With wedding season well and truly in swing a few of my friends have remarked they’re attending more christenings and naming ceremonies this year than W days. However James and I are actually having our busiest wedding year yet.
With a whopping 42% of marriages ending in divorce (yes seriously) it makes sense this year we’ll be donning the frocks and suits for several friends and family’s second nuptials.
Personally I have nothing but joy for the couples who’ve invited us to share in their new big day. For whatever reasons their first marriages didn’t work out and all parties are now happy with new partners. However a remark from a friend about a second wedding she’s recently received a ‘save the date’ for reminded me marrying again can be a tricky affair.
Said friend who shall remain nameless is about to attend the second wedding of a close friend whom she was bridesmaid for first time round. Anyone who’s had the honour of being part of a wedding party knows what an expensive business is can be. My friend Stew calculated the average cost of him and his wife attending a big day; travel, hotel, new attire, gifts and the associated hen and stag dos, would set them back around a grand, and a lot more if you’re a best man or bridesmaid.
And there is where the issue lies, said friend forked out a lot to be a BM many moons ago and now she’s been asked to do it all over again albeit for a smaller affair. However even with less guests there’s still a hen party to organise, hair and make-up to pay for and all the extras that mount up when you take up the accolade of being best girl. If you were in her Jimmy Choos would you decline?
I don’t want to go in to great detail about this particular instance, it’s not for me to pass judgement on the newly engaged couples plans. I definitely don’t intend to marry more than once so it’s not something I’ve ever really considered but nameless friend’s quandary did make me think if you do it all again, how big do you really go? What is the etiquette when you’ve been married before?
James and I paid for 80% of our wedding from our own pockets but would I expect the parents to offer to cover the dress and photographer again? I would like to think not. Would I expect guests to cough up for gifts? Well I didn’t really expect it first time around so no, but now the shoe is on the other foot and I’m one of those guests, I can’t imagine turning up to celebrate empty handed.
So ladies what’s your experience on this? Are you a guest at a second wedding and getting a sense of deja vu? Were you slightly perturbed with putting your hand in your pocket again? Anyone remarrying or remarried who has an experience they’d like to share on how they approached the second I dos?
I think everyone should celebrate a second marriage as they wish to – being lucky enough to have a second chance at love is an amazing thing after what can be a very difficult journey for those involved. A friend of mine has just got engaged for her second marriage and I couldn’t be happier for her. She was incredibly let down by her first husband and now she has the perfect guy for her I would be so sad if she felt she had to downscale her plans because it is second time around for her.
I do think that the costs should lie with the couple though and it is not fair to expect bridesmaids etc to pay for the couple’s requirements. I don’t mean to sound harsh but isn’t that what a budget is for?
Not harsh at all Claire! x
Personally, I think the traditions governing weddings are still languishing in the dark ages! We live in a modern society and I really don’t get these rules that dictate a bridesmaid or groom should organise hen/stag dos and be financially responsible either for certain elements. If a bride wants bridesmaids (again an outdated tradition in my book), then that’s lovely but to expect said bridesmaids to then organise hair, make-up, hen dos etc. astounds me. I think it’s down to the bride & groom to at least be part responsible and definitely financially responsible for those elements. As you say, attending a wedding as a guest can be expensive enough. But then I didn’t have a hen do and my husband organised his own stag do and we paid for everything at our wedding, so I’m perhaps not the best person to comment! I just think we live in a modern age and it’s time wedding traditions were brought up to date. I think if your friend is a close enough friend to the bride to be asked again to be bridesmaid, then you should be able to speak candidly to the bride and explain her dilemma concerning costs and if the bride doesn’t understand then yes, maybe said friend should decline.
Sorry, typo! I meant your friend, Lauren, not you, should be able to speak candidly to the bride…….
It’s really interesting what you say about how outdated traditions are. Like Lisa says maybe we should do a post about them all x
I agree with you Kate about costs. My hubby and I organised our own hen and stags dos – he went to a beer festival and I went to see a band. We covered all of our best man and bridesmaid’s costs – after all it was our wedding and I would not even entertain the thought of them paying for themselves! My best friend is male so I had a male of honour on my big day. It was great to break with tradition and involve him in this way.
Claire B yours and your husband’s hen and stag dos sound epic! x
I also wouldn’t expect bridesmaids/best man/men to fork out and organise part of the wedding. For me, they are just guests – albeit honoured ones (but then we don’t have the tradition of bridesmaids and I still find it rather odd to have a group of friends who are certainly not ‘maids’ in the traditional sense wear the same dress and walk down the aisle ahead of me….).
Personally, I think you should celebrate your second (or third) wedding exactly the way you want to – if you want to elope and have a party afterwards, great. If you’d rather have a whole big event in a castle with everyone near and dear, that’s also great! Weddings are very expensive, even as a guest but I think it’s a great honour to attend someone’s special day – and it’s not any less special just before they’ve been married before. After all, you wouldn’t decline a birthday invite just because it happens every year!
I’m a little bit on the fence with this one as I am not yet married, have only been bridesmaid once when I was little, and haven’t yet been invited to a second marriage.
However I agree with you ladies and I don’t think that bridesmaids should be forking out…well not too much anyway. Maybe just paying for a little gift for the bride on the hen do, or a contribution towards the bride’s bit of the hen do.
I reckon more posts about breaking with wedding traditions might be in order x
This is interesting. It’s about having the wedding you can afford. It’s not fair to plan a big party that you can’t pay for and then expect guests to subsidise the cost. This should be the case whether it’s you first or fourth wedding. If you’re being asked to contribute (whether that’s towards an outfit, hen/stag, gifts etc) then do so as long as you can afford it. In the months leading up to my own wedding, I read so many articles that metioned getting guests to pay for things as a way to save money. It’s utterly bonkers. I declined going to a friends wedding in America because at the time I couldn’t afford the flights and accomodation. I sent her a gift and she sent a thank you card with some photos of the day. We are still very good friends. At the end of the day, a wedding is a special day but it is just one day. No need to break the bank or friendship over it 🙂
Couldn’t agree more Annie. I am also really surprised that so many articles suggest getting guests to pay for parts of weddings…that just seems a bit rude!
Something similar happened to me when I was travelling in Australia. One of my friends was getting married and offered to pay for my flight back home so I could attend her wedding, bless her. (Most generous friend ever?!) I was tempted but I thought there was no way I could take her up on the offer when she had so much else to pay for.
I didn’t ask my bridesmaids to pay for their clothes/my hen etc for EITHER of the times I got married! It was a different set for each but the budget paid for dresses etc. Yes they paid for their accommodation at the actual wedding but so did everyone else. I really don’t like this american tradition of the best peeps shelling out hundreds of £££ to be in a wedding.
The second time I got married, we specifically said no presents because we already had everything, some brought gifts anyway, some didn’t, I didn’t care either way!
My second wedding wasn’t massively long after my first (long story!!) so I was quite conscious of a) making it different! and b) paying for it ourselves. Having said that, there’s nothing quite like having being married before to make wedding planning (and marriage) a million times easier!!
Ha ha. Here’s to second weddings Clairek! x
Clairek, I can imagine. I said to my husband just before our wedding that the second time around would be much easier! Fortunately he shares my sense of humour… 🙂
Oh it’s such a minefield isn’t it!
We’re currently having a ‘quieter’ year with only three weddings to attend including my sister’s earlier this year and then one next month and another in September. Despite being a bridesmaid seven times I’ve not once been asked to fork out to pay for hair and makeup and I’d expect to pay for my attendance on a hen do regardless if I was best girl or just a close friend who wasn’t a bridesmaid per se.
As Claire and Maike have both said I don’t think we can penalise those marrying for a second time because it didn’t work out for them initially and on a personal level it’s important for me to show those I care about just how much they mean to me by celebrating with them.
Yes weddings are expensive – there’s no getting away from this fact. However playing Devil’s Advocate here….is it necessary for guests to always wear a new outfit? Why not chip in with others to buy a bigger present but spread the cost…Weddings don’t always have to break the bank…
SEVEN times Lolly?!
Re guests wearing the same outfit for different weddings…I’m sure pre-facebook this used to be completely acceptable!
hahaha!! Lisa so true, although I actually cannot remember every buying a new outfit for a wedding so I’m doing ok so far!
Last year I wore the same dress to three weddings – mostly because the guest list would not overlap – and I enjoyed wearing my lovely dress so many times. It is a shame it has just been hanging in my wardrobe ever since.
At first I thought you meant wear the same outfit you’d worn to wedding number one! That’s probably not appropriate 😉
I’m thinking I can make three new dresses cover eight weddings this year x
Strangely enough, I read this and then saw another story pop up on Twitter about a bride who asked her bridesmaids to help pay for her own wedding dress…! Couldn’t quite believe my eyes on that one! That on top of the story a few months ago about the couple who asked a guest to re-think their gift of £100 cheque as it wasn’t an adequate reflection of their attendance or some such rubbish!
My friends are still on the first marriages (or yet to be married in the first place), so I can’t speak about any experiences second time around. However, I think I would feel the same as others have said and that couples should feel to celebrate their wedding (first, second or even third and beyond!) in the way that they want.
As for costs, I have to admit that I did ask my bridesmaids to pay for their own dresses, but I did ask them whilst asking them to be bridesmaids and they were free to wear whatever they wanted. They could decide their own budget or even wear something they already had – hand on heart, I wasn’t fussed. However, I would never have asked them to pay for something I wanted them to wear. I did pay for their hair (we all did our own make up by mutual consent) but again, I let them decide what style they wanted.
As for hen parties, I would always expect to pay my own way, whether as a bride or as a bridesmaid/non-bridesmaid guest.
When it comes to gifts, I’m seeing more of tendency towards people asking for nothing or just vouchers for homeware stores and so on. I haven’t attended a wedding in a long time that had an actual gift list and never been asked for a donation to help pay for the wedding itself! I think hen parties, accommodation, outfits (within limits when it comes to bridesmaid dresses) and general gifts are more than enough of an expense.
I know someone in the States who was a member of a sorority and I can’t quite believe the amount of money she’s paid out over the last ten or so years for weddings as part of the bridal party – the dress, the shoes, the hair, the make up, the accommodation, the hen party (where it’s also common to pay for the bride completely and not just a night out, full out three or four days in Vegas or similar!), a bridal shower with gifts, an actual gift for the wedding, a rehearsal dinner outfit – it seems never ending!
Completely forgot about the £100 gift story. Wasn’t that outrageous?!
I’m with you on the couple celebrating their wedding the way they want. After all ‘your big day, your way’ is the whole ethos RMW is built on.
I recently got married and had 3 beautiful bridesmaids at 2 weddings (my other half is Aussie so we did it twice!). It never once occurred to me to ask the girls to pay for their own dresses or shoes. I did give them a budget of GBP150 total for their outfit – if they had wanted to go over that I might have asked them to top up the fund. In the end I think the whole outfit came in under GBP100 each from Debenhams and they looked gorgeous.
My husband paid for half of the boys’ suits as their gift (which was roughly equal to the girls’ dresses) and they paid for the other half. Is it just me, or does it seems much more acceptable to ask groomsmen to pay their own way than bridesmaids – when suits are usually much more expensive? Anyway, I digress..
I paid for the girls’ hair and make up at both weddings. That was a lot more expensive than I had anticipated but I would have felt utterly wrong asking them to pay or having the A List treatment myself and leaving them to do their own. It was so lovely being pampered all together, and they looked beautiful.
In my opinion, anyone on a tight budget should talk to their bridesmaids – do they all have something already that they could wear/mix and match? If not, is there a style they all love that they would be happy to contribute to if it went over your budget? If not, GO CHEAP! When they’re all wearing the same thing and carrying a beautiful bouquet, they always look gorgeous anyway. The British high street is SO fabulous, you can easily get dresses for 50 quid each, and let them wear their own shoes. It’s worth it to spoil the girls who spoil you back. They pay their way many times over in love and support in the run up to the wedding.
Congratulations on your wedding Stacey!
So right about the British High Street there are some stunning dresses out there. My BMs wore high street! x
[…] guessing you may all be attending a few do’s (and not just your own!) but how many of you are attending second weddings? Or is your own wedding your second? If so do head over and share your […]
[…] guessing you may all be attending a few do’s (and not just your own!) but how many of you are attending second weddings? Or is your own wedding your second? If so do head over and share your […]