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One hundred couples will leave London’s Marylebone Town Hall today as newly-weds – all without spending money on the costly expense of a wedding.
To celebrate its 100th birthday, the wedding venue has given 100 couples the chance to get married there for just £100 each, which is a huge bargain considering the venue usually charges between £621 and £1,230.
Between 8am and 2pm on Tuesday (1 October), 100 weddings, civil partnerships and vow renewals will happen, with approximately five to seven ceremonies happening per hour, and each wedding lasting 15-20 minutes.
To keep things running smoothly, couples are allowed to bring up to eight guests and a maximum of two pets.
Shona Mitchell and Kenny Price, who met on a dating app, were the first couple to get hitched at 8am today. Among the other happy couples were the BBC journalist Thomas Mackintosh, who live reported his own “I do” from the venue.
His wife, Paige, wrote online that she pitched the idea of the wedding to her husband when she saw a callout for hall’s 100th birthday.
Sharing a screenshot of their Whatsapp conversation on X/Twitter, Paige told him it would only be “£100” and we can “spend more money on football trips”.
Mackintosh instantly replied: “Go for it!!”
Andy Lambert, 68, Mel Fawcus, 73, from Shepherd’s Bush, saw an advert for the wedding and decided to take a leap. The pair met in 1988 at an Easter Bonnet party and have been dating ever since.
The iconic London venue is where Sir Paul McCartney and his wife Nancy Shevell got married in 2011, and has been home to more celebrity nuptials than anywhere else in the UK, with notable weddings including Ringo Starr marrying Barbara Bach, Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas, Sean Bean and Georgina Sutcliffe and Cilla Black and Bobby Willis.
Oasis singer Liam Gallagher also got married there, twice, with actor Patsy Kensit in 1997 and then singer Nicole Appleton in 2001.
After a pause in construction due to the First World War, the building was opened by George VI in 1920. It held its first wedding four years later and has since hosted more than 125,000 ceremonies.
The venue re-opened in 2018 after a huge four-year refurbishment and is known as one of the busiest wedding locations in the country, holding approximately 2,500 ceremonies per year.
Councillor Ryan Jude said: “We are thrilled to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Old Marylebone Town Hall, a venue that holds historical and cultural significance for Westminster.
“This milestone is not just a reflection of the building’s rich past, but also a celebration of the diverse couples who will be creating new memories here.”
