A BEAUTY pageant finalist cancelled her £30,000 dream wedding after a “lightbulb moment”.
Sasha McDonald and Rory Allison booked a traditional white wedding at a stately home in Dumfries, Scotland, last year.
The pair, who have been together for nine years, paid £30,000 for the venue and list of vendors for their big day, which was originally booked for 2025.
However, fears of falling into debt and changes in their personal circumstances prompted the couple to question whether they really wanted such grand nuptials.
Sasha – a 24-year-old nurse and Miss Scotland 2024 finalist – said she and 25-year-old engineer Ross had put their life on hold to save for their wedding day before questioning if their ‘sacrifices’ were really worth it.
Determined to put their marriage at the forefront of their day, Sasha and Rory swapped their luxury 100-person wedding for a more intimate affair at a hotel in Glasgow, alongside 25 members of their immediate family.
The new plans will mean their bills are reduced to less than £10,000 – meaning they have cut the cost to less than a third of the original expected outlay.
Sasha, who lives in Glasgow, Scotland, said cancelling their wedding felt like a ‘weight lifted off their shoulders’ – and is urging others to consider ditching the traditional route.
Sasha said: “We came across a venue that we both really liked and was what we wanted at that time. We booked that and were super happy with it.
“We booked the vendors from there and were pretty happy with a traditional wedding. A lot happened in that year between booking the wedding and deciding to cancel it.
“I got the news that a close family member was ill, my gran died, we lost our little dog and that felt like the closing of one chapter and the opening of the next.
“I was competing for Miss Scotland, and doing fundraising and charity work. We were just busy living life.
“So a lot happened in a short space of time and it made us question what we were doing. We just sort of looked at each other and said ‘why is this wedding coming to £30,000?’ And that’s not what matters.
“We were stretching ourselves thin financially for just one day to spend an extortionate amount of money and it just did not align with us anymore.
“We said to each other from the start that we’d marry each other tomorrow so why are we doing this?. The rose-tinted glasses just came off.”
Sasha said the financial burden of spending tens of thousands of pounds on one day played a major part in the cancelling of their wedding day.
Sasha said: “We just thought it’s not worth it. I just thought, ‘Why would we spend more on a wedding than a house deposit?’
“Financial strain was definitely something we were worried about. And we thought ‘why would we start our marriage in debt?’ I wasn’t willing to sacrifice holidays and dinners for this one day.
“We did couple modelling for weddings on the side of our normal jobs and it made us realise that a lot of what we see in the wedding industry on Instagram and Pinterest isn’t real.
“Vendors are all coming together to make the industry look like this but it’s not actually realistic as to what people are actually doing.
“We just started thinking we didn’t want to put our life on hold for another year. We hadn’t been going on holidays or anything – we were just working and saving.”
Instead, the couple opted to book a French-themed hotel in Glasgow for March 2025, opting to only invite a handful of their nearest and dearest.
Luckily, the pair only ended up losing £1,000 on the venue and were able to swap dates with vendors.
Sasha said: “Cancelling the original wedding and rebooking this felt like such a weight off our shoulders. We felt like we could keep getting married at the centre of it.
“I decided to hand-write and design all our invites, I’m doing all the flowers and bouquets myself.
“People are putting themselves into debt to have this picture-perfect day. I think a wedding should be about marriage and the person you’re marrying. It shouldn’t be a production or show.
“I would say if you’ve got an urge to cancel your big, traditional wedding, look into it. Your wedding is one day, your marriage is every day.”
