Weddings are back – but at a price
With more and more couples choosing to get married abroad, it's a big spend for hosts and guests alike
Brigit Grant is the Jewish News Supplements Editor
The groom wore a traditional black suit. The bride wore a flowing white gown with a cathedral-style veil. The couple exchanged vows under a chuppah by Lake Como. The wedding cost in the region of £11m. When the nuptials of hedge fund manager Alan Howard to gluten-free chef Caroline Byron appeared in the papers last month and a kippah was spotted in the photos, the joy of realising it was a Jewish ‘do’ was tainted by what can only be described as that ‘sinking simcha feeling’. And as more details emerged – Lady Gaga’s performance (£1.2m), one month’s exclusive hire of the lakeside mansion Villa Olmo (£1.2m), flowers (£500,000) – the more that feeling grew.
For all the wrong reasons, an extravagant wedding with a giant price tag doesn’t bother us; until someone Jewish picks up the tab. “What will ‘they’ think?” is what we think self-consciously, albeit inwardly cheering our people’s good fortune. 
But we’d barely recovered from the £3m spend at the Beckham/Peltz simcha in Palm Beach before the ker-ching of the cash register sounded again for another Jewish couple. For couples who said “I do” at Dunstan Road in the Fifties or partied at the Doric Ballroom in Soho, this kind of extravagance is a mystery. But as some of them have been married for 60 years plus, they know the cost of their ‘big day’ had no bearing on the happy years that followed.
“It was the wedding your parents could afford,” reflects Gina Altman, who married her late husband, Stanley, in 1956. “It was still a lovely wedding.”
A lovely Jewish wedding these days has a very different complexion. Governed by the wishes of the couple, parents have been reduced to bank tellers allowed few opinions on even the guest list, and only after the first round of invites go out and some are declined. Invites to destination weddings are regularly declined by those without air miles or the desire to spend their summer hols in an over-priced paradise picked by someone else. The absence of the financially-stretched, however, is not a reason for excited couples to relocate.
Who cares if their only connection to Greece is that they enjoyed the film Mamma Mia! You don’t need the middle name Zorba to get married on Mykonos. And if there isn’t a Vito Corleone in the family, you can still smash the glass in Sicily. Speaking of smashing the glass, the popular Jewish wedding website is awash with destination weddings, which have been the new black (or should that be white?) for the longest time. The site founder Karen Cinnamon has done an extraordinary job gathering the most stylish simchas for inspiration and recommends the companies who provide the pizazz.
“There are only three things that make a great wedding, and how much you’re spending isn’t one of them,” says Karen (pictured, left). “The first is authenticity, the second, creating an experience, and, finally, making your guests feel comfortable and included.” As many of the ‘theme’ weddings on smashingtheglass.com look like a Merchant Ivory movie costumed by Givenchy, replicating them in real money depends on your needlework skills. But there are some on the site who have worked wonders with baskets and bunting that look beautiful, and as Karen says: “Always remember: your wedding is not meant to be a perfect day, but rather a day that truly celebrates you and your partner, the journey you’ve been on and the one on which you’re about to embark together.”
With no gatherings or travel during the pandemic , many about to embark on a life together had few choices. Marry in a mask? Unite in the garden? Or just put the whole caboodle on hold and wait for the green light. Ready. Set. Go. Weddings have returned and they’re bigger than ever, it seems. The planners are pushed to the limit, rabbis are being shuttled across the Med to officiate and popular wedding bands have more tour dates than the Rolling Stones. Take The Function Band. Award-winning and sought after, its managing director Dan Rosen, a sublime lead singer, was recently spotted with his musicians at Faro airport. After a birthday gig in the Algarve, the crew barely had time to kiss their families before hot-footing it to a wedding in the Balearics and then on to another in Marbella. Given that in 2019, the band travelled 500,000 miles, delivered 14,600 hours of songs and entertained 150,000 people, bookings for 2022 will see those numbers rise, long before they take their exhausted bows.
Bowing out of a destination wedding is tricky, and if the invite is from Brooklyn and Nicole or Alan Howard, unlikely to be turned down. Why say no to an invitation that includes flights and accommodation, but what do you give as a gift? Going also means outfits befitting the occasion and climate, but see how quickly temperatures rise if you don’t attend. “They didn’t speak to us again,” said a guest invited to a Riviera wedding, who prefers not to be named. “It was our third invitation and all of them were out the country. It was going to cost a fortune, so we said no to all of them.”
If you fear becoming a simcha pariah, accept them all, but RSVP with caution. If the foreign weddings are back to back, attending one in Israel then another in Ibiza the next day, it helps to charter your own plane and keep your luggage with you . Star simcha hairdresser Kym Mullem knows what it’s like to be at the mercy of baggage handlers and prays her hair tools arrive when she does. “I bought Apple air tags so I could trace them,” says Kym. “But it’s been really busy this year because Covid postponed weddings, so they are all happening at once. So I’ve done lots in the UK and already been to Mykonos, Crete and Ibiza. I also have my niece’s wedding in the South of France in September.”
Kym does wedding hair trials before the function, regardless of where it’s being held, but encourages an updo for hot locations. “If a bride wants her hair down we do lots of trials with products to make sure it stays. But I’m a perfectionist, so I make sure I’m organised. I do also love every minute of it.”
Kym was on locks duty at the recent spectacular wedding of Atlanta Beck to Joshua Platt in Ibiza and for the bride it was “the endless love and having family and friends under-one-roof for the entire trip that made the wedding a truly magical and unforgettable experience.” It is having all their relatives and friends with them on extended holidays that the couples enjoy most about the charrabang and why destination wedding planner Michelle Jacobs of elegantebymichellej.com is so busy sorting destinations. Without a planner or a Posh Beckham entourage to escort, keeping on top of it all is difficult for parents who have to worry about the ferrying of guests, the carrying of babies and aunts with sticks who can’t manage hills. Small wonder our cousins looked frazzled before hosting an August wedding in Italy on a rocky volcanic island; FYI no eruptions are scheduled. Challenging as it can be, Jewish parents tend to go along with what their children want if they can afford it and if that’s a chuppah in Chang Mai, so be it.
Once upon a time, the biggest wedding worry was finding a parking space near the Grosvenor Rooms, but since the Cotswolds and Cancun replaced Willesden, the Waze app on your phone and a valid passport are what you need. Israel is 58 hours away (3,432 miles) via the A3, and is a popular and spiritual alternative to marrying here. We do still play our part in the UK wedding industry, which is worth £10bn annually. The average spend, however, is £27,000, so Lady Gaga won’t be at many, and without a platinum-selling artist or a drama, those weddings won’t make the papers.
Thank you for helping to make Jewish News the leading source of news and opinion for the UK Jewish community. Today we're asking for your invaluable help to continue putting our community first in everything we do.
For as little as £5 a month you can help sustain the vital work we do in celebrating and standing up for Jewish life in Britain.
Jewish News holds our community together and keeps us connected. Like a synagogue, it’s where people turn to feel part of something bigger. It also proudly shows the rest of Britain the vibrancy and rich culture of modern Jewish life.
You can make a quick and easy one-off or monthly contribution of £5, £10, £20 or any other sum you’re comfortable with.
100% of your donation will help us continue celebrating our community, in all its dynamic diversity...
Engaging
Being a community platform means so much more than producing a newspaper and website. One of our proudest roles is media partnering with our invaluable charities to amplify the outstanding work they do to help us all.
Celebrating
There’s no shortage of oys in the world but Jewish News takes every opportunity to celebrate the joys too, through projects like Night of Heroes, 40 Under 40 and other compelling countdowns that make the community kvell with pride.
Pioneering
In the first collaboration between media outlets from different faiths, Jewish News worked with British Muslim TV and Church Times to produce a list of young activists leading the way on interfaith understanding.
Campaigning
Royal Mail issued a stamp honouring Holocaust hero Sir Nicholas Winton after a Jewish News campaign attracted more than 100,000 backers. Jewish Newsalso produces special editions of the paper highlighting pressing issues including mental health and Holocaust remembrance.
Easy access
In an age when news is readily accessible, Jewish News provides high-quality content free online and offline, removing any financial barriers to connecting people.
Voice of our community to wider society
The Jewish News team regularly appears on TV, radio and on the pages of the national press to comment on stories about the Jewish community. Easy access to the paper on the streets of London also means Jewish News provides an invaluable window into the community for the country at large.
We hope you agree all this is worth preserving.
