Did you have a big, fat wedding ?

[Dowser]

I last got married almost forty years ago and I have no idea what it cost .

Probably there was change out of two grand.

There's a lot of wives and husbands splitting up on this thread and I just wondered if those that had huge expensive weddings were any happier or have their marriages lasted any longer than those people whose weddings cost less.

If you did have an expensive wedding have you felt more compelled to stay in an unhappy marriage .

Do you now wish you had culled the guest list and gone for something less elaborate and used the money elsewhere.

Was your big day everything and more than you wanted it to be and life is still a bed of roses.. That's said with tongue in the cheek!

I had a big fat wedding, wouldn't of changed it me & dh did split up earlier this year however we worked through the problems and he stopped drinking so much. Everyone we wanted was at the wedding and it was our dream day however the only one thing I would of changed would of been the time of the wedding and the fact I ate McDonald's before the wedding and bloated in my dress

No, but I think SIL thought we did. The poshest (and v famous) hotel here offered us the best value for the sit down - a 4 poster bedroom for the night too!

We got change from 4 thousand, including honeymoon.

I wouldn't do it again, grandparents are no longer with us. I'd just slope off somewhere pretty and have a wholly civil ceremony with a couple of people as witnesses.

Nope, small. Didn't go into debt over it. We had at that time friends who were still paying off the wedding 5 years later! And god knows how many other debts had accumulated in that time we didn't know about.

So we were determined not to go down the same road. It worked out well. Going into marriage debt-free is an advantage, probably.

No, we had a small wedding. I wanted a pretty dress, organ music in the church, and a cake that tasted good. Family and a few friends, punch in the church social hall after. Our 25th anniversary is this December.

However, my sil had all the bells and whistles and she was divorced in about three years (he was a cheater).

I got married about a month before my BIL. Ours was pretty modest whilst theirs was a lavish multi-locational thing culminating in a masked ball of all things. Later that evening, in a scene that could have come straight out of Four Weddings and A Funeral, a few of us bridal suite saboteurs had to hide around room when the happy couple came back earlier than planned.... and then flew into a really nasty argument!

My modestly celebrated marriage met a sticky end about six years later. 25 years on and 'Punch and Judy' are still going strong...

We got married last year with 50 guests. Reception in village hall. I did the food myself and decorations. Local take away did evening meal. Not sure how much it cost. Less than £2000 definitely. It was completely perfect. The thought of hotel style wedding make me shudder.

Went to registry office with two witnesses. Licence, clothes and rings came to about £300.

Wanted to get married rather than have a wedding.

Still married nearly two decades later.

Not really - budget was £5k, pretty sure we came in under that. Still married 7.4 years later, and still going strong. :)

Big wedding here. Posh country hotel, big dress etc. Was bloody brilliant.

Been married three years in Feb, very happy.

Not huge by many standards but 10 years ago my wedding cost about 10k. It was lovely, not lavish, but we had about 80 people at the meal and gave them a really nice meal, celidh etc. Marriage lasted two years (though we had been together for ten). I don't really think it is a factor in people's decisions afterwards other than possibly regretting adding financial pressure - maybe they could have used the money for something more lasting. I do agree that very often when people say they want to be married they are thinking that they want a wedding.

OP, I get a bit of a whiff of the judgemental about your post, tbh. Slightly smug assumption that expensive weddings are all show with no true commitment behind them?

I do think that if you've had a massive wedding it might in the very very short term (be an added factor why you might be embarrassed to admit to "failure".

But I don't think how much you spend on a wedding is any indication of how much the marriage is taken seriously.

We spent £10K, but not in debt for it, and I had an amazing day surrounded by friends that I don't regret at all. The cost wasn't on "extras". No flowers, photographer, cars... The cost was racked up by numbers - because having everyone there was important to us.

I stayed too long in a bad marriage for a number of reasons, the wedding day was not one of them.

We could have had an admin costs only ceremony, or spent double what we did and had a dove release. Fact is, marriage ended because he was a prostitute using scumshit.

We had around 100 guests so I this may seem a big wedding but this was with us having culled around 80 people from our first draft! Cost around £20k but we didn't get into debt for it.
I don't feel any more pressure to stay married because I had a big wedding. Married for 2.5 years (together 9) and very happy indeed.

Some people seem very proud of spending a small amount and get a bit sniffy about others who choose to spend, what they deem to be, too much. Each to their own. aside from the fact that what is 'a big wedding' is all relative based on what a couple can afford and how big their families and friends group are, it's also a case of people having different tastes, styles and priorities.

I really don't think the type of wedding you choose to have will have any bearing on future happiness.

Mine had a big, fat bride.

Spent about 30k on our wedding but we only had 80 guests so wouldn't call it big. It was perfect (IMO!) It was the weekend before Christmas, in a gorgeous country manor with log fires and a giant Christmas tree in the lobby. Dress code was black tie, a string quartet played Christmas songs during the day and we had and amazing band in the evening. Food was delish, drinks poured very freely and after the last song of the night, our guests went outside and lit sparklers as we left. Wouldn't change a moment.

We did but only because I wanted to please my parents. It was what they wanted really. We had a lovely day but if I was doing it again I'd do it in a very small way. I' ve always told DD to have the wedding SHE wants and if that means just the two of them that's great.

Still together 27 years on.

I had a 3k wedding. Which lasted for just under 3 years.

I had a big, fat, Greek wedding organised and paid for by mu DM who went bonkers over it all. DP and I just turned up for the day and put our foot down over the more OTT stuff. We've been together 13 years, married for 9; the wedding doesn't feature in any way in our relationship.

We had quite a big fat wedding. Our parents paid for it though and said it was up to us how much of the money we spent on it and it was ours to do as we wish with. We spent it all on creating the perfect wedding despite being in the process of setting up home and expecting a baby. I didn't even want a fancy wedding but felt that we should do something that they would be pleased with as they were paying. Such a stupid thing to do as we struggled financially so much in the following year. Marriage now just 3 years in and is so-so, not sure how we will pan out to be honest.

No...but it was great in its own way.
We got married in the registry office in Victoria Street in Edinburgh, followed by pizza and champagne in a wee Italian on the Grassmarket.
We had a reception in a pub function room on the Royal Mile and moved the party to our own flat and into the next morning. We had a great laugh.

Mine was tiny. Just me and DH and a couple of strangers as witnesses. In an hotel garden in the Caribbean. Steel drum playing "isnt she lovely" by Stevie Wonder as I walked down the aisle/garden path - DH's surprise choice . That was in 2006, and the last overtly romantic thing he did. But I'm still very happy. With him and the way we did it. I'm just too mean to pay tens of thousands for a party. No one who mattered seemed bothered about this.

We spent pretty much bang on a grand. And that was for everything, from paying the registrar, down to the make up I bought to wear on the day.

I had a very small, inexpensive, non-fancy wedding(nearly 20 years ago). My friend got married the same month for at least 4 times the cost of mine. Her dress was 6 times the cost of mine. We are both still happily married and if I had to put money on it I would say she will be married for another 20 years. Me, well I hope for the same - time will tell!

No, just the two of us and our best friends, registry office and then lunch in a Michelin starred restaurant. Hired cars with drivers for the day and then to Rome/Italian mountains for ten days.

The day/cars/lunch cost about £1k for four of us - it was lovely and really nice to spend our money on people that really mattered to us.

It's looking like our wedding will cost around 12k, which is for 80 people in central London. Considering all the cost cutting we've done, I still find it strange that it costs so much. Then again, in reality, the food (we didn't even go for a fancy caterer!!) and the corkage charges are basically half of that number.

Costs of wedding depends so much on things like where you live and how big your families are. Granted, you could just elope, but if you want to share it with friends and families, then that often does have a dramatic effect on cost.

I don't agree that people spend more on their wedding to make up for a lack of genuine commitment or whatever. And I think people only really regret their weddings if they get pressured into having things they don't want or vice versa.

Like a pp, didn't have a big wedding (90 people) but it cost a lot - about £45k. Paid for ourselves, didnt go into debt for it, could easily afford it. Spent that much mostly because half of our guests travelled a long way so we put on a lot of events around the wedding itself - we basically hosted a whole long weekend. We remember it as a fabulous week filled with our nearest and dearest - certainly not a millstone around our necks. Wouldn't change a thing.