Santorini
The most photographed thirty-person wedding in Europe
Nowhere else looks like it, and nowhere else is so completely defined by a physical constraint: the terraces are built onto a cliff ledge, so the guest list is decided by the geology before you have chosen a single thing.
- Guests
- 24–30 at a caldera-edge venue. Above about 80 you have left the caldera entirely.
- Budget
- From about €2,500 for the two of you; roughly €15,000–€35,000 at 20–30 guests; €40,000 upwards at 60–125.
- Catering
- €80–€250 per person — the line that actually decides the total.
- Best months
- May, and September into October. September has the warmest sea of the year.
- The paperwork
- €18 per person, one week's notice, valid six months.
Among the easiest in Europe. No residency requirement, an €18 licence per person, one week's public notice, and it stays valid six months — so the paperwork can be almost entirely finished before you fly.
The steps. Caldera properties are reached by long flights of them cut into the cliff, and the guide's advice is to ask for the exact number and the route before you book, then tell affected guests. The other constraint is noise — these terraces sit among hotels full of paying guests, so late amplified music is not on offer at most of them.
Everything above is drawn from these guides, which carry the primary sources and the date each figure was last checked. Requirements and prices change — confirm anything you are about to spend money on with the relevant municipality or your consulate.
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Guest count, budget, season and whether the legal ceremony has to happen abroad — that last one alone closes two of the five countries.