Distance to Venue

We live in London and got married in Yorkshire, where I grew up! Most of our guests travelled almost 200 miles from all over the country. Two actually travelled back to Scotland that evening. Others came from Ireland, Canada, Spain, and France. My brother and his family live in Singapore, but we managed to get married when they were planning to be in the UK anyway. I did feel a bit guilty about asking people to come so far, but people would have had to travel wherever we got married, and they seemed quite happy to make a trip of it. I suppose those for whom it was a problem just turned down the invitation.

20 miles isn't really that far, it's probably less than an hour's drive. I don't think it's that much more than 15, which you were prepared to do.

Our guests will be travelling quite a distance too. We live in North Yorkshire and are getting married there but it's a big venue and still over an hours drive away from home. We have guests coming from the same location as us, but also from County Durham, the Lake District, Bristol and even Devon so wherever we picked would have meant travelling for most people anyway. It's great though, because due to the distance I don't often see my Aunts and Uncles, but most of us are staying at the venue the night before too so will have time for a nice meal together and a catch up!

I'm expecting guest to travel about an hour or two away - including evening guests - there's nowhere that would have been close to people as all of our friends and family are all over the place

There is a distance of 23 miles between our Church and venue, there were no other venues more local that I liked and it will definitely be worth the travel (I hope!) x

We're getting married in the Midlands but we live in London. Guests will be coming from all over the country. 20 miles sounds fine - when we first got engaged my Mum came out with this completely random rule that the venue should be within 20 miles of my family home. Ours is actually 25 miles away - thankfully she got over her initial suggestion!

I think you can help people out as much or as little as your budget allows. You could put on buses if your budget stretches to it, but guests who want to be there will be there regardless of whether transport is arranged. We've been to all sorts of weddings this summer - one put on transport everywhere, another expected guests to get from the church to the venue, which were a 30 minute drive apart, themselves. We made our own arrangements. I think the most important thing is to make it clear in your invites what you will be doing so people can plan in advance Good luck!

If everything is in one place, 20 miles is nothing. Are all/a lot of your guests coming from the same town? If so, a coach might be appreciated as it means people can drink and not worry about driving back, but is not essential.

Our furthest guests came from Germany, and within the UK we had quite a few people travelling over 2 hours to get to the wedding (including us, though obviously we went up the day before!). Most of them stayed overnight though, which I guess does make a difference. I'm not exactly sure what the maximum distance travelled by anyone who didn't stay over was.

We live in Bristol and all our family live in Yorkshire. They all just assumed we get married in Yorkshire and it came to a bit of a shock when we told them we'd picked a venue in Bristol's city centre and the reception after that was a 30 min drive to the outside of Bristol on the way to Bath. We didn't care. I think your wedding day is the one day you can be selfish and think about what is best for you and your partner and to make your day how you want it to be. We've laid on a mini bus for bridesmaids, parents and grandparents on the day (its free as my OH volunteers for a sea cadet unit and its their mini bus otherwise we wouldn't be doing it) but everyone else will have to sort themselves out. To be honest we are finding if you try and accommodate everyone at your wedding you end up compromising on things you may not want to compromise on. If people care about you and want to share your day with you they will do what is required to be there.

I'm from nr Wakefield, my fiancé is from Aberdeenshire originally but we now live in York. We're getting married in Filey on the East coast as I no longer have my dad and it's where I have lots of happy memories from holidays there as a family. His family will be travelling down from Scotland, which is around 6 1/2 hours and my family will travel for around 1 1/2 hours. Everyone will get plenty of notice so they can book a b & b if they want to stay as it'll be holiday season. Everyone will have to make their own way there if they want to come along. Mum has said 'what about a bus?' 'how will they get there?'. I've been to plenty of weddings and every time I've had to make my own way there. If people really want to be part of the celebration then they'll get there somehow.

I also thought this might be an issue but then remembered that all mine and H2B family live no-where near us anyways (my parents live in the middle east!) but I still wanted my venue to be kind of close to my house just for ease of planning etc.

My first choice is an 25-30min drive and my second choice (also visiting on Sunday) is 15 mins up the road.

I will be organising taxi/mini buses from the most popular used hotels on the day though as our venues are out int country

x

My thoughts exactly -when you try to please everyone then you end up pleasing no one! 20 miles really isn't that far. I am sure people can lift share, get a taxi or if they wish get a B&B / hotel.

Thanks all, that's very reassuring! Nearly all of our guests are from the same town (where we live) so that's why we were thinking of arranging transport but not sure if our budget would stretch to it or if many people would take up on it. The only reason we'd said 15 miles was because of my H2Bs grandparents who have apparently moaned about previous family weddings that are further away than that. They will be staying over night but can see it becoming an issue with the FILs, especially FMIL who came with us to look at a venue around 12 miles away and said "It's quite a way to go isn't it?" Just trying to avoid confrontation!

My Venue is 12 miles from the church.. The way i see it is if ppl care, they will make the effort. We're sending save the dates out a year in advance (its a bank holiday & school hols) If people cant save taxi fares or arrange something with a year in advance notice then theres something wrong! x

Thanks LeedsBride! We will be letting people know once we've booked somewhere and it will all be in one place which should help! We had really thought about putting on transport but these replies have made me think perhaps we're being too generous!