Pink Wedding Days | Gay Marriage and Civil Partnerships Blog

Tuesday (March 27th, 2018) was World Theatre Day , and we thought what better way to celebrate than with some love quotes from William Shakespeare’s plays. Poems and readings make great additions to a wedding but there’s also room to include some romantic Shakespearean quotes on your invitations, on your personalised wedding website or even as table centrepieces at your wedding breakfast or reception. Shakespeare’s words about love and marriage aren’t just deeply moving, they’re also timeless. Adding a touch of sophistication, charm and emotion to your ceremony, the bard’s take on love, relationships and marriage should be easily recognisable to your guests, too.  There are so many plays and sonnets to choose from but we’ve picked some of our favourites from Hamlet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Love’s Labours Lost, The Tempest and, of course, Romeo and Juliet. We’d love to hear what your favourites are. Or maybe you’re more of a Kit Marlowe fan?  Did y...

Choosing a reading for a gay wedding can be tough.  Whether you want a short poem for your lesbian ceremony or a quirky non-secular take on your same-sex relationship , it’s a big deal. Maybe you want something humorous , too? Something profound ? Something that won't put your guests to sleep.  The English language is awash with poems about love and marriage , pithy observations about life as a couple, advice on relationships (conventional or otherwise) , and romantic tracts on what it means to love someone unconditionally. Straight couples have it easier here.  Most traditional wedding readings are well, traditional: him and her , he and she .  But if you’re finding that your favourite wedding readings are more skewed towards a heterosexual audience, then you can always mix up the pronouns: him and her to him and him, he and she to she and she.   What is a wedding reading? A reading is a written piece that’s spoken aloud d...

We’re really grateful to Hitched.co.uk for sharing the results of their recent survey of 2,000 brides with us , but isn’t it a shame that so many women worry unnecessarily about their wedding day? We’d love to know what you think about the numbers below.  Did you suffer from any jitters before your ceremony? If not, how did you cope with anxiety both in the lead-up to your wedding and on the day itself?  Findings released today from Hitched  confirm the nation’s biggest wedding worries. Hitched asked over 2,000 brides what they found themselves worrying about ahead of their big day to reveal the UK’s modern bridal worries from social media, to tanning and drunken family members. The number one worry for nearly three quarters (69%) of brides is the way they will look in their wedding photos . Younger brides worry about this 25% more than older brides, with almost four in five younger brides worrying about the way they will look. The top...

Sandon Hall in Staffordshire isn’t your run-of-the-mill wedding venue . For a start, it’s a stately home surrounded by over 400 acres of verdant countryside and gorgeous on the inside and out. Not far from Stoke , it’s easy to get to and even easier to fall in love with.  At Pink Wedding Days, we list a lot of gorgeous LGBT-friendly wedding venues , but there’s truly something special about Sandon Hall , and we think it should definitely be on your ceremony shortlist. We’d highly recommend you visit their next wedding fair on April 8th, 2018,  between 10am and 4pm. Here are our 5 reasons to say ‘I do’ to Sandon Hall 1)    On your wedding day, you deserve a grand entrance. Whether by carriage or car, the mile-long drive up to the estate will give you goosebumps.  Think Elizabeth Bennet arriving at Pemberley.     (Funnily enough, Sandon Hall featured in a 2011 episode of ‘Don’t Tell the Bride’ where the groom, Dav...

Fewer opposite-sex couples are getting married , that’s according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).  The latest figures available for 2015 show that there were 21.7 marriages per thousand unmarried men and 19.8 per thousand unmarried women : the lowest on record. These numbers are consistent with previous years as  f ewer people have been getting married since the 1970s. Same-Sex Couples 2015 is the first year  with a complete set of data on same-sex marriages.  T here were   6,493 in 2015 accounting for 2.6% of all marriages that year with  9,156 couples opting to convert civil partnerships .  Religious ceremonies were not as popular in 2015 with an 8% decrease from 2014.   Unsurprisingly, there were only 44 religious same-sex ceremonies in 2015,  and this number is  unlikely to rise so long as mainstream religious denominations continue to exclude gay couples. Almost all  of ...

The kids aren’t always alright, so what happens when you don't want children at your wedding?   For a start, expect to ruffle a few feathers.  You may have to accept that some guests won't attend if they have to leave the little ones at home.  Childcare isn't always cheap and it's not always easy to arrange. Some parents will consider your request selfish. Tough.   What's the first rule of wedding planning? YOU CAN'T PLEASE EVERYONE , b ut telling people that you're having a child-free ceremony or reception is a delicate situation, so here's what you can do to make it easier. Be CLEAR on the invitation that it's adults only.  Guests will otherwise presume that the whole family is invited.  Name each person individually to avoid confusion and then double check the RSVPs as they come back to make sure no extra names have been added. The wording is key . Be clear but also be polite. Decide on what you mean by child-free : und...

This is such fantastic news! Due to open in 2021, Queer Britain will be the UK's first LGBTQ+ museum. Wednesday 28th February saw the official announcement of Queer Britain: The National LGBTQ+ Museum. The intimate reception was hosted at the iconic Oscar Wilde Lounge in Hotel Café Royal , a venue that is entrenched in queer history , and ignited the museums' ambitious gathering of its archive whilst also kick-starting the fundraising process. Credit: HAYLEY MADDEN The reception was attended by a number of high profile business people, industry and community leaders as well as a handful of LGBTQ+ celebrities including Tom Daley, Dustin Lance Black, Jack Guinness, Nakhane Touré, Tom Robinson, Tim Hailes (Sheriff of London), Paul Gambaccini and many more. The event included speeches from co-founder, Joseph Galliano , and founding Patron Ambassador, Carolyn Ward as well as an acoustic performance by Sarah Walk - an American singer-songwriter and pianist signed t...