Tying the Celtic knot

“Ireland is totally fashionable at the moment,” according to Paul Mayfield, director of operations with dreamweddingireland.com, a wedding company that specializes in planning weddings in Ireland for overseas clients.
“Just look at all the celebs getting married here — Paul McCartney, Westlife, Pierce Brosnan, Posh and Becks. Bill Clinton loves Ireland, Madonna sends her daughter to school here. J-Lo looked at sites in Ireland when she was engaged to Ben Affleck.”
Following a dip during the post-Sept.11 period, the overseas wedding market in Ireland has reemerged as an industry to rival hospitality and tourism in terms of its importance to the Irish economy. And American couples are more committed than anyone, traveling to Ireland each year in the thousands and contributing millions of dollars to the Exchequer in the process.
“We have an awful lot of clients from the U.S.,” according to Karen Dodson, principal planner with wedding company wedinireland.com.
“60 percent of our couples were from outside Ireland when we started. Most of them were from the United States or Canada. Lately we’ve been thinking about revamping our website to cater for American clients.”
“About 90 percent of our business is from the U.S.,” said Mayfield. His company will open its first New York office in December and has already begun advertising in American nuptial magazines such as “Modern Bride” and “Elegant Bride.”
“The wedding market in the tri-state area, Boston, and Washington D.C. is bigger than the entire Irish market,” he said.
“It’s generating a by-product for the tourist industry. A lot of couples come back for their first anniversary. Guests are falling in love with Ireland and coming back. We did wedding fairs in New York, Chicago, all over the U.S. and the Tourist Board grudgingly paid for it because they know we’re generating money for them.”
Family ties may be an influential factor in attracting couples with Irish roots to marry on the Emerald Isle, but Irish-Americans and ex-patriot couples form only part of the U.S. wedding market in Ireland, according to Mayfield.
“We do get a lot of second generation Irish — mostly couples from Boston, New York and the tri-state area. But we’ve had clients from California, Oregon, all over. A lot of our clients have nothing to do with Ireland,” he said.

A Love Affair
One thing U.S. couples who marry in Ireland have in common, regardless of their backgrounds, is a desire for a traditional wedding in beautiful surroundings. Rick and Celeste Brown got just that when they married in Durrow Castle in Co. Laois two years ago.
“We used to live in London, which was part of our reason for getting married overseas,” said Celeste, who now lives in Toronto.
“But we both really loved Ireland. My husband travels there regularly on business. We also felt it was very easy language wise. Some of our older relatives would have been uneasy if we’d married in, say, France.”
The Browns do not regret their decision.
“It was amazing, most of our friends say it was the best wedding they’d been to,” she said.
“It was three straight nights of partying. We spent the first night in a pub in Dublin with traditional music. The next day we went to the Castle. It was in a small town, but there were five pubs. The church was beautiful. We didn’t even need to decorate it, except with flowers. 60 people flew over from Canada. It was amazing for them to come such a long way, and to experience such warmth. I’d highly recommend the location.”
In Dodson’s view, couples that choose to marry in Ireland are looking for something unique.
“They’ve got the beautiful surroundings, the atmosphere and that Irish feel,” she said.
“We once did a blessing on the Cliffs of Moher. This couple had never even been to Ireland, but we gave them the real experience. It was a party of 25. They spent the evening in a local restaurant and then went to a bar later. It was a real traditional Irish pub. They had the craic. That’s why a lot of people choose Ireland.”
Mayfield thinks some Americans are surprised to find that their view of Ireland is somewhat dated.
“It’s the Irish and English couples who tend to go for contemporary weddings, Americans are more conservative than Europeans,” he said.
“Its like a wedding from the ’80s. I have a dress handing up in my living room at the moment that belongs to a U.S. bride. It would put Barbie to shame. They don’t feel they have to look stylish because they think Ireland is back in the stone ages. A lot of them are shocked at how advanced Ireland is. They’re expecting to see horses and carts. They’re pleasantly surprised that they can check their emails.”
Mayfield has organized weddings that range from the overtly traditional to the downright bizarre.
“One wedding we got the local scout troop to dress up as leprechauns and do a treasure hunt in the garden of the hotel,” he said.
“It was great, the kids thought they were doing a fancy dress treasure hunt and the guests looked out the window and saw all these little people dressed in green, running in and out of trees and popping out from under bushes. We told the guests not to go outside because the leprechauns would be scared of them and run away. They loved it. Another really popular thing is for people to go back to a pub for Guinness and oysters. They want the Hollywood feel of Ireland, which doesn’t really exist, but it can be created.”

Price tags
Surprisingly, cost can be an enticing rather than a preventative factor in determining many American couples’ decisions to marry in Ireland.
“New York weddings are mentally expensive,” said Mayfield.
“Ireland is one of the most expensive countries in the EU, and it’s basically cheaper for a couple to get married there than to have a New York family wedding.”
“They can definitely have a cheaper wedding in Ireland than in the U.S.,” agreed Dodson.
“The main costs are flights, accommodation and car hire, but apart from that, wedding service rates here a very cheap in comparison to the U.S. That’s the reason why a lot of brides choose Ireland in the first place.”
Brown’s wedding was “definitely not more expensive than getting married at home. It would be much cheaper than getting married in New York or downtown London,” she said. Her advice to American couples thinking of marrying in Ireland is simple — get help.
“Go over, spend some time there and get somebody local to help you plan,” she said.
“Don’t feel you need to import everything. We got our flowers from the local florist. Our photographer was from Dublin.”
Dodson’s advice, though pessimistic, is equally practical.
“Couples from the States tend to want outdoor weddings and you always have to have a plan B,” she said.
“Lots of times we’ve had to move indoors because it was lashing rain. You get the four seasons in one day in Ireland.”