Are laid-back nuptials over?
Celebrity trends suggest second weddings can be much, much bigger than the first
While Roman Catholicism still has a fraught relationship with divorce, in many other communities second weddings barely raise an eyebrow these days. Not only this but, increasingly, they’re becoming far grander occasions than the first.
Among the more high-profile names:
Meghan Markle: When the Suits actress married Trevor Engelson in September 2011, she opted for a laid-back ceremony on a beach in Jamaica. “Wild partying” was said to be involved. Their marriage lasted just shy of two years. Toning down the wildness in her second wedding, to Prince Harry, will be wise when the couple tie the knot next month. But it will otherwise be a far grander event than her first, with royalty and celebrities among the 600 guests.
Gwyneth Paltrow: In 2003, the actress and Coldplay frontman Chris Martin quietly tied the knot in Santa Barbara, Calif., reportedly with no family or friends present. After she and Martin “consciously uncoupled” in 2014, Paltrow, according to rumour, may have had a recent secret second wedding to Brad Falchuk, her television writer fiancé, which was dubbed an “engagement party.” Speculation swirled that the couple hosted a lavish black-tie party at the Los Angeles Theatre and believed to have included such guests as Steven Spielberg, Kate Hudson, Julia Roberts, Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston.
And where the rich and famous lead, the rest of us follow. Hamish Shephard, founder of wedding planning app Bridebook, is among those in the business who have witnessed the recent trend in second weddings that are bigger and better than the bride’s or groom’s first.
“It often depends on the age of the couple,” he says. “If it’s an older couple with grown-up children, that’s when it’s more of a (simple) blessing and can be a lunchtime occasion. But a lot of people are getting remarried in the earlier stages of life — 22 per cent of divorced men remarrying are in their 20s or 30s — and that’s when it’s as big, if not bigger (than their first wedding). They want to do something different.”
A second marriage would traditionally be a more low-key affair in a register office. But, he points out, “that’s a bygone era.”
Since approved premises were first permitted as wedding venues under Britain’s Marriage Act in 1994 — hotels, country houses, castles and so on — there’s been a surge in couples eschewing places of worship for their nuptials, with two-thirds now choosing alternative venues. With the downgrading of the place of religion in weddings has come the rejection of other conventions surrounding marriage, including those governing a second wedding.
The Knot, a wedding website, captures the mood in its article Second Wedding: Dos and Don’ts: “Whether it’s a super-formal extravaganza in a ballroom or a casual seaside celebration under the shade of a tent, you don’t have to limit yourself just because you’ve done it all before. Why not plan that reception you really wanted way back when but were led astray by a pushy mother-in-law?”
In short, the rules are: there are no rules. Divorce does not carry the stigma it once did, and the bashfulness surrounding remarriage is all but gone.