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Rosamund Pike says it was ‘important to cement’ her relationship by starting a family — not having a wedding

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Rosamund Pike, 47, says she stepped away from the traditional expectation of marriage and built a family her own way.

On Wednesday’s episode of “How to Fail with Elizabeth Day,” the actor reflected on a broken engagement in her late 20s that reshaped her view of relationships.

Pike was engaged to filmmaker Joe Wright in the late 2000s, though the couple ultimately called off the wedding. Looking back, she said the experience made her question the conventional milestones many women feel pressured to reach.

“My failure to get married. Well, it’s a big deal for a 28-year-old, isn’t it? Your, sort of, template for womanhood — you’re doing the right thing. Got a lovely boyfriend, he’s asked you to marry him, you’re getting engaged, and there’s going to be a wedding, and you know, it’s the right age,” Pike told podcast host Elizabeth Day.

The actor also recalled her then-fiancé asking if she was “pleased” to be marrying before 30. She added that she thought it felt “right” and “romantic” at the time, until their relationship fell apart.

The breakup was “utterly devastating,” and public scrutiny made it worse, she said.

However, Pike eventually began to see the experience in a new light.

“The freedom from that afterward is that you sort of think, OK, so you haven’t achieved the thing, I suppose, the template,” Pike said. “He was a man who was eight years older than me. He was successful, he was good-looking, he was funny — he was great. And then it doesn’t happen, and you think, ‘Oh, no.'”

“But then you realize that actually you’re free in a way, because you think there are so many other templates of what life can look like for a woman,” she continued.

The breakup also helped her see that there are “so many other ways that love can look like.”

Pike has since been in a long-term relationship with businessman Robie Uniacke, and they share two sons together. Their first child, Solo, was born in 2012, and their second, Atom, in 2014.

“Here I am. I’m not married, but I have a family, and I’ve been with someone for 14, 15 years, happily not married,” Pike said.

She added that she was intentional about marking commitment in a “different way” in this relationship.

“It was more important to cement that or, sort of, mark that with starting a family than having a wedding, because also, I thought I’m the center of attention so often. I don’t need a wedding,” she said.

Pike isn’t the only celebrity to question traditional expectations around marriage and motherhood.

Charlize Theron has called single motherhood “one of the healthiest decisions” she ever made, despite the stigma around it.

“With women, it’s always like, something must be wrong with her. She can’t keep a man. And it’s never part of the discussion of like, ‘Wow, she’s really living her truth. She’s living in her happiness. This is actually a choice that she made,'” Theron said during a July episode of “Call Her Daddy.”

Michelle Obama has similarly pushed back on the idea that women must hit certain milestones by a certain age, saying turning 35 shouldn’t be viewed as a deadline for marriage or success.

“I would just say there are no ‘shoulds’. There are so many ways to live a happy, fulfilling life,” she said on a November episode of her podcast.




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My grandmother wrote me a letter before my wedding. Her marriage advice insulted me at first, but now I get it.

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I married my husband, Scott, in April 2025 after four years of dating.

Nobody was more excited for the wedding than our families. They rallied around us, sharing tips and calming me down when the planning became stressful.

My sister made a scrapbook for me to open the night before the nuptials. Inside, there were handwritten letters from my bridesmaids, my mom, and my 79-year-old grandmother.


Wedding photo

The author on her wedding day.

Courtesy of the author



The letters were sweet, romantic, and optimistic — well, almost all of them were. My grandmother’s letter had an ominous tone.

“I wish you and Scott all the happiness in the world in your married life. I am sure you two are just right for each other. That’s not to say it will all be plain sailing,” she wrote.

“There may be bumps along the road,” she added, “but love has a way of forgiving a multitude of sins.”

I was alarmed by my grandmother’s note

It was a huge contrast to the other letters in the scrapbook. While my bridesmaids reminisced about the past and shared excitement for my future, my grandma’s words stopped me in my tracks.

I remember laughing and shaking my head in disbelief. I then handed the letter to my mom, who was equally unimpressed.

It’s not that I didn’t appreciate the advice. But really, who wants to hear the words “love” and “sins” mentioned in the same sentence? Especially when it’s in relation to your own husband.


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The author was taken aback by her grandmother’s letter at first.

Courtesy of the author



For a brief moment, I contemplated what she meant by the word “sins.” Cheating? Lying? Or something else?

My gran has a fantastic relationship with my husband, so I couldn’t imagine what sparked her cautionary words. Similarly, I had never spoken a bad word about Scott to my grandmother.

Of course, like any couple, we’d had fights, but it was never anything relationship-threatening. And I had never spoken about it with my her.

Ultimately, I disregarded the note, just as you would ignore a speck of dirt on a white wedding dress. Even if nobody else notices it, you know it’s there.

Five months later, I learned a major lesson

The wedding day was picture-perfect.

I felt so fortunate that we got to celebrate with our loved ones, especially our grandmothers. Both Scott and I were the first grandchildren in our families to get married, so it felt extra special.

Five months later, I found my grandma’s letter while looking through the scrapbook. It looked different to me with fresh eyes. Now that some time had passed, I could look at it from a new perspective. I could read without taking it personally.

I thought about my grandmother’s life, and I realized that her words were never about my husband and me.

My gran married my late grandfather when they were just teenagers, and it’s fair to say they had many bumps in their own love story. Let’s just say, their relationship wasn’t like the kind I grew up watching in romantic comedies and Disney films.

However, they loved each other deeply. They were loyal, forgiving, and supported each other throughout their more than 50-year marriage.

Staying in love is a choice

Thinking about their relationship reminded me that falling in love is a feeling, but staying in love is a choice. It’s an action. It’s not something that just happens to a person.

The wedding is the beautiful part, but the marriage? That’s where things have the potential to get messy.


Granddaughter posing for photo with grandma

The author now understands where her grandmother was coming from.

Courtesy of the author



I’ve been married for less than a year, so I’m not pretending to know all the answers. But if I’m honest with myself, I can admit that my grandma’s letter shook me because it didn’t fit the aesthetic Instagram version of what I thought marriage was supposed to be.

I know that my husband and I have a great deal of joy ahead of us. But we’re also going to witness one another’s pain, grief, disappointment, and growth. That’s just a part of sharing your life with someone.

If I ever catch myself feeling unprepared, I know I can revisit my grandma’s letter.




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We gave our daughter $20,000 for a wedding, but she used it for a home down payment and paid for her own wedding. Everyone was happy.

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When Mike’s daughter got engaged, he and his wife wanted to help pay for it.

Mike, who asked Business Insider to only use his first name for privacy reasons, estimated that a wedding in the Kansas City area would cost between $15,000 and $25,000 at the time, which was around 2015.

Mike and his wife decided they could put $20,000 towards the wedding, but they knew wedding spending can get out of hand and that emotions tend to run high during the planning process.

So instead of working closely with their daughter on her wedding plans and talking through each potential cost, they came up with a straightforward solution: give her and her fiancé a lump sum of $20,000 and let them do all the planning.

“I didn’t want to be telling my daughter what she could and couldn’t do,” he said. “She was an adult.”

Mike said the strategy took the pressure off him and his wife and helped avoid any wrestling over who was buying what or what his daughter could and could not have at her own wedding. He also said it helped him and his wife contribute the amount they wanted without going over budget by adding on things here and there.

In 2023, the national average cost of a wedding was $35,000, according to The Knot, while the average cost in Kansas was $25,000. Still, most couples end up going over their budget. A Real Weddings Study by The Knot found 56% of couple spent an average of $7,600 more on their wedding than they planned. Others exceeded their budget by more than $10,000.

While tradition typically has the bride’s family primarily paying for a wedding, those customs are changing, especially as Americans get married later in life and are more able to take on their own wedding costs. A 2023 study from The Knot found it’s more common for couples and their families to split the costs equally.

Mike, his wife, their daughter, and her fiancé were all happy with the lump-sum agreement.

“Then they kind of tricked me,” he said, laughing. “One day, they came home and said, ‘Hey, we bought a house.'”

The couple took the $20,000 and used it to put a down payment on their home — before they actually had their wedding, which they then planned to pay for out of their own pocket.

Initially, Mike was surprised, but ultimately, he thought it was a good thing that his daughter and her fiancé paid for their own wedding.

“If kids are not given carte blanche on wedding plans, if they’re forced to budget from their own standpoint, the whole thing just doesn’t get out of hand,” he said.

The couple held the wedding at the rose garden in Loose Park, a large public park in Kansas City, and at a popular reception hall. Mike said everything about the wedding seemed reasonable but that he never learned what they ended up spending.

“I never asked,” he said.

If the couple had used the money for a down payment and then eloped, Mike said that may have bothered him. But as long as he and his wife were still able to attend their daughter’s wedding, they were happy.

“I figured I got off for a reasonable amount of money for the wedding, and they got a down payment on a house out of the deal and a wedding,” he said.

Mike said he thinks too many people get caught up on the lavish weddings they see on TikTok, but that it can take away from the “whole point of having a wedding, which is to have a marriage.”

He also said that he thinks by helping them learn how to budget their money for a wedding, it was also a good step towards learning how to budget in a marriage.

Mike’s wife did end up giving their daughter a bit more money in the end, which he thinks was for something having to do with her dress.

“She snuck it in,” he said, laughing. “She couldn’t resist.”

Have a news tip or a story to share about the costs of throwing a wedding or being in a bridal party? Contact this reporter at kvlamis@businessinsider.com.


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