Rely on the richness of English traditions to plan a proper and sophisticated wedding.
Step One
Hold your ceremony at your local parish. Plan your reception in a hotel or restaurant or select a more unusual licensed venue, such as a castle, yacht club, pier or football field.
Step Two
Select a theme for your wedding so that it all coordinates and sets your wedding apart from other events. It might be as simple as a color you incorporate into your dress and decorations, or it could be based on your profession or interests (such as a military wedding).
Step Three
Request traditional wedding music, such as one of the favorite processionals, the "Wedding March" from Mendelssohn's "Midsummer Night's Dream."
Step Four
Begin the celebration on the way to the wedding by having young girls sprinkle flower petals on the ground to decorate the path to your new life.
Step Five
Prepare a horseshoe with ribbons that the bride can carry in the crook of her arm for good luck.
Step Six
Order a traditional English wedding cake, which is white with a fruitcake base. It is typically made of raisins, ground almonds and cherries and topped with marzipan (a special candy decoration). Place favors on top of the cake that you can hand out to guests.
Step Seven
Save the top tier of the cake, which is called the christening cake, to serve at your first child's baptismal ceremony.
Step Eight
Give a certificate of notice to the superintendent registrar of your district that you intend to be married. (If you and your fiance live in different districts, you must each do this separately.)
Step Nine
Understand that you are required to have lived in the district for more than 7 days before you can apply. Then there is another wait of 21 days before the marriage can take place.
Step Ten
Remember that the total cost to cover the attendance of the Superintendent of Registrar and the wedding service will vary from place to place.