If you’re planning on getting married, then there are a few things that you will have right at the top of the list. Of course, the wedding dress is one of the most important things to arrange and you need to sort out a venue too. But not too much further down the list, will be the issue of transportation.

You need to sort out how you are going to arrive at the most important event of your life; and you need to do it in style.

There are so many options to choose from, but you must make sure that the vehicle that you choose suits your style as well as the style of the wedding.

You could for example choose a Bentley chauffeur driven car for your special day, or perhaps a Rolls Royce Phantom wedding car for that classic look.

But if you would prefer something with a bit of a modern twist, then you might want to choose a Range Rover wedding car. These cars will really turn heads as you arrive at your special day and they are sure to make a big, bold statement.

The main wedding car is the one in which the bride arrives and which will then usually take both the bride and groom away after the service. However, everyone needs transportation on the day, including the bridesmaids, who are a key part of the ceremony.

For Joyce McDevitt, this proved something of an issue, as she had no fewer than 30 bridesmaids with another two on standby.

“I had 22 bridesmaids from my side of the family, plus David’s two daughters Ruth, 41, and Kate, 40, and his granddaughter. Then there were five friends whom I have grown up with all my life.”

Joyce’s maiden name is Walton and she says that this is appropriate considering the size of her family. However, she didn’t want to leave anyone out and even went so far as to get married in a church with two aisles so as to accommodate everyone.

In terms of getting them all to the church in the first place, she could hardly rely on a normal limo, so she hired two hummers, which could carry 12 people each. Another four travelled with the groom and two more arrived with Joyce herself in a Cadillac.

According to recent research carried out by a leading online provider, the Rolls-Royce Phantom is the most popular wedding car in the country.

This is hardly surprising with Rolls-Royce perhaps the best-known luxury car brand in the world. The Phantom is synonymous with style and comfort – just the qualities couples are looking for on the most special of days.

The Phantom has been around in one form or another since 1925, reflecting its timelessness. The design has evolved, obviously, but it retains the classic look of earlier versions, including coach doors that are ideal for brides exiting a vehicle in a long, flowing dress.

Phantoms aren’t solely the preserve of traditional Christian weddings either. They are also popular for Indian weddings and civil ceremonies. It is also not entirely unexpected that the most popular choice of Phantom for a wedding is a white one. It can pay to get your booking in early if you are getting married on a popular day.

Other popular chauffeur driven wedding cars include the Bentley Flying Spur and the Mercedes S-Class.

Choosing a wedding car is generally about ensuring that the bride arrives in style. It is generally taken for granted that the car selected will be reliable.

A York woman failed to arrive at the church in her vehicle of choice recently, but it wasn’t the car’s fault. Kirsty Beckett was due to marry Johnny Vintis at 1pm, but the Bentley in which she was due to be travelling got stuck in the hotel car park and the chauffeur couldn’t get it out.

By the time that she was 20 minutes late for the wedding, Kirsty took the only decision left open to her. She decided to get out and run.

“I’m always late in everyday life, but I wanted to arrive on time for my special day. I didn’t have a phone, so there was no way to contact my husband-to-be and tell him what was happening.

“After watching the driver desperately trying to get out of the car park for what seemed like forever, I just thought ‘I’ll get there on foot, and that’s that’.”

Beckett says people were staring, but she wasn’t bothered. Her main concern was getting to the church and keeping her dress clean, both of which she managed.

An engineer who works at RNAS Yeovilton in Somerset has builty her own wedding car. While most brides opt to hire a luxury vehicle, such as a Rolls-Royce Phantom, Lt Megan Ashton from Amesbury in Wiltshire somehow built a replica of a Porsche 356 out of a £200 Volkswagen Beetle.

The six-year project was inspired by her brother. He too built his own wedding car.

Ashton, who works in the engineering team for the Lynx helicopter, said:

“I wanted to drive the car myself, but I got slightly carried away and got a slightly bigger dress so I couldn’t quite fit under the steering wheel.

“Dad drove me to the church and Rob drove us to the reception venue. We did swap over and I took my high heels off and drove the last 500 metres in my dress which was quite cool, it was really special, a great moment.”

The Porsche 356 shared many parts with the Beetle, making the work slightly easier. However, it was still apparently a close-run thing to get it ready in time for the wedding.

The body shell can be lifted off an old Beetle, but Ashton said she went further, removing everything so that she could work from just the central spine. It is now worth around £25,000, but the bride herself describes the vehicle as ‘priceless’.

There are certain conventions when it comes to weddings, but conventions don’t always need to be stuck to. Some couples have their own ideas about what they would like their wedding to be like and plough their own furrow.

One such couple are Georgina Hughes and Darren Capstick of Blackburn. Having seen Darren’s large purple Mohican, it’s not entirely surprising to learn that this pair opted to do their wedding a little differently.

Married at Blackburn Cathedral, Darren complemented his wedding suit with purple platform boots and a waistcoat with details in the same colour. Georgina also boasted her share of purple, on her fringe and with her flowers.

Georgina said of her wedding:

“It was a mixture of traditional and a bit alternative. There wasn’t anything outrageous in the service but we looked a bit different to usual.

“We met at the Rebellion punk festival in Blackpool four years ago. Our paths had crossed many times at many gigs. He’s got the same T-shirts as me and I’ll say ‘I was at that gig’, but we didn’t meet then, maybe because the time wasn’t right.”

After the service, the newly married couple headed off in their own choice of wedding car – a blue convertible Volkswagen Beetle.

The majority of wedding cars have certain characteristics in common. They will be plush, luxurious and spacious and will befit a special occasion in every way. They will also almost always have four wheels.

That wasn’t the case when 28-year-old Paul Finley married 27-year-old Laura Grainger in Hebburn. Paul, a fanatical Only Fools and Horses fan, arrived at the church in a Robin Reliant bearing the distinctive Trotters Independent Traders branding.

Paul had actually begun his journey in a more conventional wedding car, not knowing what lay in wait. When he was just round the corner from the church, the car pulled over and there was the yellow van. It had been arranged by his bride, her mother and her mother’s boyfriend as a surprise.

True to form, the car failed to start and while it would have been possible to get it up and running, Paul said that it would be far more fitting to have the ushers push him to the church.

Paul was clearly grateful for his unusual wedding day transport:

“I had absolutely no idea about it at all. I love the programme, you can’t beat it. So it was a brilliant surprise. What a way to travel to the church. I was nervous before, but having a laugh about the car eased the nerves a bit.”

No two people are the same. One person’s perfect wedding might take place in a church and involve a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce Phantom. Another person’s might see the wedding reception take place in a fish and chip shop and the wedding car replaced by a lorry.

The latter was the case for Simon Forster and Clare McCann of Seaton Carew who marked their marriage at a Durham register office by heading to Almighty Cod in a truck that had been bought and restored by the groom.

Simon had bought it as a project and said:

“I’ve loved trucks since I was knee high to a grasshopper. Clare loves the truck and is absolutely over the moon with it. I always said it would be a wedding car. It can pull 38 tonnes but it only needed to carry us.

“It looks a million dollars. It’s 20-years-old but it was painted and polished to the hilt and is spotless inside and out so Clare could get in with her dress.”

As for the fish and chip shop, they’d been there shortly after Clare, from Coventry, had moved up to County Durham. They both love fish and chips and said that they therefore couldn’t think of a better location for a wedding reception.

Some people like to have a theme to their wedding. Very few people choose Marmite as that theme. However, Terry and Jennifer Constant from Bristol did precisely that.

The couple had a marmite themed wedding car for the day, as well as marmite hats and not-at-all appealing-sounding marmite wedding cake as well. The couple first bonded over a cheese and marmite sandwich while at university, hence their affinity for the product.

In fact, their love of yeast extract even extended to a two-and-a-half year world trip during which they took pictures of themselves at famous landmarks accompanied by their favourite spread.

The ceremony took place in the Brecon Beacons and rather than arriving in a luxurious wedding car, such as a Rolls-Royce Phantom, the groom travelled in a Marmite taxi. To be fair, the cake didn’t actually have Marmite as an ingredient, but was merely decorated in the colours of the label. However, pots were available throughout the reception in case any guests did have a craving.

It’s been a long time since couples arrived at the church on foot. Once upon a time, when cars were rare and people moved around a lot less, this was the norm, but not in the modern day.

These days the wedding car is a crucial part of proceedings. The wedding venue might be several miles away and the reception venue is likely to be another drive away. Furthermore, most wedding dresses don’t lend themselves to moving about a great deal.

Choosing the right car is crucial. You want something special for a special day, so most people hire a limo of some description with the exact model being down to personal taste. The bride will almost always have a car and chauffeur, but often many of the other wedding guests will also be transported in this way. As well as creating the right atmosphere, it also keeps everyone on time.

For most weddings, the bride will have one car and her father will often travel with her. Her mother and bridesmaids will have another car, as will the groom and his attendants. After the ceremony, the bride and groom will leave together.