They booked the first slot of the day at a city register office in February, which is the least romantic sentence I have ever written about one of my favourite weddings.
Eight o’clock, a Tuesday, four degrees. Two witnesses, both of whom had come straight from a night shift. A bouquet the size of a fist, made by Saoirse the evening before out of whatever the market had left.
Why they did it that way
Not money, although it was cheaper. Not family pressure, although there was some. They did it because they had been together eleven years and the idea of a Saturday in front of a hundred people made them both go quiet.
What they wanted was to be married, and to have breakfast. That was the entire brief, and I have rarely been given a better one.
Nothing about a wedding has to be big to be serious. The register office ceremony is the same eleven minutes and the same words as the cathedral.
The room
Municipal carpet, three rows of chairs, a radiator ticking, and a registrar who had clearly done this ten thousand times and still paused in the right places. Light from one tall sash window on the left, cold and grey and completely beautiful.
People assume these rooms are hard to photograph. They are the opposite. There is nothing in them, which means there is nothing to compete with two faces.
Eleven minutes, two witnesses, and a radiator ticking through the vows.
And then breakfast
We walked four streets to a café that opens at seven and does not take bookings. They ate a full breakfast in a wedding dress and a wool coat while the owner, who worked out what was happening somewhere around the second cup of tea, refused to charge them.
Three hours of coverage, start to finish. About two hundred and forty photographs. It is the shortest wedding I have ever been paid for and it is in my portfolio twice.
If you are thinking about this
- Book the earliest slot. The building is empty, the light is low and soft, and you have the entire rest of the day still in front of you.
- Winter is not a problem. Grey city light is even and kind, and a heavy coat over a dress is one of the best things a camera can be given.
- Choose the second location before the first. Where you go afterwards matters more than the room you sign in. That is where the photographs happen.
- Tell people afterwards, not before. Every couple I know who has done this says the same thing: the announcement was the fun part, and it was better once it was already true.
What it costs
A three-hour morning like this sits well below my elopement collection, and I keep a handful of weekday dates open each season specifically for them. Ask. The worst that happens is I am already booked.
The photograph they printed
Not the ceremony. Saoirse on the register office steps at twenty past eight, coat open, bouquet in one hand, laughing at something off to the left, with an entirely empty grey street behind her.
It is on the wall in their kitchen at about a metre wide. Every person who visits asks about it.
— Amanda