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Original poster

Wedding question- please help!

7 replies

Kiko39 · 10/04/2019 12:12

My fiancé and I are looking to get married on August 31st this year. We would be getting married at a venue that's out of town, but this means paying 400 for a registrar and 100 for our district to recognise the marriage.
However, if we have the ceremony at the local district, we dont have to pay those fees.

My question is, could we go to the local district and sign the register, then have someone do the readings at the venue too? I hope I'm making sense!

OP posts:

CMOTDibbler · 10/04/2019 12:14

So you mean have a legal marriage at the registrars, and then have a ceremony at your venue? Why not, its what people who have humanist weddings do. The humanist wedding I've been to was fantastic and the ceremony at the venue was no less meaningful at all

Aussiebean · 10/04/2019 12:19

My friend did this. Went to a registry office in jeans and two witnesses.

That weekend did the full ceremony.

Actually, two friends have done this

WhoKnewBeefStew · 10/04/2019 12:29

Yes you can. We went to one exactly the same last year. They did the legal bit at the registrars and held a ceremony where a friend did some readings etc at a lovely venue.

Svolvaer · 10/04/2019 13:34

Went to a wedding like this at the weekend "mock" wedding with readings, songs etc and reception/party at a venue for friends and wider family on the Saturday and then the legal bit at the registrar's in the Monday with just parents and siblings.

MiaMoo007 · 10/04/2019 14:17

This sort of thing happens all the time, particularly when people want to get married at a venue which isn't licensed or get married abroad.

Butterflyone1 · 10/04/2019 14:49

One thing to consider though what would you treat as your anniversary? The date you legally got married or your ceremony date? Sounds good to save £600 though.

mindutopia · 10/04/2019 16:42

You can have two separate ceremonies. One, the official legal one where you sign the register, and then one of your choosing at your venue. The registrar will only do the legal one, but you can do whatever you want for the other.

We had a humanist wedding (not legally recognised), but we had the registrars come the morning of wedding to do the legal bit and sign register. We did that just with immediate family before we all went to get dressed for the wedding. I just didn’t want to do the register bit as part of our actual wedding (so we paid all the extra fees for the to come out to us), but obviously you can do it whenever and wherever you wish.

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