Am I mad/unrealistic? (wedding budgets)

[kaykayred]

Just looking for a quick reality check really.

Basically I am having a bit of a mind melting moment about the cost of our wedding. We can afford it without struggling (for which I am very lucky), but I just can't get my head round it.

My fiancé has a big family, and it was important to him that they came (obviously!). So we do have between 70-80 people attending, which is quite a lot. Likewise, due to our families being spread throughout the EU, we decided to go for a London venue to make things much easier for our guests re: travelling and hotels, as everyone could get direct, budget flights.

I had secretly hoped that the wedding would cost around 10k, but had budgeted for 12k. Having just done a full run down of costs, the maximum we are looking at is 13k. To me this seems utterly insane, although that could get cut quite drastically depending on how much wine is left over, as corkage rates are pretty high. In fact, half of what we are spending is going on food and drink. Is that normal?????

Before anyone mentions the wedding industry machine, I have DIY'ed pretty much everything you can think of. Decoration (still more expensive than I had anticipated), Stationary, Table plans...everything! We're marrying off season. We got a big discount on the venue (which isn't like..the gherkin or anything insane). A school friend is doing the cake at cost. Our (very good) photographer a steal at less than 1k. Amazing colleague getting us the flowers at cost, and we aren't having a huge amount. I regret not getting a high street dress, but my dress is still less than 1500 including all alterations. I'm wearing shoes and jewellery I already own. Doing my own hair and make up. I'm pretty sure that we have cut every corner possible to cut given our circumstances.

Am I just being totally unrealistic to think it would have cost less? I do want to have a lovely wedding, and I don't regret we've gone down the traditional route..but I guess my tightwad side is just hyperventilating a little?

One thing about canapés - depending on the time of day of your wedding your guest might be starving! And sometimes the time between the ceremony ending and the meal can be a long time. I do think you need to feed people. But don't over feed them that they are so full they can't dance later on!

Although a wedding is about the bride and groom it is also about family and friends that have spent hundreds/thousands to be there and if you CAN afford it you should look after them.

MGFM - I'm so glad that you had such a wonderful wedding! I don't even know what an ice cream bike is, but I'll definitely be googling it later ;)

We decided against a hotel as in london they just all seemed so very expensive. Especially for things like the wine, where there was no option to choose your own, and their mark ups were insane. We got ours from a French supermarket (after trying a few out) and got a friend to drive them back to the UK when they went home for christmas.

I have however been to some stunning weddings in hotels, and it's super convenient to be able to just walk upstairs to go to bed afterwards!!

Sounds to me like you have been reasonable, thought about your guests and you and your fiancés priorities. It has come out a little more than expected but you can afford it. So enjoy. You only do it once.

If it helps we had a family friendly, relaxed wedding that cost closer to £25k doing a lot of DIY ourselves, Mum making cake etc.

But then we really, really splurged on the food (million course sit down then a hog roast in the evening) We had 80 during the day and another 40 came for the party in the evening.

You're welcome re makeup tip. Everything really - stronger eye line, fill in brows if not naturally dark, strong lip... Accentuate all your features.

Congratulations kaykayred!

I second PPs regarding not scrimping on the photographer. I had a professional who shot my day "documentary style" so I have a wonderful wedding album full of both natural and posed shots which tell the story of my day as clearly as if it had been filmed.

One of DH's friends is a keen amateur who chose to take lots of shots on a decent camera, although they look good compared with others' pictures from the day they pale in comparison to the professional photos. Of course I hugely enjoyed and appreciated seeing everyone's pictures from the day but having the proper shots for our album was definitely the right decision.

Just stumbled across this thread. It's our 10th anniversary this year and we spent c£9k on our wedding. This afternoon I spent a few hours going through photo albums with my children, the one they are most intrigued by is our wedding album. Then I sneaked upstairs with DD and let her see my dress (a rare treat). These are the things which make our wedding real to them. They cost £2k of out budget and every penny was worth it.

Chunderella how would you know?

Marythat is lovely. That is exactly what I want in the future; to be able to show my children (currently 8 months pregnant) our wedding album and get my wedding dress every now and then....:)

Don't know what your problem is, but get over it, I'm not interested.

It is the case that if you go into a bridal dress shop the naice dresses will start at 1500 and the naice dresses with straps or sleeves will start at 2000. That is not the same as only being able to get a nice, well made dress with a good fabric and design and alterations for over 1500.

If you go outside of the bridal bubble it is perfectly achievable to get one for less.Mine will be. But it isn't a wedding dress so to speak. It is a good, well made dress in white! Admittedly with alterations it will be 300-400 quid.

But proper wedding dresses - well-designed, well-made, beautiful fabric, altered to fit - start at £1500. I think the OP has done really well to get one for that price. It's absolutely true that you can buy them for less but they're not that nice tbh

Twinkelstein and Chunderella - I think you are both talking about completely different things.

Of course it's possible to buy a very nice, beautiful, dress for a bride, from lots of different places, which cost way less than 1.5k. Like I mentioned up thread Adrianna Papel has some stunning evening dresses which wouldn't look at all out of place for a wedding dress. I don't think anyone is questioning that.

I think Twinkelstein's point is that if you want an actual bridal gown, made by people who specialise in bridal wear, this is different. It's closer to couture than anything you can buy in shops, due to the materials and methods used (hand applique for example), and just over 1k is probably the cheapest you will get, unless you go for a tea length gown. The dresses are also more expensive because they are made to order, as opposed to made in advance and then put out for sale. And of course there are things like the fact the seams are left open to allow for easier alterations whilst buying a dress from even an extremely expensive dress shop doesn't have that.

Most bridal dresses pretty much have to be more expensive, simply because they have trains which obviously increases the amount of fabric required quite significently, whereas it's rare to find trains on non boutique dresses. Even the wedding dress section in places like phase 8 (which have some lovely things) are pretty much train free.

Anyway I think the point Twinklestein was making is that it's very dodgy to buy a bridal boutique gown from somewhere like...china. Where you have absolutely no idea what sort of horror you will receive, the quality of the fabric will be nothing like what you would have got from the actual designer, and frankly, many of the knock offs are awful, and have to be taken to a seamstress to salvage.

Anyway, back to the £1k behind the bar.
Sometimes this just results in loads of abandoned half full glasses of alcohol left everywhere and some guests necking drinks back as as fast as possible.

As well as the free wine can you just supply a selection of paid for soft drinks and not waste £1k at the bar?

I think what twinklestein said is absolutely true. I think she's just hit a nerve with people who feel their wedding dresses have been insulted . Just because you choose a less expensive dress doesn't mean you didn't look beautiful so stop having such a chip on your shoulders.

?? i tried on some lovely dresses in a bridal boutique (not in London) last year. The most expensive ones were around £800.

We spent £5k for around 30 ppl. Outside wedding, near water, lovely photos and as it down meal for all.

So double the numbers and £10k reasonable tbh. If you can afford it then do it. If Otho can't or will regret it it, then don't.

Hope you have a lovely day.

kaykayred Precisely.

paxtecum - that's a point. I might ask the bar to say that guests need to bring back their glasses when they want a re fill, or to swap drinks. They could always say it's because they don't have an endless glass supply? That would definitely cut down on the half empty drinks. In fact, that is a totally EXCELLENT point and I will definitely raise with the co-ordinator!

We don't have any crazy teenagers at the wedding, and the people who do drink quite a lot will be on their best behaviour (at least until the end of the evening) as they have never met a lot of the family there, and won't want to make a bad impression.

greatauntdinah - I applaud you. The only dresses I found at that price range were tea length, and my ugly ankles wouldn't agree with them. I didn't get my dress from London, but from a big town in the South of England. We went to maybe....four or five different places and it was still the cheapest dress I found!

If you can afford it, I don't really see what the issue is. Just enjoy it and have a nice day.