Or a nonreligious wedding. My wife and I really wanted the ceremony and community and celebration, but we didn’t want the god. So we found an officiant we liked who was willing to let us create our own ceremony. We modeled it pretty closely on the bog-standard Protestant ceremony we’d both grown up attending, but excised any Godly stuff, and added our own touches where we wanted.
You betcha we rehearsed it–figuring out what our cues were for approaching the front, when different family members would give their readings, which of us would stand on the left or right, and so on. We suspected–correctly!–that on the day of the wedding, we’d be so hyped up on adrenaline and nerves that we could barely remember our names, so we wanted to make sure that we’d practiced the very basics.
I think this is a pretty normal experience, even for people who aren’t modifying the ceremony.
I’m trying very hard to think of anything similar that didn’t have rehearsals - and all I can think of is college graduation ceremonies. But that’s only because all of those I’ve been to have been large public colleges with a couple of thousand graduates - and they have all been disorganized to the point where my daughter didn’t even go to the ceremony when she finished her master’s. I bet smaller colleges with ceremonies that aren’t so zoo-like have rehearsals.
My take on it is that it’s not so much a difference in the “costume” as a shift in the perceived nature of the event.
Traditionally, a wedding was basically a religious ceremony solemnizing a marriage, accompanied by a party that a couple and/or their families threw for relatives, friends and neighbors to celebrate the marriage. Peripheral to the event were gifts contributed by said relatives, friends and neighbors to help the couple in setting up a new household in their new social role as spouses.
So guests naturally wore some variation of “best clothes”, because that’s what you wore to attend religious ceremonies and/or parties, and hosts were fairly tolerant of sartorial variation because not everybody has the same “best clothes”. (With some exceptions: for example, once white dresses for brides became standard, a guest wearing a white dress was not tolerated. Dress codes were also more rigid in wealthier social circles where people could afford more and fancier clothing. If a wedding invitation specified “white tie” or “black tie”, you were expected to show up in clothing appropriate to those guidelines.)
ISTM that many weddings nowadays are more in the nature of a themed costumed performance, sort of like masquerade balls used to be. It’s not so much a community party as a staged “dream day” for the bridal couple, who are the producers and directors as well as the stars of the event. If they want to strictly enforce their themed dress code, or even explicitly charge admission in the form of mandatory “gifts” or cash, then I agree that they’re totally within their rights to do so. Their only obligations in doing so, etiquette-wise, are to politely make those expectations very clear right up front, and not to be demanding or resentful towards invitees who (politely) turn down their invitation.
But I can totally see how the entire structure of such an event can look rather rude and inconsiderate to somebody coming in with the traditional expectation that a wedding is a community celebration within one’s social circle, with traditional roles of “host” and “guest” at a party, rather than “producer” and “participant” in a themed performance. As in so many etiquette situations, it’s the mismatch of (usually insufficiently articulated, or even unconscious) expectations that’s at the root of conflict.
IME, rehearsals no, but marshals and programs and clearly stated instructions yes. No institution just lets a bunch of graduating seniors loose on a graduation ceremony without some pretty forceful herding.
I don’t see the problem. White but not bridal makes perfect sense to me.
Also, as I said above, dont mistake a post on Reddit as indicative of some kind of trend to have your family and friends play dress up on your whim. As I’ve said, I’ve worked 400+ weddings and I can only think of three of them being themed and the theme was only for the bride and groom and possibly the wedding party, not the guests. It was all in good fun. (Twilight, Harry Potter, Star Wars — I’d think this crew of all people would be into that.)
The vast vast majority of weddings are as normal as they’ve always been.
It’s asinine to expect your loved ones to buy special clothes that you may or may not approve of and they have to guess whether you will find them acceptable. According to the guest, the bride was genuinely a terrible person and would end up getting pissed about something.
Oh shit, I missed the part that said she wanted the guests to wear that. I thought it was just her that wanted to wear a white dress that wasn’t bridal. Yeah, that’s asinine. Also, not something that happens with anything approaching frequency such to broadly describe today’s couples as treating weddings as their own costumes performance.
I think you’ve nailed it - you’ve really managed to explain why so many of the things described in this thread seem so bizarre and outlandish to me.
(I think it also helps that American weddings are so small. You might be able to convince 75 close friends and relatives to indulge the bride and groom, but you won’t be able to pull that off with 750 of them).
No idea how common it is. I’ve been to some lavish weddings recently, but not “behind the scenes” so to speak. The only ones who can really speak to any given bride’s unreasonableness are people who have to put up with the constant behind-the-scenes demands. I went to these weddings and had a nice time but I couldn’t tell you whether there were any bridezillas.
Yes.
My friends are more likely to have steampunk outfits than normal suits or long dresses (Although, standard wedding attire here would be a cocktail dress). We would view a full normal suit as a special costume (usually signalling being a lawyer or banker).
BUT
Common practice here is to rent for a wedding, not have to have your own suit. Especially if it’s morning dress (which in my circles is a very common dress code for summer weddings). Isn’t that common in the USA?
AND
I actually have been to a steampunk wedding. Most everyone was into it, though, even the b&g’s older relatives. There were a few guests not explicitly “on theme”, but they were wearing normal khakis+shirt or cocktail dresses, so actually fitted in just fine, anyway.
You mean, the cutaway-coat-with-waistcoat-and-top-hat kind of “morning dress”? The groom and groomsmen will occasionally wear that for a daytime wedding in the US; I would guesstimate that it’s seen most often in the South and Northeast of the country, and is rarer in the West and Southwest. I’ve been to two weddings in forty years, IIRC, where the groom’s party were in morning dress.
Male wedding guests, on the other hand, are IME never requested to wear morning dress. There may be some super-ritzy weddings where this is expected, but I think it’s far more rare even than, say, putting “black tie” on invitations to convey that male guests are expected to show up in tuxedos and female guests in long dresses. I have never been invited to a “black tie for everybody” wedding, although I know a couple people who’ve attended one. I’ve been to several where only the groom’s party wore tuxedos, though.
Are you telling us that it’s common practice in South Africa for even the wedding guests to rent morning dress for summer weddings, with female guests in correspondingly fancy dresses? Damn, y’all must look SHARP. Send pix plz!
No top hats, but yes, the cutaway coat. They’re very common - as are Indian weddings, where everyone wears sherwani.
In my circle, they get requested all the time. It’s an English expat crowd. These are usually country weddings.
Not mandated, though, and there are many common, acceptable alternatives that get worn, such as the aforementioned sherwani, or African traditional clothing, or bright suits.
But jeans, or shorts and sandals would not get you in.
It’s upper-middle class and up. Not the mega-wealthy, but some reasonably well-connected (or at least, their parents are). As in, when they’re “back home” in the UK, they might be going to Ascot or the Derby. Or ride in hunts, back in the day. Here, it’s show jumping and yachting. They’re called the Mink&Manure crowd. The parents, I mean. The people I’m actually friends with are born and raised here, so are not as stuffy. But for weddings, they revert to tribal dress.
In my circle. Which is a tiny fraction of SA weddings. I go to one of these like, every 5 years or so.
My family weddings would be way more like a “standard” American wedding, I think.
I’ve been the officiant at several weddings. Although I offered the bride&groom the opportunity to write the ceremony/vows they’ve all demurred to me.
My weddings have all been god-free. Lots of talk about love and life, but never a mention of gods. Yet many people attending assumed that I was a minister of some sort. I’ve had people shake my hand and tell me my congregation was lucky to have me!
Wow, that sounds like an absolutely lovely mix. I’d adore to see an ostentation* of wedding guests with the men in a variety of morning dress, bright sack suits, African traditional clothing, and sherwani, and the women presumably in correspondingly diverse types of party clothes.
Not trying to cadge an invitation to be your plus-one at the next such event (and anyway I presume that this crowd is etiquette-conscious enough that they don’t even have “plus-one” wedding invitations for unidentified guests of their invited guests), but if you happen to know of an online publication or Instagram account or similar where any such gatherings are depicted, I’d be super chuffed to be pointed to a link!
* This appears to be one of the standard collective nouns for peacocks/peafowl, but I think it’s appropriate in this context too.
They’re surprisingly not that fussed. At least, ever since I’ve been friends with them (since Uni) their parents have always been quite welcoming of their friends and partners. I’d say rocking up to a wedding without a partner is more noticeable than arriving with a stranger.
I’m afraid I don’t do social media, outside this place. I even dropped off Facebook a few years ago. But looking up “South African wedding party” would probably get you a good idea, although most would be one culture or another so you’ll have to imagine a mix.
Send pix plz!