There are two routes and the difference matters far more to your calendar than to your wedding day.
Route one: marry legally in Türkiye
You gather an apostilled document set at home, we translate and notarise it here, you attend a health appointment, and a Turkish registrar conducts the ceremony at a registry office. You leave with an international marriage certificate that is valid in the UK immediately.
The whole thing takes four to six weeks of document handling before you fly, and it has one hard constraint: the Certificate of No Impediment is valid for six months from issue, so it cannot be obtained too early either.
Route two: sign at home, celebrate here
A register office appointment in the UK with two witnesses and no ceremony. Fifteen minutes. Then you fly out and we produce the wedding you actually pictured, with a celebrant, vows, rings and a register your guests sign for the photograph.
Zero documents on the Turkish side. This is what most British couples do, and the full comparison is here.
When route one is worth it
Two situations, and only two. If the marriage needs to be registered in Türkiye for residency or property reasons, and if one of you is a Turkish citizen. Otherwise route two saves six weeks and buys you the same day.
The order to do things in
- Decide the route before you book flights, because route one has a document deadline attached to your date.
- If route one: book the register office notice appointment first, because the 28-day clock starts there and everything else waits on it.
- Order the long-form birth certificate at the same time. It comes from the General Register Office and takes days, not weeks, but people forget it.
- Send both to the FCDO for apostille together rather than separately.
- Post the apostilled set to us. We arrange sworn translations, notarisation, the health appointment and the registry booking.
There is more detail on step four and five in apostilles and sworn translations explained.
What we do and what you do
You gather documents at home and post them once. We do everything on the Turkish side: translation, notarisation, the health report appointment, the registry booking and the interpreter who is legally required if neither of you speaks Turkish.
Where British couples marry
Fethiye and Ölüdeniz and Kaş and Kalkan between them account for most of it, both an hour or two from Dalaman. Antalya takes the larger guest lists. If you are still choosing, this piece narrows seven regions to two in about a minute.