Get­ting mar­ried needn't break the bank. These bud­get wed­ding tips will give you plen­ty of ideas on how to get mar­ried on a bud­get.

DIY wed­ding flow­ers

All you need is a patch of ground and some seeds and you can raise your own blooms in the time it takes to write your vows.

Keep decor sim­ple

A slim glass vase con­tain­ing a sin­gle white rose, or some odd bits of crock­ery from a char­i­ty shop stuffed with gar­den flow­ers can have more of an im­pact than ex­pen­sive oa­sis dec­o­ra­tions.

Buy our own brides­maids' dress­es

Brides­maid dress­es are of­ten hand­made and this can be ex­pen­sive. The cheap­est way around this is to have a rough theme and ask your brides­maids to choose and pay for a dress that they'll want to wear again. Use ac­ces­sories such as pearls and cor­sages to pull the look to­geth­er.

Sec­ond-hand wed­ding dress­es

Apart from the re­cep­tion venue and hon­ey­moon, your wed­ding dress is like­ly to be one of your most ex­pen­sive out­go­ings. If you shop around, you can find your dress at a bet­ter price than if you sim­ply buy a gown off the rack. First try on the dif­fer­ent styles to get a clear idea of what you are look­ing for. Then, buy a bud­get dress and find a good lo­cal dress­mak­er who can al­ter it to your re­quire­ments.

Ask your guests to con­tribute

We are not sug­gest­ing you charge at the door but with wed­ding re­cep­tions be­ing ex­pen­sive, it's worth con­sid­er­ing re­coup­ing some of your ex­pens­es. You can al­so ask guests to con­tribute. To save on the hon­ey­moon you can ask your wed­ding par­ty to spon­sor your trip as a wed­ding gift.