It’s me, guys! I hope you’re having a wonderful week, staying hydrated, and loving your current serum. In the corner of my apartment, it’s a gorgeous day.
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As some of you may know, I recently arranged the cheapest wedding ever, and because I care about you, I’m going to tell you all about it.
We had hoped to plan a wedding on a budget of roughly US$8,000, but unexpected circumstances drove the final cost of our wedding in 2022 to around $11,500.
We seriously considered conducting the wedding in a village hall and buying $500 worth of Domino’s pizza during the early planning phases in order to keep the ceremony budget-friendly.
However, when we considered renting an empty village hall or barn, we discovered we’d also need to rent tables and chairs, crockery and cutlery, and perhaps a sound system.
We started looking into local registrar offices in the Cheshire region, where we were living at the time, and discovered that locations that specialized for weddings with a ceremony often cost between US$7,500 and $9,000.
It felt like a terrible waste of money because these were venues that weren’t really our style.
We chose to be a little more inventive instead. We discovered a registrar office near Manchester that could accommodate 80 people and only charged $650 for the process.
It’s a strange location for a registrar office, but it’s a stunning structure. Then we came across a pub nearby that had a barn on the premises. The barn may be rented for events, and we paid US$900 for a party of 50 people.
Of course, limiting the number of guests is one of the most effective methods to save wedding costs, and we set a limit of 50 for both the ceremony and reception, but I’d also recommend looking for venues that don’t generally cater to weddings, like we did.
We were fortunate in that everyone we wanted to invite from both families fit into our 50-person guest list, but we only had a few spaces remaining for friends, so we could only invite our bridesmaids and groomsmen.
That was a significant sacrifice, but at the moment, it seemed like the best option. Our other pals, I believe, were sympathetic.
Tables and seats, dishes and silverware, and serving staff were all included in the barn rental costs. On the day of our wedding, we had the space from 10 a.m. till midnight.
As a result, we were able to arrive on January 6th, the morning before the event, to decorate the room.
The barn had gorgeous wooden beams and dried flower arrangements in the rafters, which likely saved us thousands of dollars in flower prices!
There were also wooden flooring and tables, and the location, thankfully, permitted the use of candles. We purchased hundreds of white candles from Ikea and Amazon and arranged them across the space.
However, wedding flowers were out of our price range. We were quoted roughly $3,500 for just the bouquets for my five bridesmaids. Instead of ordering flowers from a florist, we went straight to a flower wholesaler.
The only drawback was that we could only place an order five or six days before the wedding, and our selection was limited by what was available, but the wholesalers were fantastic.
We had a large selection of flowers to choose from, and they were very educated about how to put together a bouquet. We really wanted eucalyptus since it’s a terrific filler and it’s cheap, so we included it in all of our bouquets and only spent about $450 on flowers in the end.
On each of the five tables in the barn, there were five bridesmaid bouquets, my bouquet, and two vases of flowers. Huge white hydrangeas were used in our table decorations; they create a statement and appear expensive, but they’re actually very inexpensive. Then, for roughly $5 or $6 each, we bought vases from Ikea.
We printed one for the middle of each table and exhibited it in clear glass holders instead of having one for each participant. I also placed an order for white linen napkins with crochet details around the edges. They appeared to be pricier than paper napkins!
Instead of having individual wedding favors for each person, a friend of ours produced a large batch of delicious brownies, which we presented in a silver dish for each guest to enjoy themselves.
Because we didn’t want a highly formal wedding, we decided to eliminate starters from the menu. We spent US$2,500 on each guest’s main course and dessert, as well as a welcome drink and bottles of prosecco on each table. Each guest may have two or three drinks for us, according to the plan.
We decided not to serve any further alcohol because having an open bar can generate complications. Fortunately, because the wedding was modest, we were able to inform guests ahead of time; everyone arrived prepared, and the situation was not a problem.
We also saved money by using a Spotify playlist rather than hiring a DJ or band. We chose one playlist for lunch and another for dancing afterwards because the barn had a great sound system. During our ceremony, a friend of ours generously played the harp for us at no cost.
Memories? Yes, I’d like to keep my wedding memories. So do all of the guests I’ve invited, who are filming every second of it on their phones like Scorcese, despite the bride’s explicit request in the invitation text message that everyone just lives in the moment.
Professional photographers and videographers are extremely expensive. However, every single person I’ve invited to the wedding has a fully charged phone, and I’ve heard my cousin is a master of angles and light. I’ve set up a group photo album, and I won’t let anyone leave until they’ve confirmed that they’ve uploaded their photos.
When deciding how much to spend on a hundred wedding invitations, there are numerous aspects to consider. Wedding invitations cost about $700 on average, but they can cost up to a thousand dollars or more depending on the materials, designs, embellishments, and delivery expenses.
Allow me to reveal the secret! To keep wedding costs down, I used these Free Greenery Gold Leaf Wedding Invitations from Drevio to send out digital invitations to my friends and family. Isn’t it adorable?
