The short answer: as much or as little time as you’ve got.
How much time have you got? Planning a wedding can take as little as six weeks, or as long as six years. The length of time really depends on you, what you want and the details you want to create.
Planning your wedding should be fun. It should give you a chance to be creative. For instance, pitching in ideas like Casino Hire with games like blackjack, roulette, or stud poker to supply a constant source of entertainment to your guests can highlight your creativity. Or perhaps pitching the idea of chocolate fountain can represent your creative muscles. Or giving chocolates wrapped in customized “Thank You” wrappers (As wedding favours) can portray your creativity.
Anyway, remember, planning your wedding should be an opportunity for you to enjoy designing your once in a lifetime event. For some people though, wedding planning can be stressful. Not giving yourself enough time to plan is one reason for this stress. Or having too much time and adding lots of ‘extras’ can also be a reason for the stress to pile up. And, while solutions like these stress drops can help give you some relief, there are also some things that you should consider when planning your wedding in order to minimise the stress as much as possible.
It’s all about choices and compromises.
The more complicated your wedding, the more time you’ll need. If you want to get married in two months, you can. Absolutely. But you might not have the time to delicately craft and create your own invites. However, if you’re not so fond of breaking your head with all the planning, you can get Married whenever you please with the help of a wedding planner who could do all the planning for you. You might not be able to make all the decorations yourself. What are you happy to compromise on? What are you 100% set on having, and how much time will that non-negotiable task take? Factor this into your planning timescale.
So how long do you really need to plan a wedding?
A recent article in The Independent found the average wedding takes 528 hours to plan. Which is equivalent to 14 weeks of FULL-TIME work!
We don’t think putting a number or a time limit on wedding planning works. Every wedding is different and with that, it brings its own challenges and timeline.
It comes down to three things:
- Budget
Do you need more time because you need to save up enough money? Factor how much money you can save each month and compare this to your planned budget. The number of months it will take for you to reach your budget target is the number of months you’ll need to plan your wedding. You can find out more about how much a wedding costs at Hargate Hall here.
- Band. Supplier.
Have you got your heart set on a venue or band, but they are booked until 2023? That’s how you can then plan your wedding timeline. That’s how much time you need.
- Worry and stress.
Will it cause you more anxiety by having more time to think and panic and add things to your to-do list? You really don’t need as much time as you think. Make quick decisions depending on your’s and your partner’s choices and execute the whole wedding according to that. If required, look for methods to reduce stress and anxiety. Yoga, meditation, and a few cannabis products (you can buy weed in newmarket or elsewhere, either from a local dispensary or online) might help you achieve a better hold on wedding stress.
The last thing you want is to feel like you’re running out of time.
You don’t want to be working around the clock in the last few weeks before your wedding.
One of the best things you can do is to set a fake end date. Trick your brain into thinking the deadline is a month before your wedding day. You want and need time to relax, time to switch your brain off or deal with last-minute emergencies before the wedding. A month before the big day is the time you need to start stepping away from planning.
Don’t let your wedding fill all the time. It will try. It will push and pull and expand and squeeze into all the corners of your life. Make sure you keep it in a tight box.
If you feel like things are spiralling or piling on top of you in the last few weeks before the big day, it might be a great opportunity to hire an on-the-day wedding coordinator. Someone to step in and take away your stress, making sure your day runs as smoothly as possible. Find out more about on the day wedding coordination.
If you have two years to plan a wedding, it will take you two years. If you have two months to plan, guess what? It will take you two months.
How long are you spending on planning your big day?