Destination Wedding Etiquette

In My Humble Opinion
61

I think the key to this issue is whether or not you are asking the guests to do MORE, in terms of time or money, than what they would normally be expected to do. For instance, my brother got married last year. He lives in LA, I live in Chicago. Naturally, I expected to fly out there with my husband & kids, stay for a couple of nights, and maybe take a Friday off from work (not much chance of them getting married back here in IL, since her family lives in CA). It doesn’t bother me to spend that time and money for a close relative…to me, it’s the cost of doing business with a family. (I went out for his wedding, he came home for mine, I went out there for my other brother’s daughter’s 1st Communion, he came here for my son’s baptism, etc.)

On the other hand, if they had planned a wedding that would have cost me twice as much for the hotel (as these destination weddings are often at pricier resort areas), and required more vacation time or trouble dealing with traveling with the kids (like if it was in Hawaii or somewhere else with a long flight), then it probably would have annoyed me.

62

Who the hell cares what they think? It’s your wedding, you can do whatever you want.

And anyway, aren’t all weddings destination events now? I don’t know a single person who has all family and friends living in the same area. Every invitation I get has local hotel information included whether I line in town or not. Presumably, they’re sending the information for a reason, correct?

63

I think I would only suggest a destination wedding if I knew that the most important people would be able to do it - parents, siblings, best friends. It’s an easy enough matter to check with them first, and if all of the must-have-them-there people are a go, then you can invite everyone else who you’d like to be there, although you don’t need it.

64

The wedding is for the guests, not for the couple.

65

Ah, for the days when the bride and groom didn’t move in together before the wedding, and they were eager to rush off together after the bouquet was tossed and enjoy being alone together! I’ve been to so many weddings lately where the bride and groom were hanging around FOREVER and wouldn’t leave! It was like being trapped at one of those military functions I used to have to attend…no one was allowed to leave before the General did, and the real partying began as soon as he left, or you could finally go home…a General who hung about was a partypooper! I long for those days when the happy couple would make their getaway, and the party would go on without them, and the old folks could leave. Now, the couple hangs around until the clean-up starts, and if you have to leave, you have to drag them off the dance floor to say goodbye…sweaty brides are not pleasant to hug.

Which is a long way to say that we have different views about the purpose of a wedding. If and when I get married again, I’m going to be eager to get rid of all the guests and relatives and spend some quality time with my new spouse…not engage in a three-day pub-crawl with friends, or go sight-seeing with friends, or play touch football with friends…If you don’t see a wedding as a romantic time to be a couple together, then it’s a reunion you should plan, not a wedding.

66

:rolleyes:

No, a wedding is for two people who want to be joined as a couple legally. The party afterward is for the guests.

67

Almost everyone I know either personally or professionally, hates going to weddings. Okay maybe hate is too strong a word. But many people just put up with going because they feel it’s a duty.

It’s for the couple, definitely.

68

For many guests, the ceremony is just as important as the reception. For many, many couples, the wedding ceremony is not just about being joined legally, but affirming their union and commitment before their loved ones and their God.

I had a long conversation last night with my sister-in-law, who’s heartsick about her best friend’s wedding in Mexico. The wedding is in February. My sister-in-law will have a 3-month-old baby by then, and going to the wedding means leaving a nursing baby behind for 5 days, or applying for a passport for the baby the week she’s born (given that the government is taking at least 3 months to process pasport applications) and speeding up her vaccination schedule, which her parents are reluctant to do. If the wedding was at the bride’s home in Seattle, these wouldn’t be issues.

69

Back 30 or so years ago, my wife and I had not lived together – but when we got married, at the reception we got passed hints that we should leave because the older people needed to get home. Of course, we wanted to be alone together eventually, but we were having too much fun with our friends.

Most bridegrooms would probably disagree.

70

I agree, as long as they were the cause of the sweat! The bride I had in mind was my 2nd cousin…280-lbs of bride in a strapless dress, face flushed from dancing, makeup running down her face. They had to drag her off the dance floor for all the pictures (the ones she had requested to have taken) and she was red-faced and glistening in each one. And she wasn’t dancing with her groom…he was at the bar with his buds…she was dancing with her girlfriends. This was the wedding where the maid-of-honor gave a speech and toast that recalled their happy days holding each other’s hair back while leaning over the toilet after a night of drinking at OSU…her her words, a true mark of friendship!

71

We deliberately cut the cake (which is kinda the “money shot” for UK receptions) shortly after dinner at about 6pm, so that anyone who needed to shoot off early could do so.

We also had our First Dance right away too.

One wedding we went to didn’t cut the cake until 11.30pm, by which time a lot of people were grumbling about how late they were going to get home.

72

From what I understand of American weddings, when the couple cuts the cake, it’s a signal that anyone can leave after that point. I certainly took it as my cue to leave and get reacquainted with my SO when my brother and SIL got married. [sub](Long story short: hadn’t seen the SO in about six months and wanted some private time with him before having to deal with another bout of LDR status.)[/sub]

73

Yeah, if that’s the case I’m kind of wondering if I will be able to invite more than about 2 people to my wedding, since everyone I know, including family, lives in some far-flung location–there is no central location where most people live. I know virtually nobody in the area that I’d probably end up getting married, so I guess since it’s tacky to expect anyone to travel for the wedding, I’m supposed to not invite anyone and tell all of my friends and family after the fact “oh yeah, I got married.” How depressing. Kinda makes you not want to bother having a wedding at all.

I’m glad I don’t buy into that crap. I realize not everyone I invite will be able to come, but I’m going to invite everyone who I’d like to see there and hope that as many can make it as possible. I’ll understand those who can’t, but I will surely give them the option! (And I don’t think that people who don’t come to the wedding should feel obliged to send a gift–that’s just weird to me. In fact, I think that people who travel to a wedding shouldn’t feel obliged to send a gift either–they spent the money on travel, their presence is the gift. Actually I don’t think anyone should feel obligated to give a gift at all, but especially those who don’t come or who pay to travel should only give a gift if they really, really want to.)

I really don’t have any experience with the exotic style “destination weddings” other than my cousin’s, which I thought was sad. She got married in the Bahamas. I went because my mom paid for us to go, but my cousin’s mother was heartbroken because she could not afford to make the trip. So she didn’t get to see her daughter’s wedding.

74

While the level of classiness at that affair could perhaps be called into question (“You’re such a sweetheart for holding my hair while I puked up that 151! OSU, BABY!”), what was so wrong with the bride dancing, having fun, and generally enjoying the party she paid for? I’m sure you were more than welcome to smile, give her a hug, say it was lovely, and head home for the night at 6:45 if that’s what you really wanted to do. I doubt anyone would have gasped loudly and said, “Kittenblue ! How DARE you! You better sit there sipping on your ginger ale and watching the chicken dance miserably or else!”

75

Diosa, just from someone’s perspective who couldn’t go to her own brother’s wedding (Jamaica) truly it was no big deal (to me). And he didn’t come home and have a “reception” or anything - we got together just to get together. Yes, it would have been nice to be able to be there, but in the end, did it change anything? Nope.

So IMNSHO, I don’t see any problem with your plans and I would never even THINK to have someone pay for my trip to such an event. Hypothetically of course. :slight_smile:

76

Just to clarify, all of my comments regarding destination weddings relate to this latter type, the “exotic” destination wedding that incurs costs well above the “average” level of domestic travel. I don’t think that inviting guests who would travel is rude, at all, certainly it is not outside the norm.

Again, all my comments are directed toward “exotic” or unusually expensive destinations ONLY. The above situation illustrates the problem with these type of affairs perfectly.

77

I can’t vouch for the price, but when I worked in Japanese tourism in Hawaii 20 years ago, we did have quite a few couples whose tour packages included wedding ceremonies, including rental of the bridal gown and tuxedo. My favorite was the fellow who asked if we could have flowers delivered to his room during the ceremony. Unfortunately, the ceremomy took less time than expected and the flowers arrived later than expected, so when the person who worked for the hotel and I let ourselves into his room to deliver the flowers, the couple was already back! :o

My cousin had a nice solution for those of us whose families are a bit far flung. My immediate family is the only branch of the family in the US; the rest of us are in England. When my cousin got married to an American and decided to live over here, there was a standard wedding in New Jersey for his family, their friends, and my immediate family and any English connections who wanted to come. A year later, they had a reception in England, hosted by her parents, I think, for all of our family members who couldn’t make it to the states, including one uncle who didn’t fly. There were no hard feelings as far as I know and a good time was had by all.

78

See, and I guess you’ve just vocalized what I was thinking but didn’t quite realize.

If my friends decide they want to go to dinner at a restaurant I can’t afford, I don’t expect them to pay- I just politely decline. If my friend was getting married in Jamaica, I wouldn’t DREAM of asking them to pay because I couldn’t. In fact, if they offered to pay, I’d decline because I’d feel like a total mooch (now, the situation would certainly be different if it was my child or something, I suppose).

79

My husband and I got married in February in a Destination Wedding in Mexico. I’m a member of a message board dedicated solely to destination weddings - they are more popular than you think! And typically you see less ‘bridezilla-ish’ behavior from DW brides, from what I have seen on the various wedding boards I frequent.

I don’t think a DW is in any way tacky. For instance, it was cheaper for my sister to fly from California to Mexico than it was to fly to DC, had we had it where we live. We didn’t pay for anyone’s trip - just as nobody paid for me to fly to California, or paid for my hotel in PA, or any of the other trips I have ever had to make for non (to the couple) destination weddings. We made it clear we did not want or expect gifts, but we got some anyway. We made it clear that we understood that not everyone would be able to make it. But many more people than we expected DID make it. And had a bast.

Yes, some people couldn’t make it. But in almost all cases they wouldn’t have been able to make it to a ‘local’ wedding either, since where we live was not local to them. We chose Mexico because it was the cheapest option to get to for what we wanted and we picked a hotel that was more on the economic side, in order to help lessen ‘the burden’. Everyone still talks about how much fun they had, what a great idea it was, etc.

We invited 100 people and had 40 there. We had an amazing week with our closest friends and family that everyone is still talking about. We keep saying we wish all our friends would have destination weddings, since it was so much fun.

I didn’t see the point in asking people to fly 5 hours (more in some cases) to DC for two days, where I would see them for maybe half an hour? at the reception and then have them fly home the next day, which is what most likely would have happened if we had a local wedding. You’re so busy on your wedding day you only get to see your guests at the reception really, and you have to make time to go talk to all of them which means you only get a few moments of one-on-one time with everyone.

At our wedding, we saw our guests all week - we hung out, went to dinner, went out dancing and drinking - so by the time the wedding came around on Saturday night, all the family and friends who had never met before were friends and partied at the reception like they never could have, had they just met that morning, as in a traditional wedding. New friendships formed in that week that I think will last a long, long time!

It’s not for everyone, but I see nothing inherently wrong in it either. I don’t understand the hate for DW’s.

80

The way I see it, the only times this many of my friends and family are going to get together in one place are my wedding and my funeral, and I’ll be missing the funeral by a few days. So it seems pretty silly to leave while the party is still going on. There was plenty of time to celebrate alone together; the priority on that day was celebrating with the people we love.

One of the major things we wanted to avoid was a party that people were dying to leave. The last wedding I went to emptied out about five minutes after the cake was cut. The DJ ended up packing it up early rather than playing to an empty floor. Who wants that?