Inspired by wedding dress thread/how much for a wedding

[jel0511]

I'll admit it, I wore a Vera Wang when I got married and yes I did spend a LOT Of money on it!! Do I regret NO!!! I bought what I wanted and yes, I could afford it!! DH and I also did have a wedding, not a lot of people only 100, and yes it did cost us a lot of money. WE got married 8 years ago, and I believe our reception with EVERYTHING(band, flowers, Godiva Chocolate favors, photographer) ran upwards of $30k. Do I regret spending that money? NO!! We had it to spend, and we wanted to spend it for that type of wedding. We paid for the entire thing ourselves, so we did what WE wanted to and could afford. We both were working GREAT jobs in NYC making a lot of $$$ and this wasn't a big deal for us. We also bought an apartment in NYC right before we got married, so it's not like we rented for a while to save for a downpayment. This is what we wanted to do, so if people want to spend the money, let them, it's their business!!!

 

[Steve H.]

All told, ours probably was in the $25-$30K range -- MIL and DW kind of went overboard, but everyone seemed to have a wonderful time (including the two of us ). DW's parents paid for most of it, along with my parents helping out. DW and I paid for a couple things that we really wanted to pay for ourselves, like the photographer and the band.

 

[RUDisney]

Ours cost more than we had bargained for because my DH's aunt cancelled our reception that was to be held in her restaurant because of a fight that happened at her daughter's wedding. This was 3 months before our wedding. The only place that was available was my DH's uncle's country club. Much nicer than aunt's restaurant, but much pricier, too. It was an absolute fairy tale wedding. Our favorite pictures from the day are of us in our wedding attire on the 18th putting green. All said and done, we spent about $15,000. We figured it would be around $10,000-$12,000. We paid for everything ourselves and bought a house right after we got married.

My DH wanted glitz and glamour for our wedding. Having been there, done that, he now sees that we could have done something smaller and less expensive, but I think that he, like many others, got caught up in the romanticism of the wedding day and he wanted to do the same thing that everyone else does.

Because of our location, my DB and DSIL decided to have their wedding and reception at the Willows in Wayne, PA because of the location.... another estate building for the reception and my DSis and DBIL decided to have their reception at the Scranton Cultural Center, a beautiful gothic-architecture building. Their venues and ours lended themselves to wonderful photographs. Both couples said that they wanted a location that was as dramatic as ours.

In the end, being married to my DH and having the photographs and videos to remember the day were the most important things to us.

 

[Hnymoon@Dixie]

My Wedding was in Oct. 1998. I have my wedding planning book, so I'll pull it out..........

We had it on a Friday evening instead of a sat. It saved us $15.00 a head@ the sheraton in NJ.

We had 279 guests @ $110.00 a head= 30,690.00 (Wedding cake included.)

Flowers, all roses for the church & bouquets as well as cascading down the cake & flower girl baskets....$7,800

Dress-I had connections I was a clothing buyer in NY & got a vera wang "sample" for free!

Invitations.....I got them for 350.00 because I know the owner.

DJ-$ 500.00, a friend of the family owns the co.

Bridesmaids & grooms gifts-$500.

Photographer-$2600

Video-ographer?? I found them to be overpriced & not professional. Instead of doing without, I bought 2 video cameras @ $250.00 each @ QVC, gave one to each of my 2 friends that weren't in the wedding & said...If you both video my wedding ceremony & reception, almost nonstop, I'll give you the camcorders. They did & I got 2 different views of my wedding & a lot of great tape! This worked out grate for all & I saved about $1500!

In general, you can spend a little or a lot. It all depends on your means (or your parents means.)

 

[caitycaity]

ours was november 2001. we ended up having at at wdw b/c that was actually SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than anything we could do in dc (and it obviously wouldn't be as nice! LOL). we also had relatives/friends coming in from 13 states and 2 countries, so there was no "central location." we figured as long as people have to travel, let's do it some place fun! people are still talking about how great it was!

oops, seem to have gotten sidetracked there. i love talking about our wedding.

anyways, our total cost (including the honeymoon!) was about $18,000. we ended up paying about $10-11,000 of that to disney. the rest was the dress, transportation down there, incidentals, the invitations and programs, and the honeymoon (2 1/2 weeks at disney). when you marry at disney, they also comp your first night (wedding night) in any disney hotel of your choice. we somehow got a complimentary upgrade to the vp suite at the beach club. it was great!

what we did (that worked really well) was both my family and dh's family gave us what they thought they could afford and let us spend it however we wanted. they told us we could use it for house, a car, paying off our debt, the wedding, whatever. we ended up splitting it fairly close to 4 ways (me and dh, my parents, fil and step mil, and mil).

i went to a very large catholic irish-italian wedding last summer (actually i was in the bridal party) and it was crazy. they spent close to $50,000 and honestly, it was nice, but for that amount of money it could have been nicer. i loved our wedding coordinator at disney. he helped us make everything awesome with the budget we were on and fixed the few minor problems without us even knowing about them til after.

 

[Ziggie]

With my DD's wedding just a few weeks away, I love reading all this wedding talk Our plans are all in the final stages and everyone is getting very, very excited!

I agree with the poster who mentioned that she wanted her DD to be finished with college before planning a wedding. My daughter knew from little on that I wanted her to finish her Master's Degree before we talked seriously about marriage. She was a wee-bit of an over-achiever, and completed both her under-grad and Master's Degree in under 4 years. Guess where we celebrated?

Anything look familiar?

(that's the Christmas tree from the Beach Club)

While her wedding is very expensive, we really wouldn't change anything about it. Except maybe the date!

It's HOT down here in the summer!

 

[becka]

Our wedding back in May 1997 probably cost around $3,000 total. We did most of the work ourselves. My parents paid around $1,000, DH's parents paid around $1,000 and DH and I paid about another $1,000. I really can't imagine spending anymore than that.

We got married at the chapel on our college campus. For $200 or $250 that gave us the church, the reception hall downstairs, the minister and an organist. They also provided a few large plants, etc.

My dress was about $200 from a resale place. I rented a veil for about $40. We rented the bridesmaid's dresses for about $50/piece. They did buy their own shoes from Payless dyed to match the color of the dress. We all did our own hair and makeup.


Tuxes were rented from a place in the mall for about $250.

The cake was about $100 from a local grocery stores bakery.

MIL did all of the flower arrangements. We bought a book and I told her what I would like and she practiced until it looked really nice. She probably spend around $300 or so to make the bouquets and boutonierres. I helped her make the centerpieces for the reception tables.

I bought all of the raw material to make my own birdseed packets. I remember sitting in my dorm room floor making them while trying to study for finals!

Invitations, napkins, goblets, plates, cake topper, unity candle etc. we purchased for pretty cheap. I spent a few evenings watching DH in the chemistry lab working on his research project while I hand addressed all of the invitations.

The rehersal dinner was paid for by DH's parents. We ended up getting a few deli trays, sodas from a local grocery store. After rehersal we all went down to the reception hall and had a rehersal dinner/decorating party. Everyone ate and visited while we all decorated for the reception.

My Mom made the punch and we just had a cake and punch afternoon reception immediately after the ceremony.

A friend brought in a stereo so we had some background music for the reception but no dancing.

Photography was the most expensive item at $500. DH's uncle did the video as a wedding gift.

DH and I really didn't have money for a honeymoon but we did stay in a hotel in Branson for 2 nights. We just drove our own car instead of renting a limo.

Compared to most other people's weddings ours must seem pretty sad but we had a great time and I don't think I really missed out by not having a designer dress and a big fancy reception with dancing, dinner and a bar.

 

[tiggerlover]

I want to say that my wedding, almost 17 years ago, cost in the neighborhood of $10,000 (I believe it was just under). We had 150 people at a reception hall, one hour open bar, hordeorves, sit down meal, music, flowers, limo's, photographer etc. My parents paid for the whole thing, with the exception of my dress, headpiece and shoes, I paid for all of those and it was around $500.

 

[Ziggie]

My DD isn't wearing a designer gown... the bulk of our expenses are tied up with the venue itself. In many cases, we are required to use vendors that the hotel has pre-approved. But, as I said, we wouldn't change a thing.

 

[katerkat]

We spent about $28K on ours. And I don't regret a single penny! There was no way to make it smaller -- with 16 cousins on my mother's side, and his divorced parents, we had over 150 guests invited who were JUST family! So we had to find a reception site that could hold at least 200 people. We ended up with about 175 attendees.

Dad insisted on a sit-down dinner -- he hates buffets. Since he was paying... Sit-downs cost more. And he wanted an open bar. Which costs quite a bit. I think it was $60 a plate (a lot for south Virginia!) and $15 a person for the alcohol. Plus the hall rental, decorations and whatnot.

My dress ensemble was $800, and my parents paid half of the dress costs for my bridesmaids. Also, they paid for my sisters' bridesmaid dresses and added that to the total.

Photography is VERY expensive. I think our package was around $2500.

Hmm, what else....? I have great memories from that day, and people are still telling me -- a year later -- that it was their favorite wedding so far.

 

[Denine]

We paid for our own wedding. Including the honeymoon, it cost about 10K 11-1/2 years ago.

 

[d.kurz]

I never totalled mine, but a good friend works at a local contry club and he was telling me about a recent wedding there that cost $56,000!!! Top shelf all the way....Father of the bride was handing out $25.00 cigars like they were cheapies.

 

[Ziggie]

katerkat, how long ago was your wedding? It sounds fabulous! DD's will cost us between $35,000 - $40,000.00. You are so right about photography costing quite a bit ~ it sure does! DD is not having as many people as you, but the sit-down dinner is running about $230/pp.

 

[Ziggie]

Originally posted by d.kurz
I never totalled mine, but a good friend works at a local contry club and he was telling me about a recent wedding there that cost $56,000!!! Top shelf all the way....Father of the bride was handing out $25.00 cigars like they were cheapies.

Yes! I've seen this! We went and *visited* a wedding in March that cost a little over $133,000!! It was insane. But to multi-millionaires, $133,000 must've seemed like a bargain

 

[katerkat]

Ziggy -- June 8, 2002. Just celebrated our one year anniversary on Sunday!

 

[Ziggie]

Originally posted by katerkat
Ziggy -- June 8, 2002. Just celebrated our one year anniversary on Sunday!

Woohoo! Congrats katerkat!

 

[RUDisney]

Congratulations, Kate! And MANY MORE!!!

 

[mtemm]

What happens when the grooms family has many many more people who they need to invite then the bride's family?

That was similar to my situation. My family is scattered around the country, my dh's all lived where we lived, so there were many more people from his side who were able to make the wedding. If its really obvious, you can advise the ushers to seat people from the groom's side on the bride's side as well...won't look like one side is fuller than the other. Plus they'll have a better seat!

 

[Ziggie]

Originally posted by mtemm
you can advise the ushers to seat people from the groom's side on the bride's side as well...won't look like one side is fuller than the other. Plus they'll have a better seat!

This is what we'll be doing as most of FH's family is out-of-state.

 

[kdibattista]

DH and I paid about $13K... that included: catering hall, dinner, DJ, open bar, cake & other desserts

My parents paid for my dress, limos & the church (totaled ~$2K)

I forgot a few things - photography & invitations were courtesy of friends of ours (it was our wedding gifts... it's great to have such good friends!!!)

P.S. We had 300 people and our wedding was 3 years ago.