You’re engaged. That’s great! It could be that you are now taking care and consideration as to how and when you organise your big day. Or you might want to hop to it and marry as quickly as possible. Every couple is different and there is no ‘one way’ to plan a wedding. However, here’s what is typically needed, and some time frames you can expect.
How long to sort the legal aspects of a wedding?
To have a civil ceremony you must first give notice of marriage at your local register office. You have to do this at least 28 days before your wedding date. You will need to tell the register office where and when you are getting married so you must have your venue booked before you do this. So, if you have just got engaged and are planning to get married in the next 3 weeks - forget it. And before you head down to the registry office, you’ll need to know your venue. So, logically, that’s the place to begin.
How long is the waiting list for a wedding venue?
Every venue is different. Some very established wedding venues could have waiting lists spanning years. In fact, some highly popular venues might even have couples joining the waiting list before they are even engaged. Other smaller, intimate and lesser known wedding venues might have smaller waiting lists, or none at all. However, they may have limited space in the diary and can therefore only give you a date months in advance.
Once you find a wedding venue that you like, you should make enquiries as to several things:
Does the venue have the capacity required for your desired number of guests?
How much is the venue? Is the venue within your budget?
When does the venue have availability?
Once you know the answers to these questions you can make a decision on whether to book.
Your Celebrant / Officiant
If you are having a civil wedding ceremony (non-religious), you’ll need to find a wedding celebrant. Some celebrants have last minute availability for quick turnaround weddings. Others will be booked a year in advance. You’ll need some time to prepare your ceremony with your celebrant, which will involve a number of meetings and email exchanges. They’ll also help you write your vows, which can take time. It’s recommended you have around 6 months to organise these things, as a minimum, but some celebrants can book you in more speedily if needed.
Flowers, Cake and Dress Shopping
You’d think finding a dress should be easy right? There is an abundance of wedding dress shops across the country. But some wedding experts predict brides need up to 14 months to find the perfect wedding dress for them!
In terms of the cake, you’ll need to have found your baker and placed your order a good month or so before the wedding. Every baker has different timescales and this wholly depends on the decadence of your chosen cake.
Flowers also require some time and planning. Most brides / grooms will look for flowers around 6 months before the wedding day. If you want flowers that aren’t currently in bloom, your florist may require longer to prepare your bouquets. But if what you want is small, humble, in bloom and easy to arrange, your florist will only need a few weeks' notice depending on how busy they are.
Music and Catering
Musicians such as bands, singers and DJs can be booked months in advance. If you have a specific idea of who you would like to book, check their diary and see if it can correlate with the venue’s diary. You may want to explore a few options here, because it doesn’t always work out how you want it to.
As for catering, the trick is to find a venue that provides wedding catering so that you don’t need to book a separate job for yourself. If you do want an external catering company then once again, you might find they are booked up months in advance and their diary will need to correlate with the venue. If your chosen venue doesn’t provide its own catering, it’s likely they can make recommendations and put you in touch with someone who can help.
High Trenhouse Weddings
As a rule of thumb, the more extravagant your wedding is, and the more specific your requirements are, the longer it will take to plan. But at High Trenhouse we like to do a lot of the work for you, so that you can relax and enjoy your big day.
We can offer quick turnaround on bookings, so that if you want a wedding soon, we can certainly help. We also provide full wedding catering and accommodation - which solves two of your problems in one hit! And lastly, our venue is owned by a professional celebrant, who trains other celebrants, and therefore, we have a huge catalogue of celebrants you can choose from to conduct your wedding (if you have not already sorted this).
Call us today and let’s get you booked in.