I now declare you man and wife ... and bankrupt

MICHAEL WOLSEY

TOP up your Revolut account, clear off your credit card and, if your bank will give you an overdraft, go get it now. The season of the super-spend is upon us. The demands are dropping through the door.

I’m not talking about bills; few companies send those in the post any more. The requests that will drive us into debt are sent by friends who want our company: invitations to weddings that will mean booking hotel rooms, possibly air tickets. and buying several sets of clothes – for afternoon and evening events, a ceremony in rainy Ireland and a party in sunny Cyprus.

When I got married, some 50 years ago, the traditional wedding breakfast had moved to lunch time and was called dinner. The height of glamour was a ‘sherry reception’ – that is to say, all the guests were handed a glass of sherry when they arrived. There was wine at the table. After that the guests bought their own drink and danced to music from a keyboard player and a guy with a guitar. Many of them stayed late into the evening, chatting to people they hadn’t seen in a while – but not to us; my new wife and I had left to start our honeymoon, in a B&B on the Antrim coast.

That’s pretty much how all Irish weddings were back then, except for those of the super rich. Today they involve a scale and expense that we used to associate with bar mitzvahs and giant Indian marriage ceremonies.

I know of a recent wedding before which the bride had two hen parties. One, which she called the ‘home hen’, was supposed to be for close friends and family, but actually involved about 30 women. And it wasn’t at her home, which is in Dublin, but at a hotel and other venues in Kilkenny. The ‘away hen’ was on one of the Canary Islands. The groom confined himself to just one stag party. But that wasn’t the model of restraint it might seem – the stag was held in Malta. The wedding itself was in Cyprus, which I’m told is very popular with Irish couples. It was a three-day affair, with pre-wedding parties and afterwedding parties. The whole thing, from ‘hen do’ to ‘I do’, stretched across several months.

The bride and groom in question have reasonably well-paid jobs but, even so, it will surely take them several years to pay for the excess of their wedding. Well, that’s their business. But what about their friends? They had to fork out for trips around Ireland, flights across Europe, hotel bills, appropriate clothes – and were still expected to stump up for a wedding present.

Age protects me from getting too many of these invitations but for young people it has become a real problem. A niece tells me she hates the wedding season. She can’t afford it and has run out of excuses. Last year she received invitations to four weddings in August alone. And that, remember, was when we were coming out of Covid. She shudders to think what this year will bring.

Modern Irish weddings often span a weekend and can sometimes last a whole week, so working couples are having to sacrifice annual leave time to attend. I know of one couple who have abandoned their own holiday plans, to give them time and money to attend the wedding of a relative, on an island they don’t particularly like, requiring a four-hour flight they will like even less. A survey has shown that, on average, Irish couples will spend between €25,000 and €36,000 on their wedding.

The big variation depends on whether the cost includes the bride’s dress (average price €1,725), wedding rings (€1,511) and engagement rings (€3,106). The photographer will set you back, on average €1,779 and if you want a video as well you can add €1,443 to the bill.

Optional extras include a selfie mirror (???) at €428 and €414 for botox and tanning. A wedding planner will set you back €1,956. Thankfully, we didn’t need one of those for our sherry reception.