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Can’t Afford a Royal Wedding? Get Married for Free at This DC Bar

Ivy and Coney is inviting couples to tie the knot at their Shaw bar

Photo courtesy Ivy & Coney.

There are plenty of bars where you can celebrate the Royal Wedding. But if Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have inspired you to get hitched yourself? There’s only one bar for that.

While the famous couple’s ceremony will reportedly cost upwards of $45 million, Shaw’s Ivy and Coney will host weddings for anyone who wants one for free. (The average American wedding without royal security needs still costs a substantial $33,000, so this is a steal.)

Co-owner Adam Fry says this is Ivy and Coney’s latest riff off of Drink Company’s popular pop-ups. In response to Miracle on Seventh Street, an elaborate Christmas bar with a full-sized sleigh and Santa mugs, Ivy and Coney transformed into “Chai-vy and Cohen-y,” a Hanukkah Bar. And now that its neighbors up the street are hosting a royal wedding pop-up that recreates St. George’s Chapel, Ivy and Coney is looking for its own way in on the action.

The “Vegas Wedding at the Hot Dog House of Matrimony” will provide an officiant and even spring for the $35 DC marriage license fee. Newly weds can also look forward to a ride around Shaw in the bar’s company car, a 1977 El Camino, and toasts of both Champagne and face-distorting Malort (oh, God).

Fry says the bar is going all-out on its shotgun wedding promotion as a lead up to its annual Charity Gala, a Vegas-themed event which raises money for Bread For The City. The bar will be available for weddings every day leading up to the Charity Gala on June 21. Couples that get married on the night of the gala have the bonus of Blackjack and craps tables.

“We did this largely out of self-serving humor, but we thought it would be a great tie-in with our Charity Gala,” says Fry.

As of Friday morning, Ivy and Coney has received ten requests for weddings at the bar. Co-owner Josh Saltzman says they haven’t confirmed any bookings yet but many of them look promising. The vetting criteria? “Must be classified as human and crazy enough to drink Malort.”

If you’re interested, just email rabbibetdin@ivyandconey.com with at least 72 hours in advance. You can purchase tickets to the Charity Gala here.

Ivy and Coney. 1537 7th St., NW; 202-670-9489. 

This story has been updated to reflect new wedding sign-ups. 

Vittoria Elliott
Editorial Fellow