Nothing is left to chance at a celebrity or royal wedding. An infantry made up of planners, coordinators and domestic workers lead the day with military precision. Timings are checked three times, trustworthy suppliers are informed, plans B and C are created discreetly. What could go wrong with all of this? A lot turns out.
Both Princess Diana and Jessica Simpson said the wrong name in their vows (Simpson switched her own name). Blake Lively’s wedding dress caught fire at her reception. John Legend’s family almost didn’t make it to his Italian wedding to Chrissy Teigen after a storm delayed their flights. The Queen has lost her wedding bouquet.
Nobody – head of state and defender of faith or normal mortal – is safe from a wedding day. And yet the myth of the “perfect” wedding somehow persists. There is hardly a Romcom or weekly celebrity magazine that goes by without a Pinterest-worthy marriage; a day dreamed of since childhood, skilfully implemented from the first Prosecco-Pop to completion after reception.
We are never shown the broken car, the sick parents, the forgotten veil, the hungover groom.
The result is a generation of troubled couples who take on growing debts to replicate what a wedding should be. The effects on their mental health are terrifying. I’m the assistant editor of the wedding site Hitched, for which we surveyed 4,500 engaged couples: 88 percent of them said they had stress and anxiety about wedding planning, and more than half felt the pressure to highlight their wedding.
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Before the Covid pandemic, I couldn’t stand the excess of weddings – now they feel like a gift
With the average couple investing nearly £ 32,000 and having 13 months of planning in a day, it’s easy to see why you’re falling into the illusion of perfection. The idea of a “perfect” wedding is so ingrained in the collective psyche that it took a global pandemic to get it out of hand.
The arrival of Halloween marks the end of the first wedding season since the Covid-19 restrictions were lifted. It’s been an agonizing 18 months for defeated couples and exhausted wedding vendors; the marital equivalent of Squid Game – anyone who keeps their nerve to see if they can win the ultimate prize of 30+ guests and a sit-down meal.
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Why used wedding dresses are experiencing a revival when brides turn their backs on brand new dresses
It’s hard to believe that those year and a half could have a silver lining, but for those getting married in 2022 and beyond, lessons appear to have been learned from the chaos of Covid.
Paying attention to the dark Hans Christian Anderson version of the wedding tale, couples become more and more clear about what matters and embrace the joy of an imperfect day.
Among the couples who use our website, we see huge guest lists giving way to smaller, more intimate weddings and elopements with close loved ones. Rustic garden weddings and casual pub receptions are booming; Nostalgic playlists and favorite cakes from childhood put the latest trends in the shade.
The milestone of finding “The One” is also shifting – environmentally conscious brides rent their wedding dresses instead of buying them.
That doesn’t mean we won’t see big, ostentatious weddings in the future – recent events have led many to bring everyone they know together to celebrate – but we may become more realistic if things go wrong.
We are now approaching engagement season – the weeks around Christmas and New Years when there are lots of suggestions. Hopefully, this year accompanying the ring selfies will be a truer story about how the question was asked – bad weather, fake rings, accidental interruptions, and everything.
Helen Pye is the assistant editor of Hitched
