New Years Eve Wedding?

Hypothetically...what do you think of a wedding on New Years Eve?  Specifically, I'd like to have a cocktail party starting at 9 or 10, with lots of booze and passed appetizers but no sit down dinner.  Then, we'd have the ceremony just after midnight followed by cake and champagne and it's all over by 2.  Thoughts?  I love the idea, and so does the BF, if I can manage to swing it but I'm not sure how other people would react.  I feel like it's a way to have a wedding-wedding but our way, without a lot of the formality and traditions that just don't seem us.  I like the idea of a pre-ceremony party, too.  We wouldn't have a DJ or band, or things like first dances, just an iPod playing music at a volume that allows people to hear themselves think.  Anyway, fun and swanky or weird and tacky? 

The only problem I could see is staying up late enough to see you get married. In my younger days, I tended to party so hard before midnight that anything after midnight is a bit blurry.  And now that I am old with a kid I struggle to stay up till 11 even on special occasions. 

I have been to a New Years eve wedding and it was a great way to spend the night.  No worries about what to do and spending a fortune just to get into some stupid bar/club.  But it was traditional in the fact that the ceremony was at 6pm, followed by dinner, dancing etc and wrapped up around 1. 

At the end of the day, it's your big day so do what you want.  You'll never please every one, so you may as well do what you like! 

Hi   Congrats on planning your wedding!  My old boss is actually having a New Year's Eve wedding but she is getting married during the day...A few of the issues that she's had is finding someone to marry them that is available on that particular day and flowers!  All of the flower shops she has contacted so far all seem to be closed the week before her wedding...She still doesn't know what she is going to do about it  

At the end of the day, it is YOUR day.  To hell with what others think   In my honest opinion, no matter how many accommodations you make for others, someone is always going to find something wrong.  Plan it the way YOU want and let the others deal with it   Good luck!! 

It is your day and you should do what you want.

That being said, I probably would not attend a NYE wedding held that late.

It is your day and you should do what you want.

That being said, I probably would not attend a NYE wedding held that late.

Agreed you should do whatever makes you happy, but  I would add that lots of people have rituals and preferences for NYE and might choose not to attend because of those reasons, some people really like being with their families on NYE for instance.

I have my own NYE traditions and unless you were a very close friend would probably decline a NYE wedding invite. If you were a close friend I  might feel a bit resentful of you. 

A friend of mine had a christmas day wedding in London, she was really disappointed as so few attended, it looked gorgeous but it would involve staying overnight and everywhere was expensive around that time, no public transport, people needed to get home to their families, own traditions etc.

As it's so late, finding baby sitters would be difficult for your guests as well, and it would be harder on the older people to be up so late.

I think it might be one of those things which is lovely in theory...but I do believe it's your day and if you want it on NYE you should go for it.

I think it would be so much fun and a great thing to do!
Everyone does something for NYE anyway - why not come celebrate with you and have drinks and dance?
You may not have 100 people but really the people who will come will be your close friends and family that WANT to celebrate with you so DO IT!

It's your wedding and gosh every year you have a special night with fireworks ;-)

Sounds like a fab idea but I'd be concened about getting a registrar willing to do that time - might be better to do the ceremony in the evening followed by the party.

Sounds like a fab idea but I'd be concerned about getting a registrar willing to do that time - might be better to do the ceremony in the evening followed by the party.

This is exactly what I was going to post!

I personally hardly ever go out on NYE anyway for the sheer expense of all the parties and door fees and such so I wouldn't have a problem with it. But I'm planning our wedding now and kids are a huge expense - we're going to be lucky to get a registered childminder for under £1000 for the day to look after 5 kids, and some companies won't operate them past 9pm because "kids should be in bed by then". So the logistics for your friends with children would be tricky to say the least...

We'd be having it in the States, so I plan to get one of my friends ordained to perform the wedding.  So no issue there on finding an officiant.  Also, I don't have any friends with kids so the only people who need a baby-sitter would be family, for my younger cousins.  They would be invited to the wedding and honestly, except for the infants--they totally can stay up past midnight.   When they stay at my mom's, it's a struggle to get them settled down and in bed by 10:30-11.  And the venue would be walking distance from two of my Aunts' houses so it'd be fairly easy for the people with kids to duck out soon after the ceremony was over.  Or send their husbands with the kids.  

It's my experience that most of my friends (and me!) tend to scramble on the 30th for something to do on New Years, most of them don't have rituals.  The one exception is a Russian friend, for whom New Years is like Christmas.  Honestly, though, he's also an ex to whom I've stayed friendly (and have been close to his gf since we were in middle school) so I'm not toooo worried about him deciding not to show.  We'd only be inviting about 80 people, anyway, expecting about 60-70 even on a non-New Years night.  I'm not planning on inviting everyone I've ever met anyway.  Most of BF's family and friends won't make the trip over from England anyway.  As far as flowers...well, there's no budget for flowers anyway, so no worries there! 

Thanks for your feedback everyone!

It sounds fun, but I'd be nodding off by midnight.

I think my only reservation if I were planning something like this is where people would stay and/or how they would get home--I would probaly only attend a wedding like this if it was held in a hotel that I could also stay at or at least really close to one where I was staying. The last thing I'd want to do after a wedding is drive myself home at 2am on New Year's Eve with a bunch of drunk people on the road!

http://offbeatbride.com/2008/07/tacky

The whole how to get people home thing did occur to me, but there's a large B&B about a 5 minute walk from the potential venue. And like I said, two of my Aunts also live very nearby so presumably, at least some out-of-town family guests would stay there.  My bigger concern would be my friends who would be coming from the city, as there's no public transport at that time of night into the city so I'd feel bad about them having to pay for a hotel.  But they might have to do that anyway, even if it were a different night.   

And yea, yea, Cali Girl, I've seen that on OBB.  Thing is, I think not being considerate and courteous to your guests IS tacky.  And, to me, that makes things like cash bars and addressing your own envelopes for thank you notes at showers tacky while things like red wedding dresses just fun.  *shrug*