Tying the knot in Vegas
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-12-11 13:56

Looking radiant in a long, purple gown, Carlina Reyna left the wedding chapel in Las Vegas' Aladdin Hotel excited about her future.

Carlina, 36, is one of about 120,000 brides who every year shun a wedding close to home and head to the bright lights of Vegas to get married.

U.S. pop star Britney Spears (right) was married to childhood friend Jason Allen Alexander (left) Saturday Jan. 3, 2004 in Las Vegas, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. [AP Photo]

"Here you can get everything for your wedding in the same place, and a classy wedding, but the main thing is that it is about making a commitment," said Carlina alongside her new husband, 40-year-old Jose Reyna.

The couple from San Antonio, Texas, brushed aside any notion that Las Vegas, the world's wedding capital with up to 200 wedding chapels, is a tacky place to marry or hosts only "quickie" weddings that break up before the champagne is flat.

Of course, there are plenty of examples of such ephemeral unions consecrated in Las Vegas.

A view of the drive-though 'Tunnel of Love' at the Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas on Jan. 3, 2004. Pop star Britney Spears was reportedly married here on Saturday. [Reuters]

Britney Spears' marriage to childhood friend Jason Alexander in January lasted only 55 hours before the pop princess annulled it.

Socialite Nicky Hilton, 21, heiress to the hotel fortune, showed a little more commitment. Her recent marriage to money manager Todd Meister in Las Vegas lasted three months.

Organizers of the city's wedding business want to rid Las Vegas, one of the fastest growing US cities with a population of 1.7 million, of its reputation for tacky weddings.

Las Vegas' wedding industry has grown over the decades due mainly to the state's liberal marriage licence rules. Anyone over 18 can get a Nevada marriage licence on the spot for a US$55 fee.

Over the years some of Tinseltown's biggest names have come to Las Vegas to tie the knot, including Elvis and Priscilla Presley, Bruce Willis and Demi Moore and Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward - and some are still together.

Upscale weddings

The number of weddings has risen strongly in the past 20 years as city hotels started to host more upscale weddings alongside ceremonies at the stand alone chapels at the older end of the city's notorious strip of casinos and XXX-rated stores.

The number of licences issued rose to 119,124 in 2003 from 86,608 in 1993 and 59,835 in 1983.

Upscale hotels, known for their huge casinos and lavish entertainment, have set up expensively adorned wedding chapels in wings well away from gamblers.

They offer packages appealing to the value conscious as well as big spenders in a one-stop shop for weddings.

A big advantage of a Las Vegas wedding is that you can get everything in one place and get hitched for a few hundred dollars or less, with some wedding packages priced as low as US$55, while the traditional US wedding costs an average US$20,000.

You can also book a chapel on short notice, get married 24 hours of the day, and some chapels offer Webcam services so absent guests can watch the ceremony over the Internet.

"It takes the stress out of the day to have everything organized by us," said Linda Swift, owner of Aladdin's chapel.

The disadvantages of a Las Vegas wedding? You will probably be sharing your special day with hundreds of other couples, with some weddings even overlapping if chapels are running late, making it feel like a production line of brides.

Charolette Richards, owner of the stand alone Little White Wedding Chapel where Spears married at 5 am, stands by her slogan: "We love keeping you in love."

She said couples planned for months, even years, for a Las Vegas wedding, and they are serious about it.

"The reason people come to Las Vegas to get married is because it is a wonderful destination of love, with the hotels designed with a lot of romance," said Richards, who has been in the wedding business for 45 years.

Drive-through weddings

Jennifer Brown, 25, in a white bridal gown, and Justin Rotarious, 23, chose to get married at the Little White Wedding Chapel, a busy chapel that boasts a drive-through "tunnel of vows" painted with cherubs for those who do not want to leave their car.

The San Diego couple said they did not want an ordinary wedding. They came with a dozen friends and family to get married in Las Vegas after three months of planning.

Weddings in Las Vegas range from the drive-through variety, to US$1,000 ceremonies aboard hot-air balloons and lavish affairs in upscale hotels. Lookalike Elvis Presleys conduct weddings.

The Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel offers a Gothic ceremony where the minister rises out of a coffin through fog.

The happy couple can then retire for the night to the Gothic bridal chamber with a coffin-shaped bath and a graveyard bed with a headstone reading "Till Death do Us Part."

And if creepy is not your thing, other wedding themes include James Bond, disco, western, Egyptian or Liberace.

Swift said most people came to Vegas for a beautiful, traditional wedding. She refused to marry a couple at Halloween who wanted to get married in bondage gear.

"A wedding here is just as emotional and important as a wedding back home and people take it seriously," said Swift.

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