A groom's guide to creating a unique and frugal wedding day

It’s her day, or at least that’s what we were told.

From the moment I bought the ring and dropped a knee on the skating rink that had become our favourite date spot; to a year and a half later at the small 30-person ceremony by the sea, an idyllic and particularly planned-out affair – I was reminded that weddings are for wives.

The wedding industry is rife with this messaging; anyone who’s gone through the process knows this. Sure, at one point amongst all the planning, I picked up a men’s mag with a wedding feature, but even that dismissed it as a laborious affair, a “here’s what you need to do to survive the big day” sort of approach.

Sadly, it’s what sells. But my wife-to-be and I weren’t buying it.

We were both stoked about our day, we were both excited about the possibilities, about creating something that was 50 per cent hers, 50 per cent mine and completely ours. So, humour me a little as I eschew the blueprint, and give you a little advice from a groom’s point of view, a groom who lived out the best day of his life exactly the way he wanted to.

The Ring(s)

The persistent one-month’s salary rule (or three months, as some would have you believe) isn’t entirely far off. But it’s the sentiment behind that which I found most valuable. Don’t overdo it, don’t spend more than you can recoup in a month and remember it’s a symbol. I went with a reasonably priced Toronto-based designer and shopped around for diamonds separately. It split the bill in half and allowed me time to budget and I ended up with a ring rooted in place with a story to tell.

For our wedding bands we asked our family if they had any meaningful rings from our ancestors we could melt down. We combined the family gold, (what!? the symbolism was sitting right there in front of us) and had it made into two rings also by a Toronto designer. In the end it cost a fraction of what the bands could have and we now wear this story on our fingers.

The Crew

My crew was a ragtag bunch of weirdos so it only made sense to give them the option to find some groomsmen gear that fit their budget. The request was simple: navy suit, brown luggage-coloured shoes and a matching belt. If they had one or all, great. For those who didn’t we tapped into the fall wedding sell-off to outfit them. We set a budget (under $500) and devoted a portion to making good suits great through tailoring.

As for the gifts, again, I opted to go the frugally meaningful route while still observing the tradition. People like to feel appreciated. In addition to buying their matching bowties and pocket squares, I bought each a unique lapel pin, something symbolic of our friendship. I also took advantage of the Massachusetts liquor laws and the obnoxious volume of airplane bottles those laws allowed them to stock in state liquor stores, to pick them each up an airplane bottle of their favourite drink, as well as a kitschy souvenir from Cape Cod and a small bottle of Tylenol for the morning after. The end result was a little gift bag, meaningful without going overboard.

The Day(s)

There’s no illusion we were in a unique place having such a small wedding (30 people) but it was by design. We wanted to do something special and intimate that fit our budget so that meant keeping the guest list impossibly small. But that doesn’t mean you can’t borrow from our model. Once we’d developed our guest list, we budgeted accordingly. When possible, we avoided wedding-specific vendors, which usually come at a premium and found multiple sources for each need from rentals to liquor to food services. We chipped away at it several nights a week, building and re-building our cost structure and gauging it against blogs and wedding sites estimating costs. Our goal was to beat their metrics with our own.

Here’s what we came up with:

For the rehearsal dinner we skipped the traditional sit-down and went with a clambake. Not only was it more lighthearted and nerve-loosening, but 30 impeccably-dressed Canadians in tacky lobster bibs makes for some bizarrely memorable wedding photos. It also proved to be more cost effective than a sit-down dinner.

The wedding day itself of was peppered with budget conscientious details. No wedding planner, just a carefully crafted day. My wife designed the place settings and I wrote “table talk” cards with quirky facts about each individual to add a special touch (I know, this gets more challenging the larger the guest list). My groomsmen, in full labourer mode, set the awning and chairs for the ceremony.

We ditched the full bar and instead enlisted a good friend and stellar bartender to produce two signature cocktails, one inspired by the bride and the other inspired by me. Two options batched beforehand, no other liquor required. We kept the bar to four types of local beer and four types of wine for each palate. We kept the ceremony, dinner and party all on the same property; cutting out the cab fares, travel time and venue rentals.

The end result was a unique day, one that married both our interests and shut out the voices telling us what a wedding should be. Maybe this day sounds a little too much like an idyllic imitation of an Alex Colville painting (it was, and we loved every moment of it) but the point is, it wasn’t anything but what we decided together.

We wanted a meaningful day that wouldn’t put us in debt. We wanted a day that was not just hers, but ours.