I honestly don’t remember what we spent on individual items other than my American wedding dress but I do remember things we did to save money since we paid for half. We were graduate students part-time and both worked full time who were living in a truly crappy apartment together to save money.
My American wedding dress, train and wrap cost $600 at an outlet store. I loved it more than what I tried on at fancy wedding boutiques. I used a retired lady for alterations who supplemented her retirement income doing that mainly for pageant contestants and brides. It was way cheaper than what bridal stores charged for alterations. I also bought my wedding shoes elsewhere to save money. They were Life Stride and super comfy. I still have them.
Most of the locations we looked at required us to spend money on things we didn’t want to spend money on such as valet parkers, a fee to reserve a backup indoor location in case it rained, photography fees, preferred vendors, etc. I kept searching until I found a spot that didn’t require any of that and we ended up at a historic village I had loved since I was little. The fee included a huge historic mansion where the entire wedding party could dress, time for the rehearsal, an outdoor bandstand for the wedding, an intimate historic chapel in case it rained (It did.), use of the grounds for wedding photos, a huge parking lot so guests could self park, and an enclosed pavilion for the reception.
A lot of people spend a small fortune on flowers for wedding and reception decorations but we saved money by using candles in the wedding chapel instead which created a very romantic and intimate atmosphere. We made the centerpieces for the reception tables very cheaply. Each table was themed on a different book genre and had books from our collection on that table placed between bookends we made very cheaply using wooden shelf brackets from Home Depot. Fall leaves we gathered were scattered on the tables. Guests found their table using sheets that had their genre on it. We didn’t do much else in the way of reception decor because the room had floor to ceiling windows that showed off the beautiful grounds.
We also saved money on food and drink. We chose a caterer that allowed us to provide the beer and wine (no champagne or hard liquor) at a considerable savings. We got better quality stuff for less at Costco and World Market during a sale. We had a buffet and no passed drinks or appetizers which saved us money on food and staff. We found a baker for our bride and groom cakes who made cakes on the side in her home (her home kitchen had been inspected and she had a license) and was able to make the cake I wanted without using expensive fondant.
We saved money in other random ways too. We sent out Save the Dates postcards using postcards we printed on our home printer. We found a photographer who was willing to shoot our Indian wedding as a substitute for our engagement session in our photo package. We didn’t hire a limo or party bus. Since we paid for our rehearsal dinner we chose a place that would allow us to provide dessert. We only invited the wedding party to dinner and invited out of town guests for dessert. We bought simple gold wedding bands from James Avery that cost less than $200 each including engraving. We also skipped wedding favors.
The only thing I regretted saving money on was our dj. We chose him since he didn’t pressure to spend extra on a fog machine, disco ball, etc that we didn’t want. He offered to play some of the songs we provided on a CD but didn’t check in advance whether his equipment could play it. As a result, we entered the reception to silence instead of Billy Idol’s White Wedding like we wanted.
