All the bells and whistles for a budget, any tips?

What about insisting that no-one buys presents but brings a buffet dish instead???

If no buffet, have a fish and chip van?

Village hall for a venue?

Bring your own booze?

Only have 1 bridesmaid and buy the dress in the sales (high street)

Don't bother with favours. We went to a wedding where everyone just had a party mask in their places, it was great fun and I've only just thought about the fact that there were no favours.

2nd hand dress

Use candles/fruit/wine/cupcakes instead of flowers for centrepieces.

Do your own or get a friend to do your hair/make-up

Make invitations/vistaprint/emails etc

Get guests to think of 2 songs that they would like played, get them on itunes and make a playlist that you can play yourself - you would need to hire some decent speakers.

Marks and Spencers wedding cake/make your own

Are you prepared to compromise on venue, month and day of the week?

The idea of DIY excites me

A few comments:

- Invites & stationary : I'm a graphic designer so will DIY

- Flowers : Will probably look at artificial and DIY

- Dress : Last time I didn't have a 'proper dress' just a £30 one as got married abroad. However I have looked at the idea of renting a dress. Found a local place that does it for £150

- Suits : A friend had the men wear their own suit but provided a matching shirt and tie for the men. I like this idea

- Venue : Village hall is the favourite for the reception Means we can do most ourself

The biggest expense is going to be the ceremony, but last time I eloped so I am willing to spend on this to make it beautiful

Fish and chip can sounds tempting... Off to research!

Our daughter did pretty much the same as you want ie., sit down round tables and a top table but had a hot buffet of barbecued food, salads, baked potatoes, dips etc. for 100 people sat down. They also married at 3pm to avoid having separate evening do but they had two wedding cakes instead one of which was a pork pie cake which the venue cut up and served with peas at around 9.30pm which went down a treat. They married in a hotel and restaurant which was well-known for fabulous food and great scenery - it's in the middle of nowhere so lots of open countryside which was the priority for them. Personally, I think you may be struggling with £2-£3000. Don't forget it's not just the venue and food that you have to allow for. You need to add on the cake, the wine if you're having it on the tables, the DJ, and any little extras such as table decorations, favours etc. You could do it within your budget but depends on what you class as a big flashy wedding!

If you're set against a church or the local register office, that means paying for a registrar to come out, which alone could cost a quarter of your budget. Then you say you're thinking of a reception in a village hall, which implies a different venue for the ceremony, so you'll have to pay hire costs for both a ceremony and a reception venue?

-If having a buffet, contact your local catering college & see if any students can serve/man the tables/drinks etc

- tescos/asda often have 25% off bottles of wine. Cask wine can be very good nowadays & if the cask is kept behind the bar, none of the guests will know its not from an expensive bottle. You can also buy small beer kegs.

- I think its M&S & morrisons offer free glass hire if you buy the booze from them.

- Ebay & charity shops are great for vases & other bits for centrepieces. Fruit/wood/leaves/potted plants can all be used & recyled or eaten later on

- Depending where you live, Smithfield market in London is great for meat & deli items. 5kg chicken breast for £16 for example. They sell whole suckling pig too, along with sausages, bacon, beef, pork- everything really. They have 2 deli shops that sell trays of cakes, slices, wheels of cheese, pates, bulk dressings & sauces & frozen goods.

- M&S wedding cakes are very good. If you have a friend handy a coloured ribbon, you can buy plain, iced fruit cake from asda, which come in 3 sizes & do your own cake. http://groceries.asda.com/asda-estore/search/searchcontainer.jsp?trailSize=1&searchString=celebration+cake&domainName=Products&headerVersion=v1&_requestid=341556

- A friend made her own paper pom poms that hung from the ceiling. They looked great & were really cheap to make.

Thank you all for your help. More comments:

Evening entertainment: Friend is in a band who we both love, would ask him to perform in evening (he's already offered it reduced) and then do an ipod disco after (have speakers already)

Ceremony Location : We're not religous at all so a church is out, plus our registry office isn't big enough. So thats out too (as well as it being particularily not good, lol). We unfortunately don't have a choice on paying out for the ceremony location as there really isn't another option. I'm desperate to have everyone see me get married as last time we had only had two strangers as witnesses and I regret it big style now. It's going to cost us but ho hum

Reception Location: We can't have our ceremony and reception at the same place without having to pay out ALOT for food. I've been through the list of everywhere in the local area with a wedding license and none of them allow you to bring in caterers or DIY with food. It's all packages of minimum £20 a head and then drink.

Alcohol: I work in a food wholesaler so can buy all drinks for wholesale price

I know we're pushing it, but we have no savings and can only save about £100 a month. We really don't want to have to wait much longer than 2-3 years.

I kick myself as my parents completely paid for my last wedding and annoyingly it was to the wrong guy, lol.

I don't know if this is possible but can you get married in another registry office?Where I grew up the registry office was a 1960s concrete monstrosity but my current local one is a lovely Georgian building

Yes. we did 120 guests -sit down buffet and a second buffet in the evening at alocal pub function room/garden, church ceremony with wine and cake for all, musicians at ceremony and at reception, DJ.... and all for around £3K.

How? Call in favours wherever you can, make your own stationery and decorations, go for an inexpensive dress (mine was £60 from Monsoon outlet andf I customised it for £20), no bridesmaids or best man, cash bar at the reception (we had welcome drinks and toast and no one minded having to buy their own after that) and forget the fripperies. Favours? Who cares?!

You just need to prioiritse what is really important to you and not get swept along, particularly by everyone else expectations (and that includes other brides!)

Everyone has given some really good advice. It takes a bit of work but keeping costs low is very achievable.

You said about looking at DIY flowers. This is what I've done https://www.weddingbee.com/real-weddings/ feathers are really cheap and the final bouquet looks great. My example below is only my tester - I will shorten the coque feathers in my final one.

DM - stunning flowers!

Have just looked at other registry offices and discovered a venue next to a registry office in a town about 30 minutes away. They have a license and allow you to do DIY on catering. Plus I've just discovered a friend from uni is now the events manager there, lol. So have txt him!

£660 for exclusive hire for the whole day, would need to pay a registrar on top but not bad!

Another option would be to ask your local council for halls to hire. Town Halls usually allow outside caterers and/or mobile bars.

I know you don't want to get married in a registry office and you want everyone to see the ceremony, but we found that getting a registrar out was more expensive (and we also wanted to get married outside). We are getting around it by doing the official bit the day before with 2 witnesses and then having a 'fake' ceremony at the wedding. As far as we are concerned the registry office is just paperwork, and the ceremony we create on the day is our actual wedding in front of all our friends and family. Its also much cheaper!

Been doing some research and found that you are right, having the ceremony and reception in the same place would be a good way of saving money

Have found a nice (actually gorgeous) venue about 30 minutes away that is £630 hire for 11am - midnight and includes use of kitchen, tables, chairs, cutlery, cash bar (with stock) and bar staff

Even better they are having a wedding fayre there in 2 weeks so we can go properly snoop.

Also spotted another stunning venue an hour away that does a similar package for £200 The £630 is much better located and nicer to be honest but I think we'll research both.

Now to look at caterers for the buffet / breakfast. We'd only be doing one meal to cut back on costs and think I will look at only having the main course and then possibly the wedding cake as desert