Courthouse weddings and elopements

The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk headquarters at 12400 Imperial Highway in Norwalk is the highest volume option in the county and usually the easiest to get on the calendar. Large government complex, numbered queue, big parking lot, small ceremony rooms with overhead lighting and a plain backdrop. Nothing in that room photographs itself. The useful light is outside, a two minute walk from the door.

The Beverly Hills courthouse at 9355 Burton Way is a county branch office inside a courthouse, not a wedding venue. The ceremony room is small, flatly lit, and runs on a clock. What you are really there for is the front of the building, the row of white arches, the lawn, the palms, and Beverly Gardens Park directly across the street. It is the most requested branch in the county, so appointments run weeks out and walking in is not a plan.

The Van Nuys branch on Sylvan Street works the same way and is worth checking when Beverly Hills is full. In Orange County, the Anaheim, Fullerton and Laguna Hills offices run standard ceremonies in a dedicated room off the lobby, usually a small archway, a few chairs, and no window. Guest limits in branch rooms are commonly around six, and some offices count your photographer and videographer inside that number, so ask when you book.

A branch ceremony is a ten to fifteen minute slot. The ten minutes before it, standing in a lobby holding a folder, is where the honest pictures are. Plan on one to two hours at the building once you add check in, security screening and the wait, then plan the rest of the day somewhere else.

There are two separate fees from the same county clerk, and a third if you want the paperwork. The marriage license is one payment, the civil ceremony is another, and a certified copy of the certificate afterward is a third. Every California county sets its own amounts, so a figure you read for one county does not carry to the next.

Los Angeles County has been charging about $91 for a public license, about $85 for a confidential one, and around $35 for the civil ceremony. Orange County is cheaper, roughly $61 public and $66 confidential, with a standard branch ceremony under $30 and a higher fee for a slot at the Old Courthouse. Certified copies run around $15 to $20 each. Pull up the county's own fee page before you budget, because these numbers move.

Realistically you are looking at $100 to $200 for the entire civil side in either county, plus parking. Extras are optional: both counties will deputize a friend or relative as a commissioner of civil marriages for the day for an added fee, extra certified copies help with the name change at Social Security and the DMV, and a permit only enters the picture if you want portraits somewhere the county does not control.

A public license is a public record and needs one witness present at the ceremony to sign it. Up to two may sign, but one is the requirement, and that person has to be physically in the room. If you arrive with nobody, asking a stranger in the lobby is the standard fix and clerks are used to the question. Your photographer can sign it.

A confidential license needs no witness at all. The tradeoff is that it is not a public record, only the two of you can order copies later, and California requires that you are already living together as spouses to qualify. Couples who want the ceremony to be strictly the two of them usually take this route.

Either way, both people appear in person with valid photo ID. There is no blood test and no waiting period. The license is good for 90 days and works anywhere in California, so you can pull it in Norwalk and marry in Santa Ana. The officiant returns it to the county within 10 days, and the certified copy comes after that.

The license and the ceremony are two separate appointments. Most couples book them back to back the same morning, and if the license appointment runs long, the ceremony slot does not wait for you. Both counties book online, and the dates everyone wants, Valentine's Day, matching number dates, the Friday before a holiday, are gone months in advance.

Bring the physical license. Nobody will marry you without the paper in hand, and the office that issued it will not reprint it while you stand there.

Because the ceremony itself is ten to twenty minutes, we build coverage around what surrounds it. One photographer and one videographer are on every collection, which matters in a room that only seats six, since it means one small team instead of two. Photos can come back in as little as 2 days, and the highlight film runs 5 to 15 minutes and takes about two weeks.

The hour after is the real session. From the Old Courthouse you are minutes from downtown Santa Ana and the Artists Village. From Beverly Hills you have the park across the street and quiet residential blocks north of it. From Norwalk you drive somewhere. A short wedding does not have to look like a trip to a permit office.