Vows Editing and Proofreading Services

Both sets of vows promise to love, honour and cherish, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, as long as they both shall live. They are word-for-word the same vows spoken at the wedding the week before, in a different city, by two people who have never met either of them. Nothing in what either person promised required knowing anything true about the person standing opposite them.

We edit what couples write for their own wedding vows — personal vows written from scratch, personalised versions of traditional or religious vows, vows for a second marriage or a blended family, vows read privately to each other before the ceremony, notes used when vows are spoken rather than read, and the shorter promise exchanged during a vow renewal. Our editors work on the one paragraph in an entire wedding that only these two people could have written.

The specific promise is what makes vows sound like they belong to this couple, and its failure is a list of virtues borrowed from a template — honesty, kindness, patience — offered with nothing underneath to show why those particular words were chosen. A promise to be kind is not a vow; it is a description of a good person in general. We work through these so each promise is tied to something true about how these two people actually are together, since "I promise to let you finish telling a story even when I already know the ending" means something that "I promise to be patient" does not; so exactly what is being promised is stated rather than implied, given that vague devotion is easy to say and hard to be held to, while a specific, slightly ordinary promise is something a couple can actually be reminded of at year eleven; so at least one line acknowledges who this person actually is, including something not entirely flattering, because vows that describe an idealised partner are recognisably not about the person standing there; so a blended family or a second marriage is not written around as though it were a first, when children, previous partners or a longer road to this day are part of the true story; so humour is allowed if it is true to the couple, as vows that are entirely solemn when the relationship is not solemn misrepresent it on the one day everyone is listening; and so length is kept to what can be said without notes shaking, since vows are usually the most nervous a person will be all day. Vows written this way are the ones a couple reads again on later anniversaries.

Everything you send is treated in confidence, including your relationship, your drafts and anything private between you. We are editors rather than celebrants or relationship counsellors, and we offer no view on your relationship or what should be promised. What we can do is help your vows sound like a promise only the two of you could make.