Weddings...

[dizzyblonde]

Originally Posted by missyorkie_chris

Heard of a couple who got married last year for the grand total of £400! Bought everything off ebay lol. With the right friends and family I should imagine you can get it done very cheaply

Thats pretty good!! However YC would still think that were far too much money

the average wedding in scotland now coast 17.5K - as a girlie i would rather have that as a deposit.
BUT i do have my wedding planned in my head (sorry IP) To me it the quirky things that make the day
I've seen the dress i would love but at 4.5k I won't be getting it unless i win the lottery.
whenever you are shopping about try not to mention the word wedding that puts extra on straight away
Try and use friends and family if you can - that can be their gift to you. If people are wanting to buy gifts - put a list together of what you would need - my friends have have money put on gift cards to pay for suit hire/flowers/ marquee hire and holidays as they had already lived together for 5 years and didn't need anything. They did ask for nothing to be bought but people fely uncomfortable with it.
Set your budget and stick to it and don't be afraid to haggle and look around and play venues off each other.
best way is for both of you to write down what your ideal day would be then sit down together and see what you have in common. take that and then roughly price it and from that you can then work it down into your budget.

or run away and get married then have a huge party afterwards.

Think I'd be any good as a wedding planner??

Weddings these days seem to be an industry designed to extract as much cash as possible from the couple. I really can't see the point of spending a huge amount. When we got handfasted we didn't spend a great deal, even though we had a meal for 70 friends (and minimal immediate family). Mrs Wyrdness's dress was made to measure by a dressmaker in Canada. We were going to Canada anyway for a holiday, so we emailed her rough measurements and then visited the dressmaker for the final fitting. Even just flying to Canada and having the dress made to measure would work out a lot cheaper than the £5K that some companies are asking for ready made dresses.

Matt, if you want I have the excel document at home on what we budgeted and what we actually spent!

As drew said, we had the big white wedding (ok my dress wasn't white) and it came in at 6.5k.......

one thing I would say which is what I pulled drew up on... is be tough on the guest list..... we had 80 people in total and that was with people cancelleing, however drew would sit at home and say can we add so and so and so and so..... we also went with a later sit down meal and a small token evening buffet to keep that cost down.

Some venues say you need to have an evening buffet or pay a room hire charge (go with whatever is the cheapest) just pre-warn guests if there is no evening buffet.

O and as a must.... have the day you two want! Not the one your parents want! Don't let anybody change your minds.... it is your two's day!!!!!

Edit it on the dress thing: My dress was £850.... veil £200 and head dress £150. My head dress i have worn to some other weddings we have been to..... don't buy the veil from the dress shop.... find out the one that is wanted and find it online!

we got married in a Hotel in the lake district with family and friends i had 7 bridesmaids and a page boy a hot buffet, dj, photographer the whole thing came to 5K first time round my wedding was a church jobbie with a 3 course meal then buffet at night that cost about 15K

it can be as cheap or as expensive as you make it, shop around for bargains, i still have my spreadsheet if you want it

13k... and still paying it off and we didnt pay for all of it !

oh and personally id do it all again and spend more, the best day of my life without a doubt.

So long as you don't have one of those wedding planners that ensist on crystal chandeliers and gold threaded table covers. Or do they only exist in the movies

We hardly spent anything as we didn't have anything to spend...10 years later and we are renewing our vowels in Antigua, just us and that is costing much more than the first time and I have to wear a linen suit!

Everyone had a great time at ours, conversly a couple we know just spent £30k+ and there was a massive punch-up and the bride spent the evening in the toilet crying!

This wedding cost about 5-6k, all in, rings, dress, honeymoon (same time as the wedding), the lot.

The wedding was during a 5 star all inclusive holiday at an Iberostar in the Dominican Republic with first class flights, paid £2400 for both of us (my mother was a travel agent, recently retired). The wedding package was all provided and arranged by the hotel and cost £600. Our DVD and photo package cost £300, which at that rate for a few hours work makes the photographer one of the richest guys in town.

Wedding day guests come for a one or two week holiday which they pay for.

We had a wedding reception in a hotel when we got back for extended family and friends which cost about £2k.

We had a beautiful, fantastic wedding which I'll never forget, and IMO I have been to weddings in the UK that were just as good, but they cost £20k.

Sandrine's dress was a end of season designer bargain, bought in the winter for £600 which the same summer would have cost £2.5k, my wife chose the one she wanted from a full page advert in one of the wedding magazines, then went on the hunt for it.

It's only stupid expensive if you do it in rip off Britain (where you can pay £6k for the bloody photographs!) and don't shop around and use your head.

Rings commissioned to order in the Birmingham jewellery quarter where you basically pay a price per gram for the materials used, plus a fee for having them made, basically almost done at cost for the same as what the high street jewellers pay, then charge you 400% margin. From memory Sandrine's ring cost 600 quid and is insured for 2.5k.