Wedding abroad

[SphJane]

Hi ladies,

My OH and I have decided to get married abroad in Mexico. We will be paying for our parents and will be having a post wedding party at home when we return for guests who can’t make it.

Would you be miffed if you were invited to a wedding abroad? I know it’s a bit of a touchy subject for some people and we don’t expect many people will be able to attend. We just want a small wedding, with close friends and family in a lovely destination that we’ve been to and adore.

I’ve been to a few destination weddings but in each case, accommodation has been paid for by the couple (two nights in a hotel for two, a full week in self catered for others). In each case, the bride and groom / their families hosted additional dinners / events before and after the wedding- nobody was expected to fly out for one day / one dinner of wedding only. There were plenty of optional activities either referred to and directions supplied, or properly laid on and paid for by the couple with a sign up to join in. All that was incredibly generous but also proper hosting - “inviting” people to spend a week in some cancun all inclusive and cover their own bar tab and boat trip? Not so much.

We got married in the Caribbean, somewhere special to us. We invited some people who we thought may come but probably not. We paid for our family to come. You need to appreciate that even when paying, it’s still annual leave, new clothes, suncream etc etc etc. Some people have no spare funds, particularly at the moment.
If you ask someone, you need to be gracious if someone declines.
6k for you is a holiday, 6k for some is a huge amount of money.

Haven't read all of the replies. I had a destination wedding in Croatia, so no judgement here obviously. However, it was possible to just go for a couple of days as short haul with plenty of flights, and we were in our 20s with no kids in our circle yet so a European break was normal.

10 years later and we now have small kids and I wouldn't be able to go to any wedding abroad, even if I wanted to.

I know this isn't a popular view, but I'm not a fan of the "big party when we get back". IMO the party to celebrate the wedding is the wedding reception, and so if you want to celebrate with a big party you have a big wedding reception in a location that's accessible for your guests. If you want a small intimate wedding, then great, go abroad, but accept you won't be able to celebrate with as many people. I feel like the party afterwards has the feel of "you didn't/couldn't come to the wedding, but come give us a present anyway", even though I know that's not the intention.

I seem to be in the minority here but I wouldn't have a problem with a destination wedding invite in fact I personally much prefer them and they provide a fun weekend /week rather than just one fun night if it were a wedding in London (where I'm from).

That said I think it depends on your friendship group. We are all very pro destination weddings. We got married in Italy ourselves, we've then been to friends weddings in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Dubai, Nigeria, Italy and the furthest was 2019 in Phillipines - all of us are from London and therefore picked those destinations purely because we'd rather get married in warm, beautiful locations.

Given its so common in our group of friends no one feels 'miffed' because they know they're likely to do it themselves when their time comes or they already have e.g me. We had 150 guests at our wedding in Italy...no one had a problem coming or paying to attend. We threw multiple events over the weekend rather than just one and it was essentially a massive friends trip.

In the nicest way possible if you have friends that all love to hang out together and enjoy travelling together I can't see why anyone would be upset by being invited 🤷🏾‍♀️. Everyone has the option not to go. There is zero pressure.

I'd also consider your friends financial positions though. If they are typically in lower earning jobs where a trip to Mexico would be a stretch then fair enough it may not be as well recieved.

In any case I definitely wouldn't NOT have a wedding where you want to have it because you're worried about other people being annoyed. You'll regret not doing it in a place you love on a day about you to please other guests.

Through conversations.
Our friends said ‘cool we’re coming, is that ok’
Family presumed they would be coming.

I would be flattered to be invited but I'm not sure I'd go as it's a 'big holiday' and Mexico isn't on my list of big trips I'd like to make. I've turned down a wedding in Bali too but I have been to multiple ones in Europe.

@Autumnspice

Through conversations. Our friends said ‘cool we’re coming, is that ok’ Family presumed they would be coming.

Bit odd!

No invitation
But just invite yourself to a friend’s big destination wedding
And not just one. Multiple!

I love a destination wedding! I’ve been to weddings in the UK that have been on a Thursday so 2x days off work, £200+ hotel, another £200+ hen do and then add on the gift. All in a generic wedding venue, no guarantee of the weather and crap food. I’d much rather spend the time/money on a long weekend somewhere warm, like Italy or France.

I do think it’s grabby when the bride and groom then proceed to have hen/stags, gift registry then a big post wedding party in the UK. I’d also like to be able to do my own thing and not have the whole time planned out so I probably wouldn’t sign myself up to one if it was a weeks all inclusive in Cancun.

I wouldn’t be miffed but I wouldn’t go unless maybe the bride and groom were paying for everything. I find weddings abroad in most cases quite narcissistic. I don’t want to spend 1000’s of pounds and days precious annual leave on somebody else’s wedding. Even more faff if your guests have children. I think if you choose to have a wedding or hen party abroad, you have to expect a large number of your guests won’t come.

I wouldn’t go to an after party back in the U.K. afterwards either. As other posters have said, it feels like a major gift grab and pointless as the most important part of the wedding day is the wedding/vows bit.

I wouldn’t want or expect anyone to spend thousands of pounds and leave themselves in financial difficulty just to attend a wedding.

The trouble is people will feel obligated to go, and they won't tell you that they can't afford it. They'll either get in debt, or say can't get the time off or some other excuse.

A wedding abroad is fine, but not if you're having others attend.

@thedevilinablackdress

I don’t think a wedding abroad is selfish

Expecting that other people will want or be able to attend shows a lack of consideration. How would you fee is someone felt they had to attend and got themselves into debt to do so? People feel weirdly obliged to attend weddings.

@thedevilinablackdress I said at the bottom of the post that I wouldn’t want or expect anyone to put themselves in financial difficulty or feel pressured to attend, hence the reason we are going to have a celebration when we are home. You have taken my quote out of context, added 2 + 2 and got 5. Same goes for @DropDTuning

I also just want to add, we are not having a stag or hen weekend and we have explicitly requested NO gifts.

How many people are you planning to invite OP? Is it just parents and siblings or friends as well?
How much per person is the trip?

@NeedToGetOuttaHere we are getting married in August of 2022. Our parents, siblings and grandparents are attending along with our niece and nephew. We are happy with that number and in addition to paying for parents, we have told our (OH) siblings that we will help them with costs.

We are staying in a 5 star all inclusive resort, the wedding is on the resort with an open bar etc. We have been to this resort 3X and it’s heaven on earth, you don’t need to spend a penny once there (although we do bring a few hundred dollars for tips). The cost for the trip would be £1000PP (the hotel has kindly put forward a discount for guests which we will be matching should any friends or cousins wish to attend) I appreciate this is a lot of money to attend a wedding, and I also respect that many people won’t want to use annual leave. I don’t mind, I would be happy if it were just my OH and me but our family want to attend and as an only child, I’m happy that they are as they won’t get this experience again. We live in a valley, it’s constantly raining and even a low budget wedding is still going to cost us upwards of £10K due to the limited options we have. I saw some posts here saying that having a wedding abroad is cheaper because it puts more cost onto the guests but in our case that is simply not true. We are not expecting our guests to contribute to our wedding cost, we are paying for the day.

I 've never been invited to a destination wedding but DD is in the throes of that phase of her life. The issues are cost and potentially time off work . It is often the case that several friends get married over the same year or two time frame and this puts pressure on the potential guests . This is before factoring in new clothes, presents etc which lots of guests feel they should provide. I am well aware that it is an invitation and not a summons but if it is a close friend one wants to go and make it all work. I have sympathy for elope and have a party afterwards. I just think it is unreasonable to expect your guests to be significantly out of pocket and holiday time.

Wouldn’t be miffed but wouldn’t go. But I’m older, with kids. Annual leave is strictly for family stuff. I wouldn’t rule out taking the family but I guess it would be prohibitively expensive.
Far more likely to go to a destination wedding in Europe which is weekendable than Mexico which is miles away.

I’d go for £1000 per person. I’d worry a bit about the weather.

We fell out with a direct sibling over our polite decline for their destination wedding. It’s not something we were prepared to spend money on or take leave from work. We would have needed over a week and that would have been tight as 17hrs straight flying if leaving no time for connections so really 2 days there, 2 days back, 1 million wedding activities the bride had crammed in over 3 days. Hardly our idea of a good time. They felt that our decline was reflective of our feelings for them and threw a strop. Things have never been the same. Would do the same thing though if we had the time over.

I wouldn't be miffed, but I wouldn't go. And is it even legal? A lot of these weddings abroad are fake; the couple legally marries before them in the UK.

I'm not a fan of Mexico, tbh. Too far.

£1k per person? Is that literally flight out stay for a day or two and fly back?

If I was going to go all that way for wedding I’d want to drag it out for a fortnight. Ideally turn up for the wedding then go off for some exploring.

I said at the bottom of the post that I wouldn’t want or expect anyone to put themselves in financial difficulty or feel pressured to attend, hence the reason we are going to have a celebration when we are home. You have taken my quote out of context

My point was not that you would or wouldn't expect people to go but that people often feel obliged regardless. Your thread is asking how people feel about overseas weddings. I think if you want to, fantastic but keep it tiny and have a party when you get back. I like that idea, others don't. At the end of the day, only you know the circumstances of your friends and family and whether this is an easy thing for them to do.

@IceCreamAndCandyfloss

No I wouldn’t go, I find them selfish as it puts the costs onto the guests for the couples wants. If it’s important to have family and friends there then the destination should be as central as possible for all limiting the costs for guests.

I wouldn’t attend the party after as the most important part of a wedding is the vows so I don’t see it as a wedding if not part of those. Always feels like a chance to gain more gifts and wear the dress again etc to me.

Same for me too. If having friends and wider family there is important, I've never understood those who go for all these expensive places unless they're from that country or everyone in their circle is rich, no kids, lots of annual leave etc., so wouldn't feel the cost or inconvenience.

Also, sadly, a lot of couples who max out on all these expensive weddings, turn out to be the very ones who end up divorcing down the line. They focus too much on the wedding day and not on the actual important bits which are choosing the right person in the first place, what their vows really mean etc. They find the reality of a lifetime of marriage with all its ups and downs too much to handle after the fairytale wedding illusion.

You know that august is hurricane season in cancun / playa / tulum?

Hope everything goes well OP regardless of whatever you decide!

The argument that the guests can pay a lot to attend a wedding in this country doesn't stack up. You can chose to reduce the costs usually by not staying the night or only staying one night in a B&G or travel lodge. There is no need for other extraneous payments apart from , in most cases a gift of some sort. At most you will lose 1 day of holiday and in an ideal world not that.the actual ceremony is about you and your partner making your vows in front of the people who are most important to you. The rest is about your guests and their comfort.
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