{"data":{"items":[{"id":"7168de3a-a2ed-4f3f-869b-653333ec941f","excerpt":"June 2025 Bride - Budget Breakdown & Overview - Big Sur, CA — Hi BBB-ers! June 2025 bride in VHCOL/logistically challenging area. I mostly lurked in this sub because I felt like I was on the low-end of a big budget bride, but I wanted to make a post to show that you can be both a BBB and a DIY-er/cost-saver bride, as I","url":"https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBudgetBrides/comments/1psmz24/june_2025_bride_budget_breakdown_overview_big_sur/","role":"request","weight":1.3423864,"occurredAt":"2025-12-22T01:36:00.000Z","sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","credibility":0.62,"venue":"BigBudgetBrides","intent":"feature_request","painScore":0.36997044,"sentiment":0.82216144,"confidence":0.9798652,"matchedPatterns":["wish","frustrating","too_expensive"],"statement":"He kept recommending too cheap (like right price point but cheap in quality/vibes) or too expensive caterers.) I again SCOURED the internet and found a couple who lived on a farm, grew their own food, and had just started catering weddings.","title":"June 2025 Bride - Budget Breakdown & Overview - Big Sur, CA","body":"Hi BBB-ers! June 2025 bride in VHCOL/logistically challenging area. I mostly lurked in this sub because I felt like I was on the low-end of a big budget bride, but I wanted to make a post to show that you can be both a BBB and a DIY-er/cost-saver bride, as I’m sure there’s many of those out there like me! Also, I was obsessed with how everything turned out, so if anyone is looking to have a magical garden forest wedding on the Big Sur, CA coast - I hope you find this helpful and use ALL of my vendors (except for the planner that we ended up firing, lol. more on them at the bottom). But I seriously feel like our day looked WAY more expensive than it was. Even though $120k is still a ton of money! Also, sorry this ended up being the longest post ever, but I hope it’s helpful to someone! The Breakdown: \n\nGuests: 105 (invited 135 - this is a difficult place to get to! In retrospect we would have invited at least 20 more)\n\nBudget: $120k for the whole wedding weekend (including truly everything)\n\nLocation: Monterey, CA / Big Sur, CA\n\n**The Night Before + Goodbye Coffee (Monterey, CA)**\n\nThursday night un-official dinner/drinks (25-30 people): $1000\n\nRehearsal dinner (40 people): $4,200\n\nWelcome drinks (100 people): $12,000\n\nGoodbye coffee & bagels: $300\n\n**The Wedding (Big Sur, CA)**\n\n*Venue, Reception, Rentals, Logistics:*\n\nVenue fee: $19,000 (included furniture)\n\nAdditional Rentals & decor (extra tables, linens, glassware, etc.): $6,500\n\nAdditional bathrooms: $1,800\n\nTransportation (buses): $7,200\n\nBand/DJ combo (included all audio equipment): $2,700\n\nFlowers: $5,800\n\nPhotography & Video:$8,000\n\nPartial wedding planner (unfortunately half to the person we fired, half to the new planner): $6,500\n\n*F&B:*\n\nCatering : $14,000\n\nOyster bar: $2,000\n\nCoffee bar: $1500\n\nS’mores bar: $75\n\nBartender + cocktail package: $5,000\n\nLiquor + Local Wine: $2,200\n\nCoffee bar: $1,500\n\nAfter party (location + late night food): $1,500\n\n*Apparel / The Looks*\n\nBridal gown redesign (wore my mom's dress from 1990!): $2000\n\nGroom custom suit: $2000\n\nWedding party outfits: $200\n\nShoes and accessories: $250\n\nRings: $2,000\n\nHair & Makeup: $2,800\n\n*Other:* \n\nStationery & Paper Goods: $1,000\n\nGifts & Favors: $1,000\n\nMiscellaneous (Marriage license, wedding insurance, bridal party meals, couples suite for 2 nights, gratuities, misc prep costs): $6,500\n\nI won’t sugar coat it - finishing DIY’ing stuff the 2 weeks leading up to the wedding was STRESSFUL. I wish I could have eliminated some of that stress for me, my husband, and my parents. Little things like doing the welcome bags ourselves, the seating chart, the paper goods  (I love designing, but I underestimated the difficulty of printing and learned printing yourself is not worth the hassle and to pay a professional), making emergency bridal suite kits (mostly unnecessary in hindsight!), packing everything up and organizing it to make sure the right people would have it at the right times, etc etc. was all more stressful and time-consuming than anticipated. I’m assuming those are all things that a full service planner probably handles! However, it was also kind of fun and funny bonding between me, my husband, my parents, and my brother - so if you have the right people, you can make the most of anything! I consider myself VERY lucky here, I know not everyone has that type of support, so I deeply cherish the ability to be stressed but also laughing about it with my loved ones.\n\nAll that said about the stress leading up to it - I LOVED our wedding weekend and wouldn’t change a thing. It was our dream weekend. It was so us, and it was so fun!\n\nHere’s an overview of the weekend:\n\nThursday night we did an un-official kickoff at Pebble Beach just for the folks who came in early. We watched the bagpipes and sunset at the outside area of Roy's (I think, idk I'm not a golf person but my husband is and he planned this night). People ordered food and drink at the bar (we didn't have to make any sort of reservation/pay any fee, but we did do one tab bc it was easiest for the group, and we picked up the tab here). Honestly so fun and chill and a perfect way to kick things off.\n\nFriday morning at 10am we did a ‘Welcome Hike’. This is now maybe one of my favorite memories ever in my life. It was crazy getting to stroll along the coast with \\~50 of my friends and family, ranging from childhood friends to aunts and uncles. Make wedding welcome hikes a thing!!! Also - IT WAS FREE! We then went further into Big Sur for a casual lunch at Cafe Kevah (order at the bar, folks paid for themselves). We then went and did our rehearsal at our venue.\n\nFriday night 5-7pm we did our rehearsal dinner at a local Monterey restaurant - we worked with the owner to do a pretty affordable family style menu. We had SO MUCH food and everyone loved it (tbh I was still kind of stressed at this point about logistics, so I didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I wish I could have - shoutout anxiety!)\n\nFriday night 7-9pm we did the official ‘Welcome Drinks’ at our hotel. A huuuge thing that was super helpful to the budget was that the hotel let us use our event deposit as our room block deposit. Some hotels wanted us to pay for every room in the block and not get the money back until after the wedding. Personally, we did not have an extra \\~$25k floating around to have tied up in a room block until after the wedding. So this worked out perfectly. The hotel was gorgeous and exactly what I wanted - having all our loved ones “under one roof”. (I say that bc our first planner who we fired was not listening to me about that mattering, and told me the only solution to not paying a huge room block deposit was to let people fend for themselves and book at any of the local small boutique inns in the area. I’m sure that’s fine for some people, but NOT what I wanted. I wanted everyone to be in the same place and to provide a reasonable hotel room rate to all of my loved ones who were traveling very far to show up for me. We got our rate at $359/night which I thought was SO reasonable for the area).\n\nSaturday - Wedding Day - a PERFECT DAY, honestly! The girls got ready in our hotel suite - just hair and makeup there (while the boys went on a run and brunch). The bridal party then took a bus down to our venue \\~50 min drive from hotel to venue. We got dressed at the venue, and then it was off to the races! General rundown of the wedding: \n\n* After getting ready we took photos at the venue\n* Guests were bused down and greeted with champagne/NA beverages (I was worried about them having a long bus ride from hotel to venue and being annoyed about it, so I wanted to make sure they felt taken care of upon arrival - def worth the splurge).\n* Then we had a very love-filled, true tear-jerker of a ceremony officiated by a family member! \n* Then cocktail hour with acoustic guitar + singing duo. Amazing farm-to-table appetizers and a grazing bar. Locally-sourced ingredients for our cocktails (one of my friends’ husbands told me it was the best margarita he’d ever had in his life!). And an oyster bar - my groom is a sober king and he wanted something that felt \\~fancy and elegant\\~ to cheers with his friends! The oysters were perfect for that and worth the splurge. \n* Then dinner and speeches. Also farm-to-table dinner. The only hiccup here is that our venue doesn’t have a kitchen, and I really wanted plated meals rather than a buffet. Our caterer warned us it would be tough for everything to come out hot, and they were not wrong. I don’t think there was any avoiding this  given our logistical situation. Personally, I’ll take slightly chilly food over people having to walk around carrying their plates while wearing fancy dresses, heels, and suits. 🤷 \n* After dinner we did the first dance, mother/son dance, father/daughter dance, then opened the dance floor for the rest of the night!!! The acoustic duo who did the ceremony and cocktail hour also DJ’d! They also emcee'd all night.\n* During the dancing, we had a coffee/espresso bar set up and had ice cream with it to serve affogatos (shout out to my husband for that idea and for his groomsmen getting the ice cream and putting it in a cooler and transporting it!)\n* Venue ended at 10pm (noise ordinances) so we went down the street to a local bar for our after party where we did a cash bar, but we provided pizza and had a private section (room + patio) of the bar!\n* Then we bussed everyone back to the hotel around midnight!\n\nSunday to end the weekend we did coffee and bagels on the promenade of the hotel\n\n**My biggest cost-saving hack!** \n\nFind lesser-known, newer vendors. They want to show up and do THE BEST JOB they can because they’re still building their businesses up. I’m sure this could be nerve-wracking for brides and could cause things to go wrong... But honestly, we didn’t have anything go wrong with our newer vendors! It did take a lot of research and legwork on my end. Those amazing \"quality for the cost\" type vendors included: \n\n* Florals for $5,800 - okay my girl SHOWED UP AND SHOWED OUT. (This was another thing the fired planner told me wasn’t possible lol. He said I wouldn’t be able to get anyone to do around $5k in the area.) I SCOURED the internet and found someone who had recently relocated her floral business from San Diego to Central California. I legit feel like our florals looked like they were worth $15k+++. She seriously hit it out of the park. Angie Chiuzzi at Flor De Mar if anyone is looking for someone in the area. HIGHLY recommend. She also gave me a gift on our wedding day, which was so sweet! Just absolutely incredible experience. \n* Catering for $14k. Another one that our fired planner flubbed lol. (He promised he had a caterer at a great price point for us when we booked him as our planner 1.5 years before the wedding, and then two weeks after booking the planner we were like great let’s get your caterer friend booked for our date and suddenly he was unavailable…… Very odd and annoying. He kept recommending too cheap (like right price point but cheap in quality/vibes) or too expensive caterers.) I again SCOURED the internet and found a couple who lived on a farm, grew their own food, and had just started catering weddings. Again, the NICEST people in the world. Such great service for a GREAT price point in the area. The food, appetizers especially, were amazing. It felt like we got $25k+ worth of food in terms of quality and quantity and the service. They also did our cake! \n* Music for $2700 - now remembering that the fired planner laughed at me when I told him I found someone who would do both live music and DJ and said they’d do it for $2500 if we paid them in cash!! Seriously what the hell, planner! We added on them learning our first dance song to play it live - we took kind of a while to pick our song, and I think only gave them like 1.5 months heads up so they were a little concerned they couldn’t learn it in time, but ultimately they did and it was great. Just flagging that to procrastinators - maybe pick your first song sooner than us if someone needs to learn it lol. They also did all of the audio set up + equipment for the day, emcee’d throughout the night, and brought a fun extra disco ball type light for the dancefloor. We found them through a local facebook group where a woman was like I used them for my birthday and they’re incredible. Again, a HUGE steal for the price I felt like.\n\nAnd just FYI - the planner we fired was Golden Coast Planning. If you’re in the Carmel/Monterey area - avoid them. There’s another reddit post about them in SF Wedding Planning that’s a few months old, and we had the exact same experience as that couple. Took a long time to respond, disorganized (I had to correct multiple times what our wedding date was with them!), did not really seem to care about my vision, etc. GCP has 5 stars everywhere, so it’s good to keep in mind that vendors can doctor their reviews. We had booked them for partial planning and I thi","offTopic":true},{"id":"942bf633-a695-4d18-ab8e-1490f33677dc","excerpt":"Graduated! Review of my DIY wedding and photos of my favorites — I planned, designed, and executed about 99% of my wedding. Before anyone comes for him, my fiancé was absolutely present and helpful, but I have a skill level that he does not, so I did (and enjoyed doing) the vast majority of all of my DIYs.\n\nA lot of fo","url":"https://www.reddit.com/r/DIYweddings/comments/1u9by1m/graduated_review_of_my_diy_wedding_and_photos_of/","role":"request","weight":1.2972,"occurredAt":"2026-06-18T17:03:20.000Z","sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","credibility":0.62,"venue":"DIYweddings","intent":"feature_request","painScore":0.38,"sentiment":0.125,"confidence":0.94,"matchedPatterns":["wish","i_hate","missing_feature"],"statement":"We also rented a u-haul van and loaded everything up the night before so nothing was missing, and then we did hire a cleanup crew to re-load the van, and I sent my adult niece and her partner back to our house with it at the end of the nig…","title":"Graduated! Review of my DIY wedding and photos of my favorites","body":"I planned, designed, and executed about 99% of my wedding. Before anyone comes for him, my fiancé was absolutely present and helpful, but I have a skill level that he does not, so I did (and enjoyed doing) the vast majority of all of my DIYs.\n\nA lot of folks hate on DIY weddings, and I totally get why (I attended one a few weeks ago and it was a hot mess). They’re a lot of work, and if you’re not familiar with crafting, it can get really overwhelming really fast. I am very experienced at LOTS of kinds of crafts, and was overwhelmed for a minute there, too.\n\nThe biggest thing that saved me was a) doing so, so much research on how to do everything before jumping in, and also a ton of searching to thrift items before making them and b) I was really, really organized on the execution of the items. I mocked everything up and took photos so our setup crew would know exactly how to set up. We had no day-of-coordinator, just the groom, groomsmen, and a couple good friends who weren’t bridesmaids setting everything up, and it took about 3.5 hours. There were very few hitches, and alllmost everything came out how I planned.\n\nBoth our families and the bridesmaids were able to relax and get ready, while the groomsmen still had plenty of time for a cocktail and a shower. We also rented a u-haul van and loaded everything up the night before so nothing was missing, and then we did hire a cleanup crew to re-load the van, and I sent my adult niece and her partner back to our house with it at the end of the night (they don’t drink so they didn’t miss the date party!).\n\nI also assigned specific tasks to every person via text, spreadsheet, and binder at least a week (in some cases several months) in advance so no one had to wander around looking for something to do, and I got lots of complements for how a) all the helpers felt supported and clear on how things were supposed to go and b) how everything looked in the final result!\n\nDIY List:  \nI did Sola wood flowers for all our centerpieces and extra floral decor including the arch. I ended up paying a local florist to do the bouquets and boutonnières because I simply couldn’t hack it. My mom did help a TON with the centerpieces because flowers are very much her thing. Husband also did a TON of work helping me paint the flowers- I ended up mixing up custom colors with paint I bought from Michael’s (RIPmy girl Joann). I’m happy to post a separate tutorial for sola if folks will find that helpful!\n\nI bought and learned to use a circut to make the placecards, table numbers, welcome mirror, and seating chart. Note: gold foil is Satan himself straight from hell. Do not recommend as your first cricut project if you’d like to keep your sanity. If you do use it, set your blade to the Washi tape setting and do a duplicate cut. My gawd.\n\nI also learned how to use Canva and designed and printed all of our signage, which I absolutely loved. In the photo for my bar signage is also the candle holders that we used on all the tables. I bought those secondhand from someone, and then drove out into the forest with husband to collect a bucket full of local lava rock to put in the glass globes. One of my favorite details-they looked so nice with the tea lights on!\n\nI did our ceiling drapery too. I wish I had bought twice as much tulle because I wanted a gauzy cloud look but there was no way for me to mock it up in advance. I did put a lot of effort into measuring the fabric and marking where each swag should hit the rafters, and we cut and painted dowels so they’d have somewhere to rest where there weren’t rafters. Still overall happy with that, but not my favorite.\n\nWe also made our own pipe for the pipe and drape (I did order the fabric but the stands were really expensive to buy). We literally bought pipes from Lowe’s and fiancé spray painted them black and made a stand with some spare wood we had laying around. They looked janky af underneath but no one could see behind the fabric!\n\nI also designed the fabric draping for our arch, which I was super happy with when I did it myself, but it looked a little flat in our photos. Would’ve added more fabric to that, too, to account for other folks not having the same skill level to floof it up. Same with the sweetheart table!\n\nMy absolute favorite DIY was the Photo Booth. I saw examples of these on Pinterest and my fiancé jigsawed the heart cutout (I drew it for him), then he painted the wood black and helped me staple on the fabric drapery. It was kind of a pain but not TERRIBLE. If I was going to do it again, I’d add on a thin foam before stapling the fabric (I just bought super cheap silk twin size sheets off temu, so together with the wood I think we spent about $115 on it?) so there was something for the pins to hold onto before I stapled everything in place. It was a huge hit and the pictures came out SO beautifully (we set up a ring light and phone stand in front so folks could take their own photos, but we also got quite a few from our photographer).\n\nI also used ChatGPT (i know, I hate it, but it came out really well) to make temporary tattoos and printed those on our printer at home. They were a huge hit and the paper cost me about $15 iirc. Definitely going to make those again for future events!\n\nFinal kind-of DIY that was mostly a design detail I loved- we did a champagne wall on some folding bookshelves we already had at home. I used acrylic glassware for the flutes because I wanted a uniform look, and we alternated those with miller lites bottles (the champagne of beer!). We had a lot of beer drinkers at our wedding, so those were a hit too.\n\nI thrifted a LOT of our decor, especially glassware- I drove all over Oregon (no small feat) collecting amber, black, brown, pink, and purple glassware and it looked awesome on the tables.\n\nI also DIY’s our cocktails- I used the same base for both of them (local SUPER flavorful honey syrup with rosemary from my garden simmered in + lemon juice) and then folks could add either gin for a Bee’s Knees or whiskey for a Gold Rush. Both were a huge hit (our taco caterer also provided margaritas which are DELIGHTFUL but way more people did the ones I made, they got a ton of complements).\n\nI also thrifted and reupholstered the chairs for our sweetheart table, which did NOT save me money but I love them anyway haha\n\nLast thing I did that absolutelyyyyy saved my sanity: I blew up and printed at office max on foam board a floor plan of my venue and made to-scale tables so I could make sure my layout had enough space and made sense for flow. Also did the seating chart there, and it was AWESOME. I tried some of the digital tools for seating chart but found them to be way more cumbersome than just physically moving the names around. \n\nI’m so happy to give any help/advice/instructions for anyone who is doing any similar DIYs!","offTopic":true},{"id":"81476e24-69e5-4e9d-ba7c-2d446286a842","excerpt":"(20k) I can't believe how beautifully it came together — It's crazy to believe this would be considered by many to be a low budget wedding because genuinely feel like I made very few comprises. It came out more beautiful than I could have hoped for. My main priority was to make sure we did as little DIY as possible to ","url":"https://www.reddit.com/r/Weddingsunder10k/comments/1uvj9ek/20k_i_cant_believe_how_beautifully_it_came/","role":"request","weight":0.9320667,"occurredAt":"2026-07-13T18:08:00.000Z","sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","credibility":0.62,"venue":"Weddingsunder10k","intent":"feature_request","painScore":0.24,"sentiment":0.5294118,"confidence":0.75166667,"matchedPatterns":["wish"],"statement":"She did an amazing job but I wish I did my own makeup.","title":"(20k) I can't believe how beautifully it came together","body":"It's crazy to believe this would be considered by many to be a low budget wedding because genuinely feel like I made very few comprises. It came out more beautiful than I could have hoped for. My main priority was to make sure we did as little DIY as possible to avoid stress. I didn't want to ask my friends and family to do a bunch of work leading up to and on the day of the event.\n\nWe invited 125 people and landed at 103. Our original budget was 10k, but we bumped our own contribution up to 13k after I picked up Rover dog sitting as a side hustle and my in-laws contributed the other 7k. \n\nMain takeaway:\n\nIf you have the patience to do enough research to stay within budget, try to hire a vendor for absolutely everything rather than DIY. It takes off so much stress. Hiring service staff to do all the physical labor can cost much less than you might expect. That and a day of coordinator are absolutely worth it. \n\nBudget breakdown:\n\nVenue: $1,150.00 (the venue was owned by Portland parks and rec, so it was extremely affordable for how beautiful it was. Tables and chairs were provided but everything else was DIY)\n\nTent: $2,500.00 (this was the biggest expense we were hoping to avoid but it ended up pouring rain during the beginning of the reception so I'm so glad we went with our gut and didn't cancel it when the forecast said overcast with very light rain) \n\nPhotography: $2,000.00 (my photographer's wedding packages started at about 3.5k but she worked within my budget for 6 hours of coverage) \n\nVideography: $200.00 (This was our big compromise. We bought a handheld camcorder on ebay and our bridal party passed it around throughout the reception and recorded the whole ceremony. Lived up to the hype 100%! Can't wait to edit it all into a more traditional style wedding video in capcut. Make sure to buy a memory card and spare battery)\n\nCatering: $3,000.00 (put a $650.00 deposit down for wood fired pizza and he canceled a month before the wedding with no refund. Luckily we were able to book an amazing Hawaiian restaurant for a buffet including 2 waitstaff who bussed tables, served cake, refilled waters, and broke down everything at the end of the night. All that was $2,350.00)\n\nDJ: $1,000.00 (this was so worth the extra research to find a good price. I know I could have rented equipment and done a Spotify Playlist, but I didn't want to deal with a friend or family member having to play MC)\n\nDay of coordinator: $980.00 (I found her on a wedding Facebook page and she did all the decor setup/breakdown, vendor coordination, time-line management, etc. Worth every penny and more.)\n\nHair: $217.00 (no trial because I've been going to her for years) \n\nMakeup: $445.00 (including trial. She did an amazing job but I wish I did my own makeup. My eye  makeup and under eyes were a disaster from crying after our private vows, which was before our guests even arrived, and I had no touch up kit. I had to scramble to use a bridesmaids very minimal makeup selection to salvage the look.)\n\nCake: $340.00 (I ordered one round cake for cutting and 2 quarter sheet cakes for guests from our favorite bakery. They were so beautiful and our guests were raving about the flavors we picked out)\n\nFlowers: $1,200.00 (I ordered professional flowers from a local florist for my bouquet and sweetheart table arrangement. That was $468 and 100% worth it. I went to a local peony farm and picked 90 stems for $180, which we used for bridesmaids bouquets that turned out stunning. My mother in law brought 9 centerpieces from a cheaper florist in her small town and drove them down to use for both the rehearsal dinner and wedding. Those were $360. Plus a little extra for boutonnieres. Then we bought 6 potted orchids for $120 to fill in the centerpiece gaps.)\n\nBartender: $317.00 (get lots of quotes because the prices are all over the place. We provided everything ourselves for the bar so all we had to pay for was the hourly wage of one person)\n\nAir bnb: $400.00 (we only lived 40 minutes from the venue but wanted to be right by the venue so we could have our dog there and also have a convenient getting ready location since we didn't get access to our venue until 2pm)\n\nDress: $1,635.00 ($1,360.00 for the dress and $275.00 for alterations)\n\nCustom suit: $877.00 (rentals are so expensive that we figured we would buy him something he can keep wearing for years)\n\nLinens: $300.00\n\nMisc: $1,100.00 (invitations, postage, place cards, signage, guest book, marriage license, venue insurance, clear umbrellas, disposable dinnerware, shapewear, jewelry, shoes)\n\nAlcohol: $600.00 (Wine, beer, hard seltzer, and N/A drinks from Costco. We we were able to return what we didn't use)","offTopic":true},{"id":"9eef8d38-54cd-4604-9dd2-b7f153289443","excerpt":"Graduated! Budget Breakdown & Things I Learned — I graduated a little over a month ago. This sub was so helpful so I wanted to provide a high level budget breakdown and some things I thought I’d share about my experience. \n\nI’m not going to include photos as it was at my childhood home and I don’t want to doxx myself. ","url":"https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBudgetBrides/comments/1u8q76s/graduated_budget_breakdown_things_i_learned/","role":"request","weight":0.8519334,"occurredAt":"2026-06-17T23:30:36.000Z","sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","credibility":0.62,"venue":"BigBudgetBrides","intent":"feature_request","painScore":0.24,"sentiment":0.85,"confidence":0.6870431,"matchedPatterns":["wish"],"statement":"If I could say two things that may help others: \\-I wish I’d gotten more pictures in my veil.","title":"Graduated! Budget Breakdown & Things I Learned","body":"I graduated a little over a month ago. This sub was so helpful so I wanted to provide a high level budget breakdown and some things I thought I’d share about my experience. \n\nI’m not going to include photos as it was at my childhood home and I don’t want to doxx myself. 😄 \n\nFeel free to DM me or follow up with any questions. I’ve really loved helping people on their journey!\n\nLocation: PNW\n\nVenue: Private Residence\n\nGuest Count: 150\n\nThings I learned in the process: \n\n\\-I see so many horror stories about vendors, especially planners. It makes me really sad. I did not have that experience, and I am sorry for brides that do. I truly loved the planning process and it really was because of having an exceptional planner, and also having parents who are very gracious and really wanted whatever I wanted. I also think a few other things helped.\n\n\\*I hired the best people, trusted them and got out of their way. I spent my career hiring people and leading teams so I probably have a leg up here, but I treated wedding planning like I was building a leadership team. I saw myself as the CEO (defining the vision and what I wanted to achieve, helping to move things along as needed, change course when I felt it was warranted), my planner as the COO (executing my vision and managing the rest of the team), and each vendor as the “Head of” their domain. Did my planner make mistakes? Yes, she’s a human. Nothing was earth shattering. We had a conversation, solved it and moved on. We built really deep trust with each other, and I implicitly trusted her the week of my wedding. I truly did nothing starting two weeks out. Teams are built on trust, and I think it’s a really critical part of this relationship. You have to find someone who understands that and wants to build that trust alongside you.\n\n\\*Determine what communication style you want from the beginning and make it clear. I needed and wanted regular communication. My planner and I talked almost every day through voice notes. 4 months out we had an hour long call every other week, 30 days out we had one every week. She would never go more than a few hours without answering me, except when she was in production but she’d tell me when and for how long. She also only does 3-4 weddings per year so this was super minimal. \n\n\\*I know what I like/don’t like, and have an overall vision but I am not creative whatsoever. A lot of the design decisions were sometimes overwhelming for me and I turned to my team (and my mom) a lot to help me. Again, I think it helped to have built trust as I trusted them when it came to design. If you are working with a luxury planner who has a creative director, you really have to let them cook a bit and let go of the reins. If you don’t think you can do that, then I think it’s not worth it because you’ll just be clashing. \n\n\\*Again, these people can be the best at what they do and there will still be mistakes. I caught all of mine because I am super Type A— mostly minor related to really tiny things but there were a few larger budget related mess-ups. We had built that trust so we were able to work through it and I didn’t let it affect how I viewed her ability to execute. I do think you have to give people the benefit of the doubt and the chance to rectify it. Obviously in some situations they continue to mess up and that’s when you need to take action. I really did treat it as managing their performance. \n\n\\*I’m a pretty decisive person by nature so once I’ve made up my mind I don’t really change it. Super rare for most people, especially a bride. I do think this made my vendors really like me because they didn’t have to work as hard to shift things constantly. Obviously, not everyone is like that but it probably played a part in my relationships so just wanted to note that. \n\n\\*I did not hire any vendors that I didn’t personally know prior, knew brides who had used them, or were from my planner’s network + also knew brides who had used them. I didn’t do crazy diligence of asking them all of the questions in the world, but I used my network and trusted those people's referral. \n\n\\-I’m anxious by nature and I was really worried about what that week and day of would look like. I was the most calm I’ve ever been in my life. I was able to eat normally, and just truly felt completely content. I can’t ultimately say what contributed to it, but I do think just allowing myself to let go of the outcome and fully trusting my team allowed it to truly be the best day of my life. \n\n\\-My husband and I from the start knew that the word intention was really important to us and it guided us through the process. Neither of us have social media, so we really wanted nothing that felt like it was “for social media.” We also really wanted to focus on guest experience from start to finish. I truly feel that we achieved all of this. It was both the greatest party of all time with incredible food, but also very sentimental and a celebration of our love and also the love of all of the people there who got us to this point (we have somewhat of a unique story and a lot of people had a hand in it). I know many BBBs hear this, but we heard many “This was the best wedding ever” — both the best dance floor and food, but also the intention behind the day from our vows to the notes we wrote every guest etc. I do think the setting was also a part of that — it being my childhood home was very sentimental and special. My whole vibe was “Father of the Bride” and 90’s nostalgia, and people loved that. \n\nWhatever your desire for your day - I think you just have to take the time to define your vision and mission for the day from the beginning - and build your team around that. For us that meant a planner who specialized in private residence and a private chef who could curate a really special menu. \n\n\\-Your budget probably will double. It’s all a scale — if your budget was $40k, it’s going to end at $80k etc. Mine definitely did, and a lot of it was for infrastructure related things that guests never saw. Private residence is no joke. It was a lifelong dream for me, and my parents were grateful to make it happen and able to. But for anyone thinking about doing private residence it does come with a lot of cons and things you don’t think about. On the plus side, I truly didn’t have to make any compromises. There is no venue to tell you no and pretty much your wildest dreams can come true, which did make the process really fun. Do not even think of hiring a planner that hasn’t done private residence — it is an entirely different skillset. My planner had built a venue in the middle of the forest without running water or electricity. It just truly is a totally different can of worms. \n\n\\-Other random things that I’m really happy I did through the experience: \n\n\\*Dance lessons with my dad and also husband - truly such a highlight and an amazing memory. I had thought about skipping it but it was so much fun. \n\n\\*Dress shopping with my mom, SIL and Maid of Honor in NYC - I’m so glad I made a thing of it, and it was totally a highlight. \n\n\\*Find an incredible seamstress. I couldn’t have survived without mine, but again do your diligence and find someone you vibe with. In many ways they are one of the most important vendors and I think people overlook that. A good planner has a very good seamstress - my planner was very involved in everything related to my dress. \n\n\\*I started skincare prep about 17 months out. Monthly facials and micro-needling did the trick for me. Everyone is different, start early so you find what works for you. \n\n\\*Lymphatic drainage really does work. I started 6 months out, once a month then every week leading up and 3 times week of. I was truly snatched. \n\n\\*I’ve struggled with disordered eating and really didn’t want to go down that hole — I just wanted to feel strong on my wedding day. I focused on Whole Foods, protein, not restricting and worked out with a trainer 1x a week and 2 days of strength training at home. I’ve never felt better about food, and it actually healed a lot for me. \n\n\\*We had small wedding parties. We both have big friend groups but we are in our early 30s and we just didn’t want the big wedding party thing. I’m so happy I did that — truly do what you want whether it’s big or small. It has a huge impact on how you feel day of. \n\n\\*I did a mini bachelorette the week of. It was truly so much fun and such a great way to spend time with my friends the week of without planning a whole separate trip. Again, lean into what feels most you. Don’t do anything just to do it. \n\n\\*Didn’t compromise on guest list. Everyone there we wanted there, even with some family BS as everyone deals with. \n\n\\*We did an “Irish exit” of sorts - my biggest wedding nightmare was the lights turning on and us still being there. SO happy we did it and my planner and DJ executed it perfectly. \n\n\\*Before I hit 90 days out, I had done everything that was on me to do — like purchasing attire, gifts, all the little things etc. It made the last 60-90 so much easier because that is when the vendors “wake up” and start asking for things and I felt available for them because I wasn’t making returns every other day, or trying to decide about little things like vow books etc. \n\nI’m not really a big regrets person. It truly was the best day of my life and honestly, it was better than anything I ever envisioned. If I could say two things that may help others: \n\n\\-I wish I’d gotten more pictures in my veil.\n\n\\-In some photos I wish my husband and I were more aware/looking at the camera, but we were so in the moment and it’s very obvious so I really can’t complain. We have tons of amazing shots so that’s all that matters! \n\nBudget Breakdown - \\~ $360K \n\nPlanner - $41k (full-service) \n\nCreative Director - $8500\n\nFloral - $24k (incl ceremony install, my bouquet, escort table install, tabletop, bar install, some cocktail/extraneous floral, candle install, aisle petals, design mockup) \n\nStationery - $7060 (Invites and day of paper goods + tip) \n\nWebsite - $250 (custom square space made by planner) \n\nSTDs - $480 (Minted w/ custom illustration) \n\nTabletop Rentals - $14,500 \n\nLinens - $8100 \n\nRentals - $30,000 (chairs, tables, bars, tons of other things) \n\nTenting, Flooring, Pool Scaffolding, Heaters, Lighting, Labor, Trucking - $145,000\n\nPhotography - $17,200 (engagement, welcome, wedding) \n\nVideography - $7650\n\nFood - $15,200 (Private chef + food) \n\nCatering Staff - $5000 \n\nAlcohol - $8500 \n\nRestrooms - $999.00 \n\nTransportation - $2,000\n\nDJ/Sax duo - $7200 (incl tip) \n\nStrings - $870 (incl tip)\n\nHMUA - $9180 (incl tip & travel + night before, bride + moms + 3 bridesmaids)\n\nDessert - $4200 \n\nWeek of incidentals - $2500 (rain plan, pipe and drape to cover certain things) \n\n\\*Notes about budget: In LCOL area but far from major cities so travel was a big cost for non local vendors \n\n\\*Doesn’t include attire/accessories, rings, welcome party, gifts for vendors/wedding party, other small things, (vow books, hangers etc.) anything beauty related or a lot of hidden costs related to getting the property ready. \n\n\\*Welcome was about $20k (same guest count as wedding with full dinner, on private property so no venue fee) ","offTopic":true},{"id":"ff0b5a34-5b10-41b6-b2ef-08055987ebc0","excerpt":"(20k) 100 person wedding in Massachusetts, USA — We just got married a couple months ago, and now that the dust has settled, I wanted to share our budget breakdown and some details about things we spent vs saved on. Hopefully this can be helpful to some of you! Happy to answer questions.\n\nIn total, we spent just under ","url":"https://www.reddit.com/r/Weddingsunder10k/comments/1vuv0ti/20k_100_person_wedding_in_massachusetts_usa/","role":"demand","weight":0.72426665,"occurredAt":"2026-08-21T22:41:15.000Z","sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","credibility":0.62,"venue":"Weddingsunder10k","intent":"tool_discovery","painScore":0.12,"sentiment":0.071428575,"confidence":0.64666665,"matchedPatterns":["looking_for","product:canva"],"statement":"I made a post about our budget venue search previously if you're in the same area & still looking for a venue.","title":"(20k) 100 person wedding in Massachusetts, USA","body":"We just got married a couple months ago, and now that the dust has settled, I wanted to share our budget breakdown and some details about things we spent vs saved on. Hopefully this can be helpful to some of you! Happy to answer questions.\n\nIn total, we spent just under $20k. With reselling, we're down to $19k, and we're hoping to get down to a final net total of about $18k once everything is sold.\n\nCaveats:\n\n* My wedding dress was free-- my sister bought it used for $400 and wore it at her wedding, and then gave it to me. I spent money on alterations, though, which is included in the budget breakdown. (I'm also planning to sell the dress to cover the cost of alterations.)\n* Our parents paid for our photographers, which helped a lot! So professional photography is not included in the breakdown. \n\n**BUDGET BREAKDOWN:**\n\nhttps://preview.redd.it/i8zcl21iwskh1.png?width=1366&format=png&auto=webp&s=e905e7c1e67c2bcf142bac9c1a7f881523c13240\n\n**THINGS WE SAVED ON:**\n\n* **Wedding planner/coordinator:** skipped! my husband and I were the planners, and we work for free! (Just don't tell my job how many work hours I spent wedding planning)\n* **DJ:** skipped! We made Spotify playlists, rented a sound system from our venue for about $150 (included in the \"venue\" total above), and had a family member emcee when we needed announcements. We spent a long time working on our music selection and arranging/reordering songs and it definitely paid off-- our dance floor was packed all night!\n* **Decor/florals:** skipped the florist! Instead, we did a combination of high quality faux florals that we got on FB marketplace + DIY dried flower bud vase arrangements. We used the faux florals all over the venue and at our sweetheart table, and used the bud vases as centerpieces. For the DIY, we ordered the dried flowers online, got a bunch of bud vases from FB marketplace, and spent a couple weekend afternoons making arrangements together. We got tons of compliments on these, and they were both cheaper than a florist and less stressful than DIYing fresh flowers. And as a bonus, since all our florals were \"shelf stable,\" we were able to resell them after the wedding to recoup some of the cost. Other budget/DIY decor we did:\n   * We got freeze-dried flower petals to scatter down the aisle instead of fresh. I'm not sure whether this was cheaper, but it was completely hassle-free (and you honestly couldn't visually tell the difference from far away).\n   * I designed our table numbers and made them on my Cricut (and got frames for the table numbers on FB marketplace, of course). I even used a free trial of the Cricut premium subscription to avoid paying (lol)\n   * We got pillar candles and hurricane vases used on FB marketplace for a steal! The candles were pre-burnt but still in great shape, so we just cleaned up the vases and stuck the candles back down with some putty. Sticking the candles to the center helped them burn really evenly and kept the vases clean, so I was able to resell these after the wedding as well (and actually made a profit on them).\n   * I designed our seating chart on Canva, printed it at the library, and stuck the cards in a nice thrifted frame.\n* **Photobooth:** this was probably the craziest DIY logistics-wise-- I really wanted a photo guestbook with actual printed photo strips, plus I wanted guests to be able to take home photo strips as a favor/keepsake. But the cheapest photobooth quotes I could find were over $800, which felt crazy. So I ended up putting together my own iPad photobooth, complete with a big ring light, side lighting panels, backdrop, and a little photo printer! I already owned the iPad, and got the rest of the equipment from a combination of FB marketplace and Amazon. I can write a separate post about this if people are interested. It was a huge hit with all our guests, and I'm planning on selling everything (minus the iPad) as a bundle to hopefully make our money back.\n* **Hair, makeup, nails:** I did my own makeup, and a friend very kindly did my hair for me. I had to buy some new makeup supplies since I don't wear a lot of makeup normally, so this wasn't free, but it was way cheaper than hiring a professional. I made my own press-on gel nails using supplies I already had, so those were free!\n\n**THINGS WE SPENT ON:**\n\n* **Suit:** my husband previously only had a cheap suit that didn't fit very well, so we decided we could afford to get him a nicer one. I think this was totally worth it for us, especially since he can rewear it as much as he wants.\n* **Rings:** gold is unfortunately just really expensive right now, so there wasn't much we could do here.\n* **Venue/food/alcohol:** I actually think our venue package was a great deal, but we do live in a super expensive area. It wasn't the absolute cheapest option we found, but we thought it hit the right balance between cost and workload for us. I made a post about our budget venue search previously if you're in the same area & still looking for a venue. We also decided to spend when it came to alcohol-- we had a consumption bar, but we just told all our friends it was open because we wanted people to drink as much as they wanted. Our bar total ended up being just under $3k with tax and gratuity.\n\nMy biggest takeaways: FB marketplace/secondhand stuff is your best friend, especially if you live in a dense, high cost of living area where the reselling market tends to be more active. And your labor is probably your greatest cost-saving asset (though sometimes it can be worth it to spend some money to save your time and energy for more important things-- everyone has a different balance).\n\nGood luck planning!!!","offTopic":true}],"breakdown":[{"sourceKey":"reddit","sourceName":"Reddit","count":5}],"total":5}}