An elopement is a wedding for two — or close to it. No venue booked a year ahead, no guest list, no seating plan.
Some people call it an intimate wedding, others a private wedding. The word itself comes from to elope, to run away, and for a long time it meant a marriage kept secret, decided in a hurry, usually with a whiff of scandal about it.
The meaning has flipped. Couples who elope today aren’t hiding from anyone. They’ve simply decided that a wedding built to satisfy a hundred and fifty people isn’t the wedding they want.
It isn’t an escape. It’s a decision.
Elopement, micro wedding, intimate wedding: what actually separates them
Three terms used more or less interchangeably, describing three very different scales.
| Format | Guests | Reception | What it changes in practice |
|---|
| Traditional wedding | 80 to 200 | Venue, caterer, seating plan | The day is built around the guests and their comfort |
| Intimate wedding | Up to 50 | Scaled down, often a single meal | You keep the people, you drop the protocol |
| Micro wedding | Around 30 | Full logistics, tightly compressed | A traditional wedding, at a smaller scale |
| Elopement | The two of you, sometimes a witness | None | Almost nothing to manage but the place, the hour and the moment |
Only the last one removes the machinery entirely. That’s why the word, once a slightly shameful thing, has become desirable again.
Why more couples are choosing it
Twelve years photographing weddings, more than 160 of them since 2012, and a change in my own life in 2022 that put me permanently on the road: it gives you a fairly clear view of how couples are approaching the day now.
What I keep seeing isn’t a trend invented by wedding blogs.
It’s a real weariness with budgets that disappear into catering, flowers and a room, for a day where you rarely spend more than ten minutes with anyone.
A lot of couples are redirecting that money towards the experience itself — the place, the journey, the photographs, the film — rather than the logistics of feeding a crowd. Others keep a full wedding day for their families and add a private ceremony before or after, as something that belongs only to them.
Living nomadically makes this straightforward on my side. An elopement can happen anywhere: I have no studio to close, no catchment area to respect. The van follows the project, not the other way round.
Getting married in France: what the law actually allows
This is where most international couples run into a wall, and it’s worth understanding before you fall in love with a clifftop in Brittany.
France does not permit legally binding ceremonies outside the town hall. There is no equivalent of an officiant, a registrar travelling to a venue, or self-solemnisation. Only a civil ceremony performed by a maire or their deputy, inside the mairie, has legal force.
The second obstacle is residency. Under the French Civil Code, at least one of you — or one of your parents — must have residence in the commune where you intend to marry, and residence means roughly thirty continuous days of living there immediately before the banns are published. The banns themselves are then posted for ten days. In practice that means spending about six weeks in a single French town before you can legally marry in it.
For most couples travelling from abroad, that’s the end of the conversation. And it doesn’t matter as much as it sounds like it should.
The route almost everyone takes is simple: you handle the legal paperwork at home, quietly, in a registry office or a courthouse, with two witnesses and no ceremony to speak of. Then you come to France — or Scotland, or Italy — for the ceremony that actually means something to you. Symbolic, unbinding, and entirely yours to shape.
If one of you holds French nationality or has family here, the picture changes and it’s worth asking the relevant mairie directly. Rules are applied with some local variation.
Planning an elopement: what actually matters
The first instinct is to look for a backdrop that photographs well on Instagram.
It’s the wrong instinct. Somewhere you’ve walked together, a region that got under your skin, a landscape that says something about the two of you — that ages far better than a location saved from a carousel.
Weather and season carry more weight than they would at a traditional wedding. There’s no reception hall to occupy people while you wait for the light to break. The day rests entirely on the two of you and on whatever the place decides to give you.
Build in margin. Keep a plan B. Choose a window that leaves room for the light rather than for a schedule.
Then there’s the question of suppliers. A traditional wedding needs a long list: caterer, florist, DJ, planner. An elopement reduces almost entirely to one — the photographer, or the filmmaker.
With no reception and no guests to retell the day afterwards, that’s the only tangible trace of what happened.
It isn’t a logistical detail. It’s the centre of the whole thing.
Where to go: France and beyond
A few French regions I know well enough to recommend, having worked in them.
The Côte Vermeille, between Collioure and Port-Vendres, where the vineyards run down into the Mediterranean and the late light has a density you won’t find further north. The Gulf of Morbihan and the Breton coast, where low tide uncovers kilometres of rock and the light changes every twenty minutes. The Verdon gorges, if you want verticality and a landscape that flattens any sense of human scale. Île d’Oléron out of season — softer, flatter, quieter.
The Vendée coastline works in the same register: a couple session in the Vendée gives a good sense of what a compressed day by the sea can look like.
Further afield, my one rule is that the destination should stay reachable without turning the elopement into an expedition.
In March 2026 I went to Las Vegas with Océane and Pierre — the city first, then the drive out to the Valley of Fire, red rock and complete silence forty minutes from the Strip. It’s the format at its purest: two people, a desert, and nothing else to manage.
Closer to home, two sessions that weren’t strictly elopements but show the kind of terrain that suits one: two days in Scotland, between the Highlands and Edinburgh’s cobbled streets, and a walk through Berlin’s street art, for a couple who wanted something urban and unfussy.
Porto and its tiled alleyways, Venice outside the season, the Amalfi cliffs, Miami and its Art Deco light: I’ve parked the van or landed with a bag in enough places not to reduce an elopement to two or three ready-made destinations.
How I work with you
An elopement isn’t a list of deliverables. It’s a collaboration that starts long before the day itself. We choose the location together, taking the season and the light into account. I share what I know from the ground — I live on the road, and I know what a place gives you at a particular hour, in a particular month. On the day, I’m there from start to finish, with no team to coordinate and no military timeline to hold to.
Most of the work on this format happens beforehand. Scouting, choosing the hours, building the shape of the day between the two of you, weighing up the season: none of that exists at a traditional wedding, where the reception has already written the schedule. I spend a lot of time with couples before the date, and that’s precisely what makes the difference when it arrives.
Pricing
Elopements start at €5,000.
The final figure depends on the location, the time spent there, and the preparation beforehand.
Two people on a Breton morning in autumn is a different proposition to two days in the Nevada desert — the quote is built once those elements are on the table.
Frequently asked questions
What’s the difference between an elopement, a micro wedding and an intimate wedding?
Scale. A micro wedding keeps around thirty guests and a full, if compressed, reception. An intimate wedding goes up to roughly fifty, tightening the spirit without dramatically cutting the numbers. An elopement is the stripped-back version: the two of you, sometimes a witness, nothing more.
Can we legally get married in France as foreign nationals?
In practice, rarely. French law requires a civil ceremony inside the town hall, and at least one of you must have lived in that commune for around thirty continuous days before the banns are published, with the banns then posted for ten days. That means roughly six weeks in one French town. Most international couples handle the legal marriage at home and hold a symbolic ceremony in France instead.
Can an officiant marry us outside a town hall in France?
Not legally. France has no equivalent of a travelling registrar or a licensed officiant, and self-solemnisation doesn’t exist here. A celebrant-led ceremony in a vineyard or on a clifftop is entirely possible and often beautiful — it simply carries no legal weight on its own.
How much does an elopement in France cost?
Elopement coverage starts at €5,000. The final figure depends on three things: the location, the time spent on site, and the preparation beforehand — scouting, choosing the hours, shaping the day — which accounts for a significant part of the work on this format. The quote is built once those elements are known. Get in touch to talk it through.
How long does elopement coverage last?
Anywhere from a few hours to two or three days, depending on the destination and what you want to keep from it. A stretch of Breton coast can be covered in a well-chosen half day. A European destination usually justifies a two-day format, so you get several kinds of light and more than one setting.
Can we bring a few people with us?
Yes, a witness or two close family members changes nothing. What defines an elopement is the intention: staying at a minimal core rather than gradually reopening the list until you’ve rebuilt a small traditional wedding.
Do you travel outside France?
Yes. I live and work from a converted van and travel throughout Europe and beyond — Scotland, Portugal, Italy, and further when the project calls for it. Travel and accommodation are factored into the quote rather than added as surprises afterwards.
