COUPLES will have to wait to say “I do” at Blackpool’s new wedding chapel.
Work to complete the £2.8m building on the Promenade – named Festival House – has been delayed due to electrical hiccups.
It had been hoped the first ceremonies would have been staged before the end of the year, but now it will be 2012 before anyone can tie the knot there.
But town hall bosses today confirmed the delay.
A Blackpool Council spokesman said: “The wedding venue is nearly finished but there has been a delay in relation to the electrics. Until we can get the electrical and heating systems signed off the building can’t open.
“We’re hoping the final pieces of work on Festival House and the surrounding areas will be completed before the end of the year so that ceremonies can take place in January 2012.
“Almost 100 people have already provisionally booked ceremonies at Festival House for next year which shows just how popular its going to be when it does open.”
Around 100 weddings are already booked in at the chapel which will replace the existing register office on South King Street.
People will be able to register births and deaths with the council, and can also use a registry service already operating at Blackpool Victoria Hospital.
The iconic new venue includes two ceremony rooms, one for large parties and a second which holds just a handful of people.
There will also be a restaurant and tourist information offices.
Being built by Mowbray Drive-based contractors F Parkinson, it has been designed so no two angles in the main structure are the same.
The top floors are made of a treated wood, taken from sustainable forests in Finland, and it has been treated with a plastic coating to protect it from the harsh seafront elements.
The lower floors are a mixture of wood and glass, with a restaurant space downstairs which Blackpool Council is set to put out to tender for an operator. The building is part of the £14m Festival Headland which is also nearing completion.
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