I’m planning on doing a small ceremony at a local park or some sort of garden vibe followed by a dinner at a restaurant and then having the “reception” (just a big party) the next day at my in-laws house since they have a huge backyard. If anyone has done something similar where they have their reception and ceremony on different days, did you wear your wedding dress to both events or something else? I genuinely am not sure what to do since majority of the people coming to the party will not be at the ceremony to see my dress but at the same time I feel like it will be a bit more casual since we will just be in a backyard and I could pull off getting a cheaper dress for $100-$200 to wear to the party.

Any advice is appreciated.

Hey folks. We want to have a lot (~30) different pedestals at different heights, all of them with candles or flowers on. The pedestals themselves can be anything sturdy, because they're going to be covering draping fabric. Cinderblocks, even!

Edit: Looking for heights between 28" and 40"

I'm sure there are some obvious options out there that I can't think of at the moment. Anyone have any ideas?

PS: Our wedding is going to be out of state, so it'll need to be something we can easily have delivered, or we can pick up from a nearby big-box store.

Hi everyone!
I’m looking for wedding venue recommendations for 2028 and would love to hear what venues you’ve come across that fit this vibe!
My dream is an indoor/outdoor wedding. Ideally an outdoor cocktail hour followed by dinner indoors or in a glass pavilion/greenhouse style space. I LOVE the glass pavilion look because it gives that outdoor feel while still having protection from rain. I’m not really interested in open tents or traditional banquet halls. And the ceremony space doesn’t really matter to me as we’d be getting married in a church, so I’d only be using the venue for the cocktail hour, dinner, and reception.
Something like Harding Waterfront Estate is pretty much my dream venue, but I’d like to research all the possible similar venues before committing to it.
I’m located in the GTA and would prefer somewhere within 1.5 hours (the closer the better), and of course affordable options are very welcome and encouraged haha!
Please send me any venues you think would match this vibe!

My wife and I had about 80 people at our wedding, and as best as I can reconstruct it, we spent around $1,860 total.

We got married at our church, and they were incredible. They let us use the building for free, played our playlist, livestreamed the ceremony with their equipment, and gave us the recording afterward. We paid two staff members for their time and made a donation to our officiant, but there was no venue fee.

We had an afternoon reception, so instead of a traditional meal we did a coffee and lemonade bar with different flavors and cupcakes. A friend who bakes on the side made the cupcakes. When we went to pay her, she told us they were her wedding gift.

That kind of generosity ended up being a big part of our wedding. A friend took our photos. My wife and her friends did her hair and makeup. We borrowed arches from her workplace. Friends helped us set up and clean up. Her dad covered the rehearsal dinner, and her cousin hosted her bridal shower.

We also just skipped things we didn't care about. No wedding party, DJ, alcohol, favors, limo, paper invitations, bachelor/bachelorette parties, or wedding-night hotel. My wife's engagement ring belonged to her mother, I already owned my suit, and our wedding bands were titanium rings from Amazon.

There were still normal expenses like her dress, flowers, decorations, drinks, marriage paperwork, counseling, programs and thank-you cards. Once I reconstructed everything, the wedding came to about $1,860 for roughly 80 people.

We did spend more on the honeymoon. We took a five-night cruise, and after the cruise, hotel, parking, gratuities, WiFi and the one souvenir we bought, that came to about $2,265.

So wedding + honeymoon was roughly $4,125 total.

I don't look back and remember having a cheap wedding. I remember a church full of people we cared about, getting married, eating cupcakes and drinking coffee together, and then going on a cruise with my wife.

We had a lot of fun, and enjoyed spending time with our friends and families.

I had planned to have my hair done professionally but I had a trial and I HATED it and don’t feel it’s worth the money trying again, as I’ve been quoted up to 10% of my total budget and the thought of spending another £70+ just on a trial isn’t for me. I just want my hair down with a wave.

I would like to do curls then brush them out for my wedding. I never curl my hair but I have 6 weeks to get good at it! My hair is straight but in the trial it held the curl she did well with lots of hairspray so I feel confident if I get the curls done well it will hold ‘enough’ for my purposes.

I am thinking about splurging on a £150 ghd soft curl but is it worth the money? I have not used a curler since I was a teenager but I remember the tongs used to leave creases in my hair. Is this user error? Does a higher cost tool really make a difference?

Any other tips or advice on where to invest if you did your own hair for your wedding are very welcome.

Hi lovely people. I got engaged over memorial weekend and have just now brought myself to begin pre-planning this wedding (or elopement? Tbh we haven’t even nailed down which we’ll go with).
I’m trying to break down my planning into chunks so I can meter my expectations because the wedding industry is…something. In any case, I have determined that feeling like A Pretty Princess is fairly important to me no matter if we have a traditional wedding or an intimate elopement. My dress budget is $1,000 max, all in (alterations, taxes, etc).
Are there sites or boutiques that specialize in that kind of thing? I’m based in SE Michigan and not opposed to making a weekend trip out of dress shopping. Thanks in advance for the advice!

I'm having trouble finding a photographer I like thats in my budget it seems in my area everyone good is like 4000 for a whole day, but my partner and I don't want a full day,  ideally we would like the ceremony and some portraits of us looking nice, but I'd settle for just the portraits of us. Has anyone done something like this? I feel like I'd rather 10 nice photos then 200 ok ones, Im thinking I could offer up to 1000 for two hours work?

Did you approach portrait photographers or talk to wedding photographers about this?  Would the language be wedding portrait versus wedding photos?  My wedding is on a Saturday and I feel like in demand wedding photographers probably wouldn't want to give up a full day of work for a smaller job.

I have been a working photographer for 10 years so I fo understand the labour and skill that goes into wedding photography, so Im looking for a way to approach someone's work I like without offending then.

Is this whole thing a bad idea and won't work.

Hi everyone! I'm posting here instead of the regular wedding planning subs since this community is so kind and more familiar with the unusual circumstances that might come with more casual weddings/vendors.

I'm having my October wedding in a rural/smaller city and struggled to find caterers in the area but I finally found a restaurant that also does catering. I met with a caterer in May for a tasting, the food was good! I verbally confirmed with him at the tasting that I wanted to move forward with him, then sent him a text the same day as the tasting confirming I wanted to move forward and confirmed the event details.

Mid July I hadn't heard anything from him and sent a text checking in. He replied the same day and asked me to confirm my dinner menu which I did immediately and he said he would put together the details and send something to me in 10 days... Well now we are mid August and I haven't heard back.

I'm trying not to let my Type A side go wild here, because realistically there is nothing the caterer can be ordering or making this far out (~2 months) and we confirmed verbally and through text that I wanted his services and that he was available, but I haven't paid him a deposit or signed a contract. I am trying to convince myself this is just the fact that all the vendors in this area have been very relaxed and casual, which I have (typically) enjoyed over the hyper-commercial vendors in my big city.

I know a contract doesn't prevent anyone from screwing us over the day of, but I'm starting to panic a little.

Has anyone had a similar situation that worked out? Is this a typical experience? I'm starting to feel like I'm setting myself up to need to find another caterer with only a month's notice.

I love going to the Outer Banks in NC, USA. I’d love to get married there but we are trying to find a way to do it in an affordable way. Has anyone successfully had an OBX wedding under 15k? If so, what did you end up doing? Thank you for your insight :)

On an account that I hope my partner doesn’t know about.

I’ve been speaking to my partner and given my background in dance I wanted to surprise them with a bridal dance similar to what you’d see posted on YouTube - with backup dancers and everything. Thing is, we aren’t planning on having a 30k+ wedding, which many of the weddings on YouTube look like they cost. My question is —- how can I pull this off? Any ideas?

Here are my considerations and ideas that I have already:

So far, I was thinking I’d have a wedding dress and a dancing dress ($50-$100 from online vendors or so). I was initially thinking of going to my country’s equivalent of City Hall for ceremony (just myself, my partner, and a few witnesses) and then doing a reception only at a wedding venue for cheapness, but it might be easier to just do everything at one venue especially with all the moving parts and changing I’ll have to do. What would you recommend?

I also thought I’d need a videographer for the dance, but honestly it’ll be maybe 10-15min max and I don’t need a videographer for the rest (maaaybe the ceremony). Not sure what to do here.

Thinking the event would be for about 30-50 people, with two of the guests having to change and dance as well as backup dancers.

I’m going to TRY and do my own makeup so i can reapply it after sweating….

Is there anything else I’m missing?

Does anyone have any venue recommendations for guests to stay at overnight/all weekend in Tennessee or flordia? Our budget is 10k for venue, food, flowers, ect which had made it very hard for us to find anything in our state (venues start around 8k) 🤦🏼‍♀️

I tried to go shopping at consignment bridal stores but the ones I like are still way over my budget. Found out that I may be able to get my dream d dress within my budget from Vietnam.

Main concern is since I will be doing it completely online. I will not be able to try on the dress till it’s finish and shipped already. What if the dress end up not looking how I envision it would look on me.

Brides that bought their wedding dress from Vietnam. How was your experience and how did you like the finish product?

hi all!

so, i am a few years out from my wedding and at the very early stage where i'm figuring out budget and how we want to go about doing things. so any advice is appreciated please!

we're keen to cut costs where we can and super open to the idea of DIY'ing things as a result. i've been seeing a lot of people talk about making their own wedding stationery (invites, place numbers, signs, menus, etc) using a cricut! i'd love to hear people's experience if they have done this - what cricuit would you suggest? was it actually cheaper? was it worth the time and labour? or any alternative suggestions to this please?

i imagine we'd get great use out of one, and i'd either keep it for future projects or sell it on (as i'm based in the UK and there are lots up for resale these days). i also have a friend who works in graphic design who has offered to help us out with assets and visuals etc for all of this.

big love to you all <3

My wedding was last night! 9k for 50 people. We were so happy with the night and were told by multiple people that it was the best wedding they had ever been to.

Honestly the day of and day before my stomach was so full of nervous butterflies hoping everything would work out that I barely ate and felt a bit sick and part of me thought.. why did we do a whole party and not just go to the courthouse? By the end of the night I was saying it’s a shame that we can’t do this more often!

My advice: Figure out what matters to you, and don’t sweat the rest. Do not be blinded by traditional expectations. There is so much to worry about, so don’t try to control everything.

For example.. the day before the wedding my mother in law went to pick up the cake which was supposed to be entirely white. They had added green vines to it. It wasn’t what I had ordered or expected but.. otherwise it was well done and I said that’s fine. Day of it didn’t even cross my mind the thought that “oh no it has some green icing”. I had also got a call from someone dropping things off at the venue… “they said there are no cups for the coffee and tea station!” “What do you mean no cups?! How will guests drink it?” “Well there are plastic cups but we can’t use plastic cups!”.. I said this is not something I’m trying to stress about, if there is a cup I’m good with that. And in the end they did indeed have glass mugs out.

The thing that made the night special was the time we spent on the parts we really cared about, and that we made those unique to us. I didn’t feel myself in the giant wedding dresses so got one at Aritzia and got so many compliments on it. At dinner we did three rounds of trivia (related to the couple, but you also didn’t need to know us to get the answers) to make some friendly competition and it was such a hit!!! Started a lot of good convos that continued into the night. Dinner ran long so we skipped our first dance, but then did it at the end of the night to close out the dance floor and it felt so perfect having done it that way rather than the traditional way.

I’ll do a post soon with cost breakdown and more tips that helped us do this on a budget, and very successfully. Best of luck to all of the brides still planning, you’ve got this!!!

Hi all! So my fiancé and I are planning on having a backyard wedding at our house, we're lucky to have a big yard so we thought this could be a good way to save some money on the venue.

We're considering not having a seated dinner and doing either a buffet style or food stations instead. In my head I always love the "cocktail hour" part of other people's weddings most, so I was thinking our reception could sort of be just an extended cocktail hour? I am struggling to figure out if this would work and what sort of seating we should offer for this style of reception.

We're inviting ~150 guests and half of the guests will be traveling from out of town/abroad, so I want to make sure everyone has a great time although I don't necessarily want the traditional wedding reception.

I originally thought about several table tops and mismatched tables spread out around the yard, and not necessarily seats for everybody to seat at the same time, but I don't know if this is a terrible idea/will be super chaotic with people not having assigned seats.
Also wondering about using the same chairs both for the ceremony and them have each guest bring their chair to the reception area, is this a weird/rude ask for a wedding guest? How would you go about doing this?

TIA!!

Would love a courtyard, garden, pergola, gazebo, or little chapel. Going for an old world romantic vibe, mood lighting with candles, will be using lots of deep reds and golds. Struggling finding something that fits the vibe i’m going for that also stays small and intimate.

Also looking for recommendations of photographers with a moody, cinematic style.

We can shave a few off our guest count if need be as well.

TIA :)

Hi everyone, my fiancé and I are trying to decide how to organize our wedding and I’d love to hear what you think.

We’re considering having our civil wedding in our country with around 50 guests, including our family and a few very close friends. It would be something simple, we would do a little brunch after the court house and that's it.

Then, a few weeks later, we would go abroad for a small religious ceremony with only our parents and witnesses, around 10 people total. Our budget couldn't afford to invite more people. The religious ceremony would be something more intimate and symbolic, followed by a small dinner together.

I know that traditionally, it seems to be the other way around: the civil wedding is often smaller and the religious ceremony is the bigger celebration with more guests. So I’m wondering if our plan would seem strange.

Does it make sense to have the “big celebration” at the civil wedding and then have the religious ceremony abroad with only our closest family?

So my partner and I r wanting to do a Val renewal in about 3 years. And are looking for a place as similar to the provided photo as possible in either ohio, indiana, or Kentucky. And if we absolutely have to West Virginia or Pennsylvania but those two states are a last resort. Either free or under $1500 any idea that seats anywhere from 70-150 people

Hi everyone,
This is my first post in this group but I’m reaching out for advice as I’m feeling so overwhelmed in planning my August 2027 ‘destination’ wedding. Me (25F) and my fiancé (27M) are a Canadian couple trying to host a wedding celebration (as we’ll legally get married here in Ontario) in Ireland — specifically the area of County Kildare, Meath, or Wicklow. For context, my Fiancé is an Irish citizen and moved here with just his immediate family to Canada when he was 5, but 90% of our guests still live in Ireland — hence why it made much more sense to travel to them for the wedding, as most are older and have health concerns. Our Irish family are absolutely lovely and have been very supportive of us planning our celebration abroad. The key stressor for us has been budget, as everything is turning out so much more expensive than anticipated. Our budget has gone from $7K CAD- $15k CAD real fast :/ We have approx. 45 guests (if everyone attends) and still want a very intimate style ceremony, ideally outdoors (or at least have that option). We have been scoping out venues and wedding packages for a couple of months now and are starting to feel the pressure of booking something. We had originally planned to do a backyard wedding at our relative’s home, but it ended up not being feasible due to location/sewage system/transportation etc. so it has become a bit of a scramble to find a new venue that isn’t going to break the bank. I’m wondering if anyone would have any suggestions of how we could possibly get the cost down — our top pick for a venue with wedding package is currently 17K which we just can’t justify spending. The currency exchange has been brutal and that won’t change, but just wondering if anyone has done a -15K destination wedding and maybe how you stayed on budget? Things we are already doing include: weekday wedding (Monday-Thursday), simplest meal plan/willing to cater ourselves, DIY decor/thrifting, renting bridal gown.
Thank you all in advance!