Repost...wedding on a budget...please help!

codemonkey

Why don't you pop over to the weddings board OP? Everyone over there is really friendly and there are loads of great ideas for keeping costs down.

teabag29

I got married In the east midlands (Nottingham) on a 4 k budget and I can deffo recommend the following:

Jo’s celebration cakes- this lady is a miracle worker, her cakes are marvellous and a very good price. You can have any flavour, style size. I got a 3 tier chocolate cake decorated in choclate icing and white chocolate hearts (icing). On top was 2 white chocolate icing roses. This cost just £100 and she delivers too. She also does catering so I used her for the buffet which was for 60-70 people and cost £150. There was every food imaginable there, certainly a good selection and loads left over at the end of the night. I cant find her site but her number is 0115 8414118 (she will be able to tell you the site and you can see pictures and prices).

For the photo’s we used Richard stevens based in Mansfield but travels all over. We had the standard wedding package which came with 5 albums of large pictures and a beautiful large white wedding album and a cd with 500 pictures on it (£370). His site is http://www.myweddingmoments.co.uk/main.htm

For the flowers we used http://www.sarahsflowers.co.uk/. These are artificial flowers but look very real (made from silk). We also got the buttonholes and bridesmaids hairbands from here to, they have a beautiful selection. Unfortunately my daughter who was 6mths old at the time got her hands on my flowers and 1 looked a little out of place after she’d finished lol.

A great site that has a wedding forum is bounty. The girls on there will give you all the money saving tips and often sell wedding items too. http://my.bounty.com/forums/subject/266/1/1/Weddings.htm.

Finally as a previous poster mentioned ebay is fantastic. I got my cake toppers, invites, decorations, tiara, bridesmaids and wedding dress from there (all brand new) J

LolitaLove

teabag29 wrote: »

I got married In the east midlands (Nottingham) on a 4 k budget and I can deffo recommend the following:

Jo’s celebration cakes- this lady is a miracle worker, her cakes are marvellous and a very good price. You can have any flavour, style size. I got a 3 tier chocolate cake decorated in choclate icing and white chocolate hearts (icing). On top was 2 white chocolate icing roses. This cost just £100 and she delivers too. She also does catering so I used her for the buffet which was for 60-70 people and cost £150. There was every food imaginable there, certainly a good selection and loads left over at the end of the night. I cant find her site but her number is 0115 8414118 (she will be able to tell you the site and you can see pictures and prices).

For the photo’s we used Richard stevens based in Mansfield but travels all over. We had the standard wedding package which came with 5 albums of large pictures and a beautiful large white wedding album and a cd with 500 pictures on it (£370). His site is

For the flowers we usedThese are artificial flowers but look very real (made from silk). We also got the buttonholes and bridesmaids hairbands from here to, they have a beautiful selection. Unfortunately my daughter who was 6mths old at the time got her hands on my flowers and 1 looked a little out of place after she’d finished lol.

A great site that has a wedding forum is bounty. The girls on there will give you all the money saving tips and often sell wedding items too.

Finally as a previous poster mentioned ebay is fantastic. I got my cake toppers, invites, decorations, tiara, bridesmaids and wedding dress from there (all brand new) J

Thanks so much for that info, will def have a look at Jo's celebration cakes....sounds great and £150 for a buffet is a fantastic price!

Thanks SO much too to everyone that has answered...your replies have all been great and given me loads of ideas, all brilliant! The post regarding the Guildhall in Leicester was particularly interesting and I've been and had a look at that over the weekend, looks promising! I'm much more confident that it's achievable now, so much so I'm looking at cutting the original budget to try and squeeze in a surprise honeymoon! Sorry I haven't posted back in a while (been busy) but thankyou again to everyone I really appreciate it:)

chatnoir

I agree that with that budget it is totally do-able. But also have you thought of appealing to the charitable nature of some wedding companies? If you explain your friends condition then they may be willing to offer some help, you read about companies doing it all the time obvioulsy for the good press it brings them, but it would also benefit your friend greatly.

All the best in your planning

mintedby30?

Hi there,

I got married in Feb of this year. Although we didn't have a set budget it ended up costing probably around £6000.

We rented a huge house in Perthshire for a week for £2000. The house could have accommodated 20 but there were only 17 of us. It could have sat up to 35 if we had chosen to have more at our meal.

We hired a local chef- recommended by the house owners- he did an amazing 5 course meal for us at what worked out to be £40ish/ head- the same as what some run of the mill hotels charge for bog standard meal- we had venison as our main with chicken for those who wouldn't eat venison- again the benefits of hiring someone directly- you are not charged through the nose for offering alternative courses. We also had a choice of starter.
Canapes were included- they were gorgeous! Chef brought his wife who did the table and 2 waitresses who served canapes, the champagne we supplied and our meal.

Flowers- walked into local florist 3 days before wedding in February- hardly height of spring summer blossoms- and paid £70 in total for a beautiful bouquet for me-a huge spray of white tulips and huge thistles- a smaller one of the same for our daughter who was my flower girl and about 10 handmade corsages- some roses, some gerberas in colours to match each lady's outfit. The florist made them with magnets so they wouldn't put a hole into clothing/ handbags. I made the boys thistle buttonholes with silk thistles and ribbon to match my hubby's kilt tartan- cost £3 each


Photography- again local to where we were staying, highly renowned photographer charged us £350 for a couple of hours of photography, the supply of photos on disc and the licence to print them ourselves.

Cake was a gift from my sis and bro in law, made by bro in law, designed by sis and decorated by bro in law- it was amazing, and much more personal than a bought cake.

Registry services- £200 all in for registrar for 4pm on a Friday and the licence for the venue which we had to pay ourselves

Hair and make up both by local ladies about £400 in total to have 9 ladies hair done (inc me as bride) and 5 ladies make up.

My dress was monsoon- "lorton" style- £225, dd's dress £70 debenhams, hubby had his own kilt outfit.


We bought all our champagne/ fizzy wine and normal wine and beer over xmas./ new year and ended up spending £700ish which is a lot but bought our booze for the whole week inc 3 magnums of vintage 2000 rose moet for the day, 12 lanson rose, about 20 bottles of marques montrisol rose (we like our rose!!!!) as well as some naked wine, tesco wine and beers/ ciders etc, we're still drinking the leftover red!!!

Rings- bought 2 platinum rings from bands of love- can't post link but they are amazing, £1000 all in but I figured it's the only part of the day you'll wear forever! They have some just as beautiful gold/ white gold much cheaper and most importantly for much cheaper than you would pay like for like on the high street.

I did all the stationery myself for around £100 for all the bits on ebay/ hobbycraft. Also bought ebay pashminas in purple and silver and co-ordinating organza from amazon to make chair covers/ bows. Also bought 100 tealight holders and tealights- 25p/ asda holders and ikea tealights and asda purple hurricaine lamps with silver sand and cream candles- £5 each set. We also bout a huge string of fairy lights for £10 from ebay for round the doorway of the room we were getting married in.

Hope this helps- I know you're not looking in Scotland so I won't give details of the services we used but I think my main point is look for local guys who don't necessarily specialise in weddings- this seems to give hotels etc licence to chage a 50% premium!