I lie awake in my hotel room in Kyoto, nearly 6,000m from home, my stomach in knots. My mind is racing with thoughts of my wedding tomorrow. What if I can’t go through with it? I take a deep breath and tell myself I don’t have anything to worry about. I can’t be stood up at the altar, because the person I’m marrying is myself.
The solo wedding is a growing trend in Japan: young single women getting dressed up as brides and staging a bridal photoshoot. “You are single and you don’t know if you would be able to get married and have a wedding ceremony in the near future,” suggests the Cerca Travel website, which offers this experience, “but you would like to have some pictures of yourself in a wedding gown or in a gorgeous bridal kimono now, when you are young and beautiful.”
Like many of the women who use the service, I am a self-proclaimed spinster. I’m 42, and while all my friends are married or in long-term relationships, I sort of forgot to do it myself. In my late 20s, I thought I was dating the man I would marry but, while he was working abroad, he broke up with me abruptly and with no warning. It was nearly 13 years before I had another relationship.
I used to think I was single because I lived in New York City during my 20s and 30s, where single women outnumber single men. Or because I travel so much for my work as a photographer, and men don’t want to wait around for a woman who is off globetrotting. But I have many friends in New York in the same industry as me who have managed to meet, date and marry a man. Meanwhile, I enjoy sleeping on whichever side of the bed I choose (though I barely move an inch at night), eating cereal for dinner most nights and doing whatever I want, whenever I want. Sure, I enjoy the company of a man once in a while, but I’d rather just borrow a friend’s beau to help me put up shelves than be in a full-time relationship for those kinds of perks.
I’ve watched many friends get married, but I never thought I’d have a wedding of my own. Now here I am in Kyoto, awaiting my big day.
Yukiko Inoue has been running Cerca Travel for 10 years. She is a 48-year-old divorcee whose main business is to arrange packages for Japanese women who want to travel alone in Europe and feel safe. Two years ago, her colleague, 37-year-old Natsumi Akai, expressed interest in having her photos taken professionally in a wedding dress and the solo wedding was born. Since then, 130 Japanese women have paid Cerca ¥380,000 (£2,500) for a two-day package, including a dress fitting, hair, makeup and a photo shoot – in short, everything except the actual ceremony.
On the first day of my solo wedding package, I am met by Natsumi Akai at the Ayumi Bridal dress shop. Natsumi is tall, slim and strikingly beautiful. She tells me she has had many relationships and was once engaged, but called it off because she realised that if she were to get married, she would have to quit her job, and she didn’t want to do that. For her, the solo wedding was all about the dress.
“For Japanese women, the wedding dress is a symbol of beauty and being beautiful,” Natsumi explains. “In the story books I read as a child, there was always a princess in foreign countries. For me, getting married and wearing a wedding dress are totally different things. I wanted to wear the dress without getting married.”
I, on the other hand, have never fantasied about wearing a wedding dress, and feel slightly nervous as Natsumi leads me into a private fitting room lined with poufy white gowns. But trying one on, I am shocked. I look in the mirror at the tightly bound bodice and I can’t help catching my breath. I barely recognise the radiant, elegant woman I see in the mirror. Sensing my amazement, Natsumi smiles. “Kawai! You’re a princess!”
Suddenly, I understand the appeal. “In Japan, we don’t often have the opportunity to dress up,” Natsumi explains. “We wear casual wear. That’s why we dream about wearing the wedding dress – it’s a once-in-a-lifetime event.” She looks at me. “Do you want to wear a kimono? It’s the same concept. It’s a little foreign, you’re playing a role.”
In the end, I try on eight dresses, each one a little bit more over the top. I end up choosing the first one I tried, strapless and snug around the bosom and waist, shooting out below the hips with multiple layers of tulle.
That evening, as I fight my way through a rain shower, I think about whether my fiercely independent nature means I will never meet my soul mate. I duck into a ramen shop and eat a bowl of steaming soup, in a packed restaurant where everyone is dining alone.
In the morning, I wake up for my big day, only to look in the mirror and see that my eye is red and oozy with conjunctivitis. Hardly ready for my closeup. In the hotel lobby I meet Natsumi, who graciously pretends not to notice, and we take a taxi to a fashionable part of town where we will meet wedding stylist Mayumi Hayashi and leading wedding photographer Yuhino Suzuki.
I rarely dress up – in fact, putting a brush through my hair is a big occasion, so why I requested finger waves is beyond me. Mayumi is up for the challenge, though, and places my hair in curlers to set before beginning to apply my makeup, expertly covering up my weeping eye. I have visions of looking like a 1930s beauty queen, but the reality is matronly. I put on my dress and look in the mirror. I look like the Queen Mum.
If it feels strange to be getting ready with no one to greet me at the other end, the photoshoot itself is surreal. We make our way to the Shugakuin Kirara Sanso Japanese garden, where I am photographed getting out of the car, walking in the garden and standing beneath the blossom. I pose for the customary wedding shots: bride looking away dreamily, bride gazing downwards chastely, bride looking virginal and blushing innocently. No shots with the groom, sadly. Cerca Travel used to offer an “image partner” for the shoots: an age-appropriate man to stand in as the groom. But not one client requested this service, so they stopped offering it. I personally would have liked to have had a fake husband in my photos, if only for the kitsch factor: here’s me with my fantasy Japanese husband.
There is no actual solo wedding ceremony, which is a shame, because I had imagined promising to love myself for richer, for poorer. But Natsumi says it is a life-changing experience. You need courage to apply for a solo wedding, and clients are often surprised by the self-confidence they gain from the experience. “In real weddings, the main character is the same, the woman, but the goal is different,” she says. “A solo wedding is a jumping-off point; a celebration of yourself. Many women have already given up on meeting someone or getting married, and this makes them realise marriage isn’t the only goal in life.”
On my return home, I am surprised to find that I love showing off my wedding album – I was recently in a posh pub and happened to meet Oscar-winning actor Marion Cotillard, so I showed her my wedding pictures. “It’s like Cindy Sherman, only sadder,” she said. “More depressing. These photos are very sad.” I enjoy hearing people’s reactions: most think it’s funny, weird or peculiar.
Natsumi takes her wedding album everywhere, too. “I don’t need to show it to anyone, I just like to know I have it,” she says. “When I get angry or irritated, I can look at it. That was when I was at my best. Many women keep their solo wedding a secret. I want it to become something that is not shameful. There is not a large culture of therapy in Japan, and the solo wedding is therapeutic.”
Upon my return from marrying myself in Japan, I started dating someone I had known for many years. I wondered if my experience had changed something, that my luck with men would now change. Sadly, this relationship also ended abruptly. But I’ve decided I’m happiest on my own. Perhaps I’ll find someone one day – but I don’t need to have a big wedding. I already have my photo album. I can just use Photoshop to add the groom.
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