I was boujee on a budget with my £380 micro wedding of less than 30 – the venue was the ‘biggest save’
NEARLY every woman dreams of having a big white wedding but as the cost of everything goes up, big ceremonies might be a thing of the past.
In fact, one woman spent just £380 on her big day and is now encouraging other women to save on their ceremonies.
Ironically, Amber Rainbow had a very different vision for her wedding when she first met her husband Jake five years ago.
Their love story also began in an unconventional way too as a chance meeting at the Portsea Hotel changing everything.
At the time, Amber had been due to go travelling around Europe when she caught Jake’s eye and the pair exchanged details.
For months nothing happened between them, until she finally returned to Australia and the couple finally were able to have their first date.
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Having worked as a bridal make-up artist and dreamt about her big day for five years, she’d been convinced that she’d have a big wedding when he popped question on their anniversary.
As they planned their ceremony, things soon began to change.
Recalling the preparations, she told Narvi Jewellery: “We didn’t really know what we were doing when we first started planning the wedding.
“Like the rest of the cost of living in Victoria, the prices of a regular wedding are becoming pretty unrealistic for the average couple.”
Rather than call off their big day, the couple decided to scale back their plans and opt for a micro wedding after doing some research.
There was another reason why the couple want to save as well, after the makeup artist discovered she was expecting her first child.
“When we first got engaged the planning was all for a big wedding at a fancy venue with all the bells and whistles,” she revealed, adding: “…a positive pregnancy test changed all that and we decided to scale down because we wanted to be married before our daughter came along.”
Unlike traditional ceremonies, the couple decided to use an elopement company help them who organised the ceremony, celebrant and wedding fees for just £387 ($750).
With such a small fee, the engaged couple were only allowed 30 guests at the wedding and had to invite beloved guests to the reception only to save on costs.
“It was difficult but the way we organised the ceremony was to invite immediate family, so parents, grandparents, siblings and our bestest of friends who would be in the bridal party,” she explained, with Amber shocked by how understanding everyone was.
Limiting the number of guests wasn’t the only saving they made, as the couple had the ceremony at Amber’s parents house to save on venue fees – after being quoted over £10,000.
She added: “The venue was the biggest save...I was really shocked when we first started getting quotes for the wedding with the total cost coming to over £10,200 for the majority of the places we enquired with.”
Breaking tradition, they also had cocktail party at the reception rather a sit down meal which cost them just £10 per head.
The savvy bride-to-be even decided to get craft and created multiple DIYs for her intimate wedding, including a welcome sign she made for just £5.
“I made my own welcome sign by getting a clothing rack for £5 and some £1 gold spray paint. I then printed out a sign from Canva which was about £10 to print, while the premade signs I found were £75-ish or more,” she revealed, urging other brides to jump on Tiktok and Instagram for inspiration.
Amber also cut costs by using £1 ($2) faux flowers and £1 photo frames from the charity shop to decorate the reception venue.
After sharing her thrifty hacks on Tiktok, it wasn’t long until the bride began to go viral and quickly gained over 1.7 million likes.
She told the ethical jewellery brand: “I didn’t expect it [her TikTok] to blow up, it’s quite nice knowing I am helping those who want a boujee wedding but didn’t have a massive budget, the same as me. It was overwhelming but I love that it’s helped others.”
She added: “You don’t have to break the bank to have the perfect day, it shouldn’t be about outdoing another or feeling the pressure because of social media.
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It should be about making your beautiful commitment special for yourself and your love.”
The family are now looking forward to a bright future, with enough left over from their wedding for a caravan to enjoy holidays together.
