Small but mighty

Micro-weddings have soared in popularity since the pandemic but what makes these little weddings so popular and why are so many couples really choosing to downsize their big day?

Micro-weddings aren’t a new thing, couples have been eloping to Gretna-green or getting married abroad with only a handful of guests for years, but for lots of couples, this was never even a consideration. The idea of only inviting 16 people to the most important day of their life would have been unthinkable before the pandemic.

Like a lot of people in the wedding industry I fully expected this reduction in numbers to be a temporary change but combined with the rising cost of living they have become increasingly popular. In 2022 more than 50% of the weddings we photographed had fewer than 35 day guests.

In addition to the cost savings, a lot of these couples found it far less stressful to plan a smaller wedding with 20-30 guests, they were able to spend quality time with everyone who came and a told us afterwards that they felt far more relaxed than they had expected.

Smaller weddings also give you such a lovely variety of locations, there are some beautiful function suites, restaurants and private venues which are only available for smaller celebrations. It’s worth considering a rough guest list before you start looking at venues to make sure that you don’t have to make a difficult decision between your guests and your perfect venue.

It’s very popular at smaller weddings to have just one larger table, I love these events (not just because they look lovely in photographs) but also because they don’t exclude anyone from the top table. They feel more like a family gathering with everyone sitting together and sharing a great meal.

At a lot of the smaller weddings the couple has made their evening reception a completely separate event, often this has been at a different venue, sometimes a few days later or even after their honeymoon. One lovely couple got married in secret and had their night guests invited to a surprise birthday party only to arrive and discover that they were the ones being surprised!

If you decide to have a separate event it’s worthwhile checking what your options are for suit or kilt hire, especially if you are having your party a few days later as you may have the option to extend your hire, but sometimes it’s cheaper to have two separate hires.

If you plan to re-wear your dress (and it’s so lovely to have the chance to wear it again) it’s worth considering that it might need to be dry cleaned or aired before you put it back on. If you are going on honeymoon in between, you might want to consider arranging this before you go away and check on likely timescales to ensure it will be back on time.