Judge John Laurie – Wedding Judge

Judge Laurie married us in September in Cancer Survivor’s Garden recommended by him. It was a nice and private place and he was there on time and well dressed. He wore the gown during the ceremony (although it was in a park) which made the ceremony more formal and we liked it. He also sent us the vows before the wedding so we could change if we wanted to which was really nice.
The only thing was that not everyone could hear him even in the video we took. Although it might also be because of the street noise as we were so close to the main street. So I recommend to either bring a mic or pick a more quiet place if you want everyone to hear the ceremony.
Overall I think he did a great job and we are happy we shared our big day with him.

I recommend Judge John Laurie for downtown weddings. He sent us his prescriptive vows one month before our wedding for us to edit. He was on time on the wedding day and didn’t rush us to start the ceremony. He was quick on email correspondence. Overall, he did a good job for our big day.

Judge Laurie was recommended to us by another judge we had contacted who was not available on our date. He was polite and professional on the phone and immediately sent us a copy of a secular wedding ceremony for our review. We edited this ceremony significantly, including replacing the vows with ones we had found on our own. Judge Laurie accepted our revised script and was helpful in answering any questions we had.
On the wedding day, he arrived well before the ceremony and met separately with my husband and I. He gave us pointers on how to stand during different parts of the ceremony and how best to put the rings on each other’s fingers so that our photographer could get a picture of the moment. During the ceremony, he was calm and authoritative but also threw in a small aside at the beginning of the ceremony that was very touching and set the tone for the rest of the wedding. He didn’t have any problems with our names or the name of my sister in law (who did a reading).
Overall, I was very pleased. He also was experienced enough in weddings that he politely slipped away after we’d walked down the aisle. While I certainly would have thanked him had I seen him head out, it was very considerate of him to realize my husband and I would be so caught up in the moment. I appreciated his professionalism and experience and the tips he provided us before the ceremony, and would highly recommend him.

We googled Wedding J.O.P. (or something like that) and found Judge Laurie. He’s ok. We liked that he didn’t require that we meet with him, he didn’t shove any advice about married life down our throats, etc. On the big day he was businesslike and no-​nonsense. The reason why he gets two stars? On the wedding day, he hurried us into starting the ceremony exactly on time. Three of our nineteen guests weren’t there yet, and without noticing, we ended up starting without them.

After googling «Chicago Justice of the Peace» and «Chicago Wedding Officiant» and compiling a modest list of potential officiants for our wedding, we decided to go with Judge John Laurie.
Our decision was made based on the following: availability, price (charging us $ 225 for 30 minutes of work versus the $ 450 the next guy wanted), and willingness to let us write our own ceremony.
We initially contacted him through his website, and also had the opportunity to email and chat with him on the phone.
After handing over our $ 100 deposit, we received the stock ceremony script he uses for weddings he prefers. If I had not already planned on writing our own, I would have been disappointed because it was pretty blah. Ours, on the other hand, was awesome, and he complimented it as well :)
On the day of, he showed up on time and got the job done. Our venue had no mic, which could have been helpful as he did not project as much as we would have liked. A word of caution on tricky names, have him practice them beforehand because even though we had names written out phonetically, a few were still butchered in the pronunciation.
All in all, Judge John Laurie took care of business. I would recommend him to others, especially those getting married downtown, to act as an officiant. you might just want to go over the volume and pronunciation ahead of time.