What did your DC wedding cost?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:November 2016 at the Capitol View Rooftop. All told about $35k for 140 people.

That's really cheap for that many people. Where did you skimp out?

PP here. I don't think we truly skimped out anything in the sense that we had certain priorities that might not be traditional. For example, the only flowers we had were bouquet and boutineers (still a thousand freaking bucks). I bought the table decorations wholesale online (candles and vases). Instead of buying 150 of something as favors, we offers $5 Uber coupons and only paid for the ones that were used (very few). We had a planner who helped us find vendors on the cheaper side, but all of which we were extremely pleased with. Our caterer was probably on the cheaper side as we actually planned to do a buffet, but the venue said at the last minute we couldn't use open flame sternos, so we ended up with a plated meal at no extra cost which was awesome. My husband is a brewer, so we got all the beer for free from his brewery and bought all the wine and liquor from Costco (then had professional bartenders serve). The venue was pretty expensive in the sense that it was just the space itself, but it was so worth it for the backdrop of the Capitol and the city lights. But related, it probably helped that we cobbled everything together rather than had some packaged per head price like many other places do.

Happy to share any of the specifics if anyone is interested!

[Anonymous]

About 38K all in at a bed and breakfast in Middleburg, ten years ago. 125 guests, open bar, evening wedding in June.

[Anonymous]

You know what they say.. "the bigger the wedding, the sooner the divorce". Think back to those weddings in your family..
usually those most fancy and fanfare weddings end up in ugliest and soonest divorces. The smaller the wedding and more about the two people in love the better marriage. It is because those people right off the bet know what is the most important in life and focus on their future and not making drunk bunch of people they see once in their lives.
The big weddings are result of big egos.. bride, groom, parents.. and they will pop up all the time afterwards.. so there.. big egos don't go together well with marriage stability.

[Anonymous]

The wedding cost your future and the kids future. That is the real cost.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know what they say.. "the bigger the wedding, the sooner the divorce". Think back to those weddings in your family..
usually those most fancy and fanfare weddings end up in ugliest and soonest divorces. The smaller the wedding and more about the two people in love the better marriage. It is because those people right off the bet know what is the most important in life and focus on their future and not making drunk bunch of people they see once in their lives.
The big weddings are result of big egos.. bride, groom, parents.. and they will pop up all the time afterwards.. so there.. big egos don't go together well with marriage stability.

Big weddings are also the result of culture. For example, Indians do big weddings. Greeks do big weddings. People in the Northeast do big weddings. And there is no statistic that the bigger/more expensive the wedding, the more likely you are to divorce. If there is, I'd love to see it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The wedding cost your future and the kids future. That is the real cost.

That’s your opinion. I liked having a wedding of 150 guests in my family and friends. I could easily argue that people who choose a 6000 square foot house when a 3000 square foot house or two cars when the household could make do with 1 car and the occasional Uber or bus ride are costing their future or their kids’ future. In some cultures, weddings are worth the expense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The new formula is 1/3 groom parents, 1/3 brides parents and 1/3 couple

BTW when grooms parents paid 100 percent the groom was expected to pay for home and let wife be a SAHM.

The grooms today wife expected to work, pay 1/2 everything and do 80 percent of child rearing. And actually give birth.

If anything in 2019 groom parents should pay

THIS X 1000.

Nobody owes you a wedding, or even 1/3 of a wedding. You're grown-ups, you should be spending your own money and not grifting off your parents or in-laws.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:About 50-55k all in at the Monaco 10+ years ago

Ours was $28k total at hotel Monaco 10 years ago. That includes photographer, dj, ceremony musicians, rings, clothes, invitations, flowers, the whole shebang.

[Anonymous]

$280 per head just for the venue food and drinks to the hotel, 200 guests. Hotel was near Farragut North.

[Anonymous]

2009.
100 guests. About $16,000. Church plus Potomac riverside reception at a members-only club (we got the venue via a friend so little cost to that). Lots of DIY on flowers and decor and friends who served as DJ and photographer. Biggest part of the bill was about 12K for catering.

[Anonymous]

lol wow 100k for a wedding. You could put that as a down payment on a house and have a smaller wedding.....

[Anonymous]

$5K including rings. Married in a garden at a lovely B&B 13 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:2009.
100 guests. About $16,000. Church plus Potomac riverside reception at a members-only club (we got the venue via a friend so little cost to that). Lots of DIY on flowers and decor and friends who served as DJ and photographer. Biggest part of the bill was about 12K for catering.

Could you name the club? That's a great price!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The new formula is 1/3 groom parents, 1/3 brides parents and 1/3 couple

BTW when grooms parents paid 100 percent the groom was expected to pay for home and let wife be a SAHM.

The grooms today wife expected to work, pay 1/2 everything and do 80 percent of child rearing. And actually give birth.

If anything in 2019 groom parents should pay

I think you have your history mixed up.

The tradition, at least in whitebread America, was that the bride's parents paid for the wedding and the groom's parents paid for the rehearsal dinner.

When I got married 13 years ago my parents paid for the wedding, DH's parents paid for the rehearsal dinner, and while old fashion it was still a common precedence in our circles of upper middle class east coast professionals.

[Anonymous]

Last year, $50k, in dc, 130 ppl