Cheap wedding?

[rolzii]

Hi all,

I have been engaged for the past year and a half and haven't booked a date for the wedding yet.

I am 27 and me and my partner have our own house, but I would love to get a wedding booked.

The only problem is, weddings are extremely expensive and tbh I just can't justify it. I've looked at a few venues and we're talking around £16,000 for the venue alone without the dress, suits, etc.

I can't think of anything worse than spending £20,000 odd on a wedding when that money could have gone on so many better things.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to have low budget weddings? Ideas on something different? I really want to get married but not for the prices that I have been quoted!!

Church weddings are cheap (fixed fee regardless of where you live). Sometimes cheaper than the registry office - it depends on the area, day if the week, capacity. So a church wedding is around £600. In Bristol it's just shy of £1200 at the registry office (150 seats on a Saturday) and similar for Marylebone town hall (100 people on Saturday PM). So don't rule out a church, you don't have to be a Christian (I used to work for a church)

Afterwards you can go to a community or village hall. I've been to a couple like this with a bring and share reception.

Honestly if it were me I'd you could try and find a hall in a lovely location and then use the local church.

You can have my wedding dress if you want it too.

We did registry office in the late afternoon, followed by a buffet and a party at a nice pub. Meant we didn't need to do the sit down dinner and the costs associated with that (and the registry office was so pretty, plus they already have flowers!) but still did speeches etc. after everyone had eaten and the buffet cleared. Cost about £10k total but that included a few hotel rooms for family.

Our budget is £800!

Registry office wedding, home grown flowers, simple white dress from
Vinted, fizz at our local pub then a massive knees up at our house with a buffet spread and using the bath to keep drinks cold.

Your big cost is likely to be food and drink - so knowing numbers is the starting point.

I went to a lovely wedding in a library with an Indian buffet laid on. Lots of council run places are licensed for weddings so you can have your ceremony there. If you have the ceremony later in the day, say 5pm and a generous buffet you only need to feed your guests once.

Any local arts centres, museums, libraries, cricket pavilions etc that could fit the bill?

You can buy a fab dress second hand. Look on Vinted and eBay or some charity shops have a bridal sale. It’s more sustainable too.

Transport - a black cab is a good option. Lots of drivers are willing to put a suit on and a ribbon on the front for a few extra quid.

Cake - M&S naked cake, can customise it yourself.

Keep your bridesmaid numbers low or don’t have any at all.

Hair and makeup - either do your own or do you have a talented friend or family member that could do it as a gift?

DH can have a new suit - all men need a decent suit in their wardrobe so it’s worth having.

we wanted a marriage not a wedding.. me, him, 2 witnesses and my 2 kids... job done!

Find a nice local restaurant that has a private room you can hire. An accommodating restaurant will be pleased to have guaranteed tables filled. Not all places charge a fortune just because it's a wedding.

We had ours in the restaurant where we had our first date, they charged us £400 for the hire plus everybody's food and drink costs. There were only 11 of us, close family and a few close friends so total cost was about £1000.

The actual wedding was in a registry office, but they did a great job and it felt very special. I also bought a new dress and shoes I really liked and DH got a new outfit.

But even altogether with the rings, our new clothes, the meal, the registry office and a couple of nights in a hotel, we only spent about £2500. It was an amazing day.

Currently in the midst of wedding planning, and trying to do it as near as 5k as possible.

Searched for a registry office near us that was as photogenic as possible. We will be wearing wedding dress/ bridesmaid dresses/ suits, wedding at 2pm. Pictures in the grounds area/ local area. 40 people ish. Paying for photographer.

Went for a local 'naice' pub with a function room. We're going there for 3pm ish, drinks in the function room bar area, mingling

Food will be in a separate room in the pub, that's been used for lots of weddings, so big tables/ white clothes and chairs/ decorated as you wish. Food is nice, and can either be pub grub or traditional wedding food, about £25 a head for 2 courses. Time for speeches if you want them.

Afterwards back into the bar room, where we are allowed a band or DJ. We probably aren't bothering with cake. 100 guests invited for the evening, buffet served later at £15 a head.

The main budget for us is going on food, and a toast/ wine for the table mainly. Priority for us is a party and photographs with friends & family, so we're paying for a photographer all day, for a band and leaving out favours and cake to save cash.

I hate it when people say we wanted a marriage, not a wedding. Whether you're spending £200 or £40,000, 2 people or 200 people, you're married at the end. It doesn't make you more worthy if you decide to keep it small and cheap, or destined to fail if you have everyone you know there and spend a relative fortune.

@anon2022anon I never said I wanted a marriage not a wedding, I definitely want a wedding😂 I just can't afford to spend thousands on it.

@rolzii I didn't mean you ☺️
It's the competitive small wedding syndrome on Mumsnet.

Have you had a thought about 1. A budget, and 2. what your main want is for the wedding? Start with those and see where you can get them to collide.

If your budget is £xk, and getting awesome photos in a spectacular looking place is your priority, then maybe look at where your ideal would be, and how can you make it work- can you have a micro wedding there for 20 people? Can you get married on a Tuesday in January?

If your budget is smaller, but you have a massive family and you want a party, can you look at hiring a village hall and have a hog roast?

If you want a bigger wedding, can you look at getting legally married at the registry office just you two, then get a celebrant in a twilight ceremony, so you can just feed guests once instead of twice?

@anon2022anon aww sorry, I misunderstood your first comment that's my mistake!

Thank you for the suggestions😊 my most recent consideration is to get married in a church/registry office and then just have the evening side of things.

The place close to where I live which I love (who originally quoted me 16k) do a twilight package that starts at 5pm, so if we have a slightly later wedding I was thinking we could go straight there for 5pm and only have to feed everyone once!

From my own experience attending weddings there is often a bit of a lull between lunch and the evening side of things, so doing this will also avoid that. The wedding planner is going to call me on Monday to discuss prices 😊

Get married at the local registry office or if your church/religious building and have a buffet meal at a pub or other similar type venue. That's what weddings were like when I was younger.
They were big , informal happy events with little stress or expensive celebrating two families coming together.
Or if you prefer instead of a buffet meal just go for a nice meal with close family and have an informal party afterwards for friends.
Weddings don't have to cost a fortune if all you want is to get married

🤞🤞
Make sure you join their Facebook/ Instagram groups, and just generally search wedding stuff- sometimes they put different offers on their pages, and more than once I've had targeted adverts just when browsing general wedding stuff, with offers that are better than I've seen on their pages- screenshot and send a message.

It's also worth joing your local weddings in xx groups, I've seen loads of photographers offers in there, again not advertised on their pages.

@Notreat the OP has said in her posts that's not the type of wedding she's after, and is looking for ideas to get a more typical wedding (of the current time) for a lower price.

A friend of mine had a very small legal wedding in the registry office, and then hired a private room in a very posh hotel for food for 16 of us- very tasty!
Then on the night she had a hotel reception, feeding 100 with DJ.
Cost of that was about 10k total.

We got married mid-afternoon in a National Trust ‘castle’ having 20 guests with wedding cake, champagne, tea and coffee after the ceremony and a photographer booked to be there for ceremony and after it ie no getting ready shots or first look shots (not my thing). Then everyone had a couple of hours to do their own thing and we all went (plus another 10) to our local favourite restaurant at night. I am older so went for more of a MOB dress albeit floor length beaded and chiffon and pink! The only thing I would change is I wouldn’t spend the money I spent on bouquets for me and my MOH - absolutely gorgeous but would rather have spent that money on something else.

Thank you everyone for the suggestions, I really do appreciate them all.

But like a PP has mentioned, I want an actual wedding! Unfortunately a registry office followed by a pub is not going to cut it for me!

I would like an actual wedding but don't want to pay the extortionate price. My best friend got married last year and ended up paying 30k - I can't justify that. My parents have kindly offered to contribute as they are quite well off, but I wouldn't accept an offer like that because I simply can't justify spending thousands on one day.

This has been a real eye opener to me on how expensive weddings can be, I can't believe the price of some things. The search continues!

Very silly to not get married because you can't have the fancy day.

If you want it you have to pay. If you want to be married then get married.

Unless you want to beg on line then you're going to have to pay for what you want.

I'm selling my wedding dress. That would save you 😃

@BirthdayRainbow I wouldn't buy a wedding dress from someone with an attitude like you, it probably wouldn't be to my taste😌

I am by no means begging. I am asking for suggestions on how to have a nice wedding for an affordable price, and if you bothered to RTFT you would see that many people have done this and have shared some very helpful comments and tips.

Thanks again to everyone for the helpful comments, although I haven't replied to everyone I have read every comment and have taken suggestions on board.

Registry office followed by wedding styled afternoon js sounding appealing 🥰

Agree.
Makes me role my eyes when people say it on thread after thread.

We got married between Christmas and New Year on a Friday meant we got a great deal on a country house hotel which was handily decorated for Christmas , kept things modest no bands or extended open bar and spent around £5k

I wasn't offering to sell it to you. I was selling it but I'd have given it to you. Having said that, I was in a grouch earlier so I will apologise.

@BirthdayRainbow I apologise for my arsey comment yesterday, I was being out of order. I'm sure the dress is beautiful. In all seriousness I am not a materialistic person so am definitely open to shopping around for second hand dresses or cheaper alternatives 😊

@CoastalCalm I went to a wedding a few years back which was between Christmas and new years and it was beautiful! Something special about getting married at that time of year. I am in South Wales so the weather isn't the best, but then having a wedding in the summer wouldn't make a difference it'd probably still rain 🤣 I'm open to any time of year, out of season probably as there's hell of a difference in price by doing that