do it and want to do it, go for it. I've had more pleasant trips to the dentist than I experienced on my wedding day. I wish I had a memory of feeling special for a day.

Because its one of the great rites of passage in life. At a time when so much else is cheap or meaningless, it seems to me that something like committing yourself for life to someone else, deserves to be celebrated with all your family and loved ones. Of course not beyond your means, and of course many mariages dont make it, but I still think its worth marking the occasion. And selfishly, I do love a wedding. Big, small, or inbetween, they are always joyous occasions.

See I see it completely differently. I hate the patriarchal history of weddings, and nowadays it’s just making a relationship a legal contract. I have no interest in the minutiae of how other people manage their relationships and I really couldn’t give a monkeys if they’ve signed a register or not. I don’t see it as a huge momentous occasion or feel excited by people announcing engagements. Just go to the register office and get it over with without wasting 30k. I find it far more interesting and exciting hearing about people’s individual life events and interests like travel, personal/professional development.

This is so true . It's just a nice day out for most people . A lot don't even bother coming back for the evening disco or even thank the bride and groom .

Goodness, that sounds so joyless.
While I agree with the OP that the wedding "industry" is bonkers and there is so much unnecessary expense on fripperies that guests couldn't care less about, a wedding is still an event to be celebrated.

I think if the couple focused less on the Instagram side of a wedding - difficult to get to venues, hours long photo shoots, colour themed dress codes for guests, expensive matchy matchy accessories etc, and more on the fact that they are getting married everyone would be happier.

Also couples need to remember that they are the hosts of a party as well as being the main attraction, and if they want to celebrate with as many friends and family as they can then having a destination wedding and/or a wedding that excludes children will cut down the number of guests significantly. They then need to accept gracefully that not everyone can attend and not throw their toys out of the pram.

Then there are the expensive hen dos. Invitees need to kick back and say they are beyond their budget without the organiser guilt tripping them into spending money they don't have.

I don’t give a monkeys how much couples spend on their weddings, as long as they don’t expect others to suffer for their choices, eg a £6k dress and nothing for guests to eat but canapés did not sit well, but the photos looked good on IG (which was the whole point for the couple!) I chose a small wedding in which we paid for everything. We’d been to an insane $150,000 wedding abroad the month before, so it felt even more low-key than it was.

Absolutely this. You don’t need a small army of bridesmaids, flower girls and and groomsmen, you don’t need to spend several thousand pounds on a dress you won’t wear again you don’t need a stately home as a backdrop, you don’t need a long haul honeymoon.

Incidentally, I know someone who had a destination beach wedding in the Med, didn’t make it to the first anniversary.

When we got married,my husband was very clear it was a marriage service and not a wedding. I think that's part of the problem. People are so focused on the day that they forget it is a day of promises about the rest of their lives not just a party.

Well said @Silvertulips

Also there are many, many, many anecdotes of people living happily together for decades, they get married and split up afterwards....

I think that is because there are already cracks in the relationship and the wedding is sticking plaster.

Each to his/her own. Ours was a few grand, in an unpopular hotel. I had a traditional dress, bouquet, cake, nothing crazy. I was just delighted to have people agree to attend, it meant a lot. Looking back, I think I’d have been happy at the local registry office!

I remember after my (now) husband proposed to me we were sitting looking at his diary together to find a date. He wrote it as ‘marriage’ rather than wedding - it struck a chord with me then. Still in love 32 years later.

Should do it the Thai way. No presents...just money gifts. You get a lovely invite written in golden lettering in an envelope with your name on. You bring aforementioned envelope with your monetary gift, and give to one of the ushers whose job it is to collect them. He passes them to the Master of Ceremonies who then reads out WHAT EVERYONE GAVE!!! (No cheapskates...)

Funerals, as above, but the invite is written in black.

Oh, and there is a bride price to be paid. A reverse dowery in fact, from groom to bride's parents, to pay for the costs of bringing her up.. One wedding I was at, this was a new truck and a couple of motorbikes amongst other things.

These threads do annoy me. We're both high earners and spent ~£30k on our wedding last year -- if you want a traditional white wedding, an open bar, enough food for ~100 people for two meals, and a great guest experience, that is how much these things cost!

I had the most incredible, joyous day on my wedding. I loved the solemnity of the church service and the promise people made to support us in our marriage. I loved seeing most of our family (I didn't grow up in the UK) and friends all together and mixing in the strangest ways. I have enjoyed all the weddings I've been to, except one where it was clear that the couple were prioritising pictures and lengthy speeches and not the guest experience.

We got married, with a lot of people around us, but on a rainy day in February and at a much lower cost than average for the time. Put the money into really good food and photographs, and did a lot ourselves/family rather than by professionals (booklets, cars, table favours, makeup etc). When the average dress cost £1,500-2,000, I spent £250 on dress and £90 on alterations. And I got white shoes, but as the dress was full length so they were hidden, I got basic plain white satin heels in a sale. Bridesmaid wore her beautiful prom dress that was perfect. Gentlemen rented their suits rather than bought them. I did get my hair done but by my normal hairdresser. Bought flowers were augmented by greenery and some flowers from the gardens of both mums (for nostalgia and involvement, but helped keep budget down). The normal choir from church sang (that I had been part of) - and I got them all lovely candle each as they wouldn't take money. Those sorts of things.

We just celebrated 25 years married. And still happy together. But it helped that we didn't start heavily in debt for 1 day and focussed on getting a decent life set up for ourselves instead (we bought a house 4 months before the wedding which needed a lot done to it).

@duckduckgo13 I don't have an issue with couples spending a lot on their wedding. I do have an issue where they don't prioritise their guests and it is all about the photos, so I agree with you there.

I also have an issue where the couple prioritise the venue over the guests. If they want a child free wedding in a remote castle on a Scottish island they can't get stroppy with invited guests who can't make it due to the logistsics and the expense.

All the good weddings I have been to have had plentiful good food and drink and a comfortable ambient temperature. Extras such as wedding favours, matching chairs etc are not important to guests.