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DIY Brides: Trashy or Treasured? |
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August 19th, 2010 by Cotton Blossom
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Image by Cotton Bud
A link to a very interesting article was posted recently on a thread over at the forums on Wedding Wire, that discusses the many tiers of a bride – based on her budget. Naturally, I landed on the bottom rung, which didn’t surprise me. What did was the seeming lack of respect the author had for brides on such a small budget.
Here’s a direct quote:
“DIY Bride: (Budget: under $5000) Someone who probably doesn’t have the resources to get married just yet and is likely to turn most of her wedding into an Arts and Crafts project.”
Maybe I’m just a bit sensitive, but being a DIY bride with a total budget of about $4,000, I was a bit offended that my wedding is considered an Arts and Crafts project. Perhaps, I need to thicken my skin. The article is written from a wedding industry perspective for wedding industry professionals, not specifically for brides-to-be. However, I feel that saying brides like me don’t “have the resources to get married just yet” is a mis-statement. Many brides with small budgets and long DIY lists, like me, choose not to spend tens of thousands of dollars on one day, intentionally. CC and I could have had a formal, black-tie, multi-course dinner for our reception, but we chose not to – it’s just not our style. We prefer to showcase our creative and artistic talents in our wedding to ensure that it is our wedding and not a cookie-cutter industry standard. We feel that it represents us more than store bought items that are not only common, but often times impersonal.
What are your thoughts about this article? Are you a “DIY Bride” with a budget under $5,000?
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Categories: Budget, Do It Yourself, Etiquette + Advice, Ways to Save, Wedding Planning |
13 Comments |
August 19th, 2010 at 11:40 am
My FI and I’s wedding will be a lot of DIY and a small budget of $5-6K. Just like you, we are choosing this because we’d rather spend our money elsewhere. Like buying a house, creating a good nest egg before we start a family, etc. It is just one day and we are spending wisely instead of starting our married life in huge debt.
)
I am a bit offended myself but I also don’t care enough to let it get to me. It’s your day and it will special and beautiful weather you spend $4000 or $50,000. Besides, reviewing weddings I’ve attended, I remember more about the lower budget ones than the fancy details of the fancy ones. Not to knock the brides who have the fancy budget.
Just my opinion.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:44 am
I understand your point… you CHOOSE not to spend all that money in your wedding, which is a more than legitimate choice. However, all choices come with consequences. In this case, your wedding will be considered an arts and crafts project, yes. In all likelihood, it will be, unless either you, your soon to be spouse, or some friend or relative is a wedding designer, or a planner, or both. By taking the choice you are taking, you are saying that it’s more important for you to save money than to have a pleasant experience design-wise. It’s your right, of course. But call it like it is
Oddly enough, in a way I agree with you… because given the professionalism (or better the lack of thereof) of many wedding planners, weddings nowadays are so impersonal that it makes absolutely no sense to squander money in THAT cr@p.
I hope one day you won’t regret having “sold out” your day over being tight. Because you know you can buy a house or a care later on but you can’t redo your wedding… and, especially when/if it is a successful one – as I’m sure yours will be – you might regret your choice.
You said it’s just one day in your life. You’re right. But so is the day of the birth of your first child, or the day you met your soon to be husband. Does it make it “just one day”? I doubt.
August 19th, 2010 at 1:04 pm
My budget is luckily a little more than that, but I’m still a DIY bride. And my veil and flowers were “arts and crafts” projects.
I totally get your feelings though. We have the resources to be married but not for a crazy expensive wedding.
Be a DIY bride and enjoy pouring yourself into your wedding. That’s what I’m doing.
August 20th, 2010 at 8:48 am
Don’t let it get to you. I went completely DiY for my day and I haven’t regretted it at all! We already had the house, the car BLA BLA, but just couldn’t justify spending money on what we knew we could just do ourselves. Everyone has commented to us how personal and unique our wedding day was and how memorable it was…
It was OUR day done OUR way.
August 25th, 2010 at 11:25 am
I would just like to say a lot of my wedding is do it yourself and by no means was I able to to keep it it under 5000 so to you who did, congrats. Whoever wrote this article doesn’t understand how much more personal a wedding that you yourself create. Also you are able to keep you wedding reasonable you’ll have money to start your life together after the wedding. Boo to that article and “cookie cutter” weddings. Wild flowers win over rose any day of the week for me.
September 3rd, 2010 at 2:36 pm
this is crazy! i’m planning our wedding and we just sent out save the dates (that I MADE) it costs us about 89 dollars to send out 50 save the dates. i spent so much time on these it was a pain in the butt but booooy were they cute!!! I’ve never seen save the dates the way that we made them. we made little shakers with a tiny beach inside every one. Every one raved about them. I don’t know who wrote this article but if I would have *purchased* save the dates they probably would have been magnets (which by the way OURS we’re magnets just really big ones!) – just because you spend a lot of money doesn’t make what you have in the room less boring. ugh, this makes me mad.
September 12th, 2010 at 2:58 am
I love the idea of a DIY wedding for budget and creative reasons. I’m not willing to blow so much money on a wedding, it’s the meaning of the wedding itself that I care much more about. Anyway, we only want to invite few people as we’re very private. The idea of an awesome honeymoon, house, etc is much more appealing to me.
September 17th, 2010 at 7:23 pm
I completely agree with this post. I’m contributing as much as I can to my wedding and it has nothing to do with the fact that I cannot afford it. My fiance and I are excited to start having a life together and cannot justify spending $20,000.00 on 8 hours of food and laughter. A nice retirement at 50 sounds a lot sweeter than a couture wedding.
That being said, we aren’t getting married at a HOJO’s but we definitely researched the most cost-friendly venues and we’re doing everything simple and intimate. Not because we can’t afford it but because this day is about us and I couldn’t give a damn about what my vendor’s profit from my wedding. I want a day that I’ll love and my guests will love. I don’t care that I’m not feeding (pun intended) into a fancy commercial caterer. I want everyone to be relaxed and have an awesome party. At the end of the day our wedding is about love, not satisfying the wedding industry.
Budget Bride and proud to be!
October 12th, 2010 at 1:27 pm
I TOTALLY agree with you girl. this guy is a loser. My budget by choice is $3,000. I could have chosen more, but im a thrifty person and have found it personally satisfying to succeed at such a large challenge. I also am commanded from Scripture to be a good steward of the money God has entrusted me with. I am excited about this special day that will have extra special meaning because it was made with love and not bought.
December 31st, 2010 at 11:29 pm
I just read this, and i might need to grow some thicker skin!! I have the luxury of having a very over the top mom who has given me a very nice budget to spend on my wedding. BUT i have instead decided to have a budget of 4,000 and use the rest towards our house. I think if anything you will appreciate your wedding day MORE with it being a DIY versus regretting it. I know too many people who have thrown everything at a wedding planner and haven’t been a part of every aspect of their weddings, and to me, thats what I would regret more. I am loving every minute of my “trashy” DIY wedding. I am the type of person who puts everything into something I am passionate about and to be honest I like all of my homeade things way better than some over the top wedding. I love being able to make everything as personal as I want it and you have shared some amazing ideas! i thank you so much for posting everything for other DIY brides-to-be! and screw the snobby generic man who thinks otherwise
January 16th, 2011 at 5:23 pm
my upcoming wedding is DIY, with a budget of 5,000, it will be a most classy and wonderful affair, even with this budget, we are still able to make everything look as though it came out of a magazine. it’s just too bad that the writer of this article is so blind to see that with creativity and patience and hardwork, a DIY wedding can look extremely proffessional, classy, and as beautiful as any 10,000 wedding easily. He is clearly not very aware of what is possible on such a small budget. Mine may need some arting and crafting to get it all done, but it is by far not an art and craft project. I also feel that my wedding will not only have a better atomosphere, but also, probably a better overall look and appeal than a more pricey and rediculous wedding.
January 17th, 2011 at 8:57 pm
I would first like to address Rosanna by saying that you do not have to be a wedding planner to be classy and tasteful, or even artistically inclined.
The fiance and I are charging none of our wedding. Everything is coming out of our checking, not even Savings accounts are touched. Our budget is $5,000 and over 50% is for a fantastic museum venue. Sure, we could put several thousand on a credit card, but why? I am a teacher and he is corporate at a not-for-profit…civil servants. Do we want to pay on our wedding longer than we are paying on our student loans?
We also have a lot of things at our disposal. His parents own a restaurant, his uncle is a professional DJ, we are having a childhood family friend officiate the wedding. The fiance’s old band-mate will play live steel pan for the ceremony. His mother’s friend IS a professional wedding planner, but she is only lending us the china and linens. All of these people were not just eager, but insistent on helping. They would have been offended if we had paid thousands of dollars for someone else to do it.
If I do say so myself, I am incredibly crafty. I think the term crafty has a bad rep. When people think of crafy, they think of the first grade popsicle stick frames. I am not just crafty, I am talented. Just because I don’t have a digital design degree doesn’t mean I can’t create something beautiful. Every detail we have put into our wedding from my veil to every swirl on every piece of stationary is OURS.
July 19th, 2011 at 11:02 am
We got married last year, and much of our wedding was DIY. I made the save the date cards, and the invitations, and they were at least as nice as we could have bought. In total we spent less than 40 on stationary. We even did a table plan for the venue, and place cards with guests’ menu choices. We involved our talented families – mum made the bridesmaids dresses, and I got mine online for less than £100. 2 of my aunts very kindly made our 7 tier wedding cake, a family friend made a dvd of the day, my bridesmaids and I made all our table centre pieces (flowers and vases bought from the supermarket), and my husband and I made all the wedding favours/gifts (cufflinks for the men, pendants for the women). We were then able to spend a bit more on the venue and a really fab live band.
Having a DIY wedding isn’t always about scrimping and saving. It can be about involving your loved ones and – more importantly – making your wedding personal to you, not just an off-the-shelf / cookie-cutter wedding.
On a stress note: because we had done so much, I knew it had all been done to a high standard, and we had a really lovely day – no stress because everything went to plan!