A couple who were due to be married at the Cresta Court Hotel next year say they are “heartbroken” after their long-planned wedding was cancelled without warning earlier this week.
The Altrincham hotel suddenly shut its doors on Monday after its owners struck a deal with Serco to convert it into effectively a holding centre for asylum seekers for a period of at least 12 months.
The news has shocked local residents but few have felt such a direct impact as Dan Butler and Katy Evans.
The couple were due to be married at the Church Street hotel on Saturday 24th May next year having booked its all-inclusive Always & Forever wedding package way back on April 18th 2023.
The package included virtually everything - the wedding ceremony, breakfast and reception for 60 daytime guests and a total of 120 in the evening.
The couple had also booked 20 bedrooms for guests for the night of the wedding, and around a further dozen rooms for the night before the big day.
“We’ve had 18 months of imagining the day and slowly getting our stuff together,” said Katy. “I’d been getting more excited and had sorted out my wedding dress.”
The couple had even attended a wedding breakfast tasting event at the hotel in March and had bought their rings from Altrincham jeweller Hill & Hill.
The £9,000 cost of the package was a huge undertaking for Dan, a cable jointer, and Katy, an office manager, but they had already paid £5,000 and had saved up enough in order to pay the rest of the bill - which they were actually about to do next week.
“One of the reasons we booked so far in advance is that we wanted the time to save up for it,” said Katy.
“We don’t have a lot of money and we have been very strict with it.”
But then on Tuesday, disaster struck.
“One of my aunties rang up and said look at the Altrincham Today story online,” Katy said.
“We had heard nothing from the hotel at all so I rang them up as I had to hear it for myself.
“I asked ‘is this true’, the lady who answered said ‘yes it is true’. I asked why they had not rang to tell me and she said they had two funerals and a wedding on the list before they were going to call me.
“But I’ve still heard nothing. That's what has upset me the most.”
The news hit both so hard that they had to leave their respective workplaces early.
“I was crying in the office in front of everyone, it was so embarrassing,” said Katy. “I just couldn’t handle it.”
The couple had chosen the Best Western Cresta Court because it seemed like the perfect option.
It was local for Katy, 38, who had grown up in Partington, but also not too far from 40-year-old Dan’s home patch of Great Sankey in Warrington.
They’d also secured their ideal date on the Saturday of the second Bank Holiday weekend in May.
Now, their plans are in tatters - just like the wedding invitations, which of course included Cresta Court's details, which had only just arrived.
“We could understand it if there had been a fire or a pandemic, it would be easier to swallow,” said Dan. “But the way they have done it has really hit us hard.”
The couple now face the uphill task of finding an alternative location for Saturday 24th May.
“We would like the same date - it’s been set in stone for a long time now, our family and friends have saved the date, so to have to change it now would be upsetting,” said Dan.
Katy said there was now the added complication of finding a new wedding registrar available on that date but she said she would consider having the official wedding part of the day on the Friday if necessary.
Another concern for the couple is that their £9,000 wedding - which had already gone up to £10,000 in the Cresta Court’s 2024 brochure - would be now much more expensive elsewhere.
“Costs have gone up everywhere,” added Dan. “That nine grand wedding is not going to be nine grand - we had booked our day at 2023 prices and we’re now looking at 2025 prices.”
Katy said when she spoke to the hotel she had been told that a third-party event company had been hired by the hotel to find alternative venues for people’s bookings.
But she said she had still not been told whether or when they would be refunded.
We contacted the Cresta Court who insisted they had been in touch with Katy and Dan, but refused to clarify what their reimbursement policy was for cancelled bookings.
Dan and Katy are now appealing to other venues to get in touch if they can step in and help save their big day.
