It’s 11 am on a Sunday in Unexpected Guest, one of many new warehouses turned gin distilleries in Sydney’s inner west. The mood is chaotic joy and the place looks like a scene from Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet – red velvet and candles, an altar decked out with bright flowers and a giant neon crucifix fallen on its side.
The Darkness’s I Believe in a Thing Called Love is blaring, and John and Amanda, conspicuously overdressed for mid-morning in a gin joint, are doing shots at the bar – laughing and kissing. Are they starting a bender early or finishing one late?
Someone hands Amanda a pen and a piece of paper while someone else hands John a baby. They take turns holding the infant and signing the gin-stained document as a professional photographer captures everything.
“Drink up,” shouts one of the few others present. “We’ve only got an hour!”
Welcome to ShotGin Weddings.
Adam Seeney and Dane Tucker love weddings. So much so they have each made the ancient rituals their life’s purpose. Once a caterer and drama teacher, Seeney is now an in-demand wedding celebrant, while former engineer Tucker was recently named one of the world’s top 30 emerging wedding photographers by Rangefinder, a leading American industry publication.
Together, they have more than 700 nuptials under their belts.
Since entering the industry, the pair have watched the cost of weddings soar as interest rates and cost-of-living pressures rise. This has priced many couples out of the market, prompting elopements, indefinite engagements and sometimes even wedding debt.
Easy Weddings’ 2024 Australian Wedding Industry Report shows the average wedding costs $35,315, 29% more than the betrotheds’ original budget. The report also showed that average wedding spends dropped 2.5% year-on-year as couples incorporate DIY elements and forgo pricey traditions.
Seeney and Tucker have seen first-hand that, when it comes to weddings, bigger rarely means better, many “must-have” trends and traditions are redundant, and some couples crave something stress-lite, with less pomp and more party. They heard the cries for something “more personal, flexible, and, frankly, easier”, and they rallied.
Seeney says they started the event to “give couples something meaningful without the overwhelming logistics or expense”. It’s about creating a space “where love is celebrated in its purest form – joyful, authentic and surrounded by the people who matter most”.
The concept is simple: one day, one venue, six weddings.
John and Amanda were the first couple to get hitched that day. Then every hour for the next five hours, two people said “I do” in front of 10 of their ride-or-dies, for roughly the cost of two tickets to Las Vegas.
There were no Elvis impersonators – though Seeney probably wouldn’t need much convincing – but each couple received a customised wedding ceremony, professional photos, cocktails on arrival and full use of the space for an hour. Light catering and other add-ons were available at extra cost.
The final timeslot, The Last Supper, allowed the couple to invite up to 60 guests and enjoy several hours in the venue.
That Sunday in November was ShotGin’s maiden run but pop-up weddings aren’t new.
Since the early 2010s, variations have been available to Australian couples seeking a low-key, cost-effective alternative to traditional weddings, with more personalisation and gravitas than a registry ceremony.
Already growing in popularity before Covid-19, lockdowns forced couples to adapt their wedding plans and vendors to pivot to reduced, more flexible offerings. Post-lockdowns, the challenging economic environment has seen pop-up weddings flourish. However, they are more than a financial imperative, representing a cultural shift towards more conscious and small-scale celebrations.
So, while Seeney and Tucker didn’t invent pop-up weddings, they did put them in a gin bar. Sydney couples are on board. More than 200 have now registered interest, while more than 50 vied to win the final – free – spot at the inaugural event.
While the giveaway winners were randomly chosen, the first five couples nabbed their spots on a first-in-best-dressed basis.
“When bookings opened,” Tucker says, “John and Amanda swooped in and booked their spot in about three minutes. It was wild!”
John and Amanda met on Tinder in Myanmar in March 2020. During their ceremony Seeney described it as “some kind of romcom”. After an epic 12-hour date, they waited almost two years to see each other again.
The wait was worth it.
Engaged in 2023, with a newborn soon after, they dreamed of a small Tuscan wedding but struggled to make the logistics work. When they heard about ShotGin Weddings, Amanda was on board immediately. John needed convincing. “I thought it would take away from what we wanted,” he says. “But, as I discovered, it added to the day we thought we would have.”
Highlights for the couple included seeing each other as Amanda walked down the aisle, dancing with their baby girl, and Seeney’s deeply considered and hilarious ceremony, which included telling their proposal story as an original sonnet.
“I’m just so thrilled with how everything feels very us,” Amanda says. “While I’m looking forward to having a party with more people down the line, I wouldn’t have changed a thing about the day.”
Their hour at Unexpected Guest flew by, followed by champagne, caviar and a three-course meal at Bennelong. Wed in a gin distillery and fed at the Opera House? “Pretty iconic,” said one happy guest.
When conceiving ShotGin Weddings, Seeney and Tucker set out to create a stylish, intimate space that didn’t take itself too seriously. As John and his guests entered Unexpected Guest that morning, Seeney knew they’d nailed it.
“Who could go past the moment when everyone walked into space for the first time?” he says. “Jaws on the floor, audible gasps – you name it. It made it all worth it.”
For Tucker, that moment came a smidge later.
“There was a moment during the first ceremony where I looked around for emotional people to capture. Amanda was crying, and a number of the guests were tearing up. As was Charlotte, our publicist, and yourself, Nadine – two people who had only met the couple moments before.”
The secret’s out: I’m a massive softie.
“Despite the shorter timeframe, it proved we could make the weddings feel sacred. That we could not only make them look phenomenal but also make them meaningful.”
Alice and Jordan also said “I do” that day. These two met as teenagers, and their first date was to see Shark Tale. Either the sharks killed the vibe, or it wasn’t their time because, like Amanda and John, their second date was years in the making – seven in this case – after they randomly ran into each other.
One adorable toddler, a schnauzer named Rudi and 13 years later, they weren’t officially engaged when they learned about ShotGin Weddings. They had discussed marriage but found traditional weddings daunting and registry weddings detached. Both loved the sound of a “low-fuss, low-stress” pop-up wedding with heart. And gin.
“It was the perfect combination of both options,” Alice says. “Once we heard about the concept, we went into Unexpected Guest to look at the venue, and it blew us away.”
They entered to win the last-spot giveaway and received news of their triumph surrounded by loved ones.
“We were at my house,” the bride’s mother recalls. “We have a fortnightly family lunch and Alice got the call that she’d won. There was an explosion of love. But I thought we’d have a year to prepare, not seven weeks!”
Thankfully, with the venue, celebrant, photographer, flowers, catering and cocktails already sorted, all Alice and Jordan had to organise was their attire. And a bow tie for Rudi. While finding a wedding dress with time for alterations in under two months might strike fear in many women’s hearts, Alice got lucky.
“It wasn’t too hard to find a dress. I only went to one shop and loved the first dress I tried on.”
Talking to their guests after the ceremony, it was clear a quirky, hassle-free wedding was exactly what Alice and Jordan needed. From their parents to their close friends, variations of “it’s very them” and “they would never have done it otherwise” abounded.
Asked if they’d do the same again, the newlyweds were resolute.
“The entire day was perfect. It was exactly as we had both imagined our big day – none of the pretence but all of the positivity.”
What about Seeney and Tucker? Would they live to do another marathon?
“The day was incredible,” Seeney says. “Tiring, yet, incredible.” He was particularly tickled by how keen couples were to get to the bar for their shot of gin with guests “as soon as the ceremony was over … It was a vibe. I cannot wait to do this again.”
“Everyone had a raucously good time and left saying how wonderful it was,” Tucker says. “We’re thrilled the concept works.”
The pair will be doing their second round in March 2025 and have big dreams of taking the show on the road. As an elderly guest at Amanda and John’s wedding puts it: “I suppose you don’t have to get married in a church to get married.”
