A lot of little unspoken rules exist in the wedding arena. More often you’ll find weddings that are non-traditional, and you are welcome to make your wedding all your own.In this article, several wedding planning etiquette tips will be pointed out. You can decide how you want to use these to plan the wedding you’ve always dreamed of.
Some guests at your wedding may feel more strongly about the wedding etiquette. You may experience more opinion sharing than originally expected. That’s ok! Feel free to make your day your own.
Choosing a dress
Picking your dress can be one of the biggest and trickiest decisions you make during your wedding planning. So many small details, and you want it to be exactly your style!
Traditionally, wedding dresses are white, symbolizing purity. This is a very traditional part of weddings (in most western cultures at least). You may feel drawn to other colors, but be sure to consider this.
Who pays for what
This can be a sensitive one, depending on the financial situation of those involved in planning the wedding. Again, these are not hard and fast rules, rather etiquette based on tradition
Typically the bride’s parents pay for the bulk of the wedding. This includes reception, photography, dresses (including bridesmaids). The groom is then typically responsible for the honeymoon, church, and flowers.
There are A LOT of costs for weddings, so this is something that you will want to discuss. Creating a comprehensive budget before spending any money is a great way to communicate expectations as to who covers which costs.
Seating arrangement
At the wedding ceremony, it is tradition to have the bride’s family to sit on the left side of the aisle, with the groom’s on the right. The trend is becoming more of an unstructured “pick your own seat” arrangement.
While you will likely still reserve a few rows for immediate family, having an open seating chart will save you on time and hassle, and can be seen as a symbol of two families becoming one.
If you are more traditional, and you want your guests to know exactly what to expect (including where they are meant to sit), then keep this rule in mind!
At the reception, you have some decisions to make. Sometimes the couple will sit at a sweetheart table at the front on their own. In other instances, the bride and groom will sit in the middle of the front table, with the groom on her right. The best man will sit to her left, and the maid of honor to the groom’s right.
You may choose to have parents of the bride and groom at the front table. If this is the case, the same seating will be for the bride and groom, and you may have the bride’s parents closest to the couple, with the grooms next to them.
The most important guests (including oldest family members) should be closest to the head table.
Biggest takeaway from the head table, you have some leeway here. Don’t stress too much, and place your people as you feel most comfortable. Consider having each person giving a speech at the head table to make things easier.
Who plans which events
The bride and her maid of honor, mother, and whoever else is helping directly, will plan most of the wedding events and details. This includes the ceremony, reception, and invitations.
The honeymoon is planned by the groom traditionally, and he and his family may plan a luncheon if desired.
Engagement parties can be planned by the engaged couple, their friends, or even their parents. This is a more loose event, and many of the decisions surrounding planning an engagement party depend on how long you will be engaged. See this post to learn more about when to have an engagement party 🙂
Bridal showers are often planned and hosted by the bride’s mother and maid of honor. Her bachelorette is planned by bridesmaids and maid of honor.
As the bride, you will need as much help as you can get, so be flexible with who helps plan each event.
Open bar
Are you required to serve free drinks to your reception guests? No! Should you choose to save money by not offering an open bar, you will be just fine in terms of etiquette and tradition.
You may feel that this nice touch is what you want at your reception, but keep in mind the cost and potential liability when deciding.
Walking down the aisle
A surprising amount of symbolism goes into the tradition behind how a bride and her escort walks down the aisle. Her escort is most traditionally her father, but a brother, uncle, or close family friend may also walk her down the aisle.
She walks on the left, and this allows for the escort’s right hand to be free to defend her if needed (like some medieval knight). This also allows for her to enter the ceremony on her family’s side (who gives her away), and leaves on the groom’s side when leaving (as if to introduce her to his family).
Pretty cool! And specific…
Gift list
While it is becoming more common to see wedding registry information on wedding invites, this is not correct according to traditional wedding etiquette. Listing a wedding website, however, where you may link your registry, is acceptable.
You can choose how to distribute gift list information, but the reason why this is typically not meant to be shared on invites is because it sends the message that guests are required to give a gift in order to attend.
Out of town guests
If you are like me, you may have family that live outside of the state you are getting married in. When considering these guests, there are some things you can do to help them feel appreciated for coming to celebrate your special day with you.
First off, are you required to pay for their accommodations? No. This is not required. You may have the budget to help them with the travel and stay cost, but guests will likely accept an invite if they can afford the trip.
To show your gratitude to them, you can give them full details of events occurring, give suggestions of where to stay, and transportation. You may also consider giving some recommendations of things to do in the area should they decide to make their stay a bit of a vacation!
Who requires an invite
The rule of thumb here is to be consistent. If you want to elope and have no guests, don’t have any guests, but if you want to invite all second cousins, you better have them all.
You get to decide who you want to invite, so no you don’t have to invite each and every friend, co-worker, and family member.
Types of invites
Can you send electronic invites? Is that tacky? With paper invites do we need to have all the frills and pictures, or can it be simple?
Yeah, invites are tricky, but the truth is, it’s totally up to you. Whichever way you decide to invite your guests will be just fine. Just ensure that you proceed with good taste.
One other thing to keep in mind, some of your guests may have a hard time with electronic invites, especially in the older generation. You may want to have a few physical invites for such guests.
Asking for cash
Should you be asking your guests for cash? You can, there is no rule against mentioning that you would prefer cash over gifts. One caveat is that certain guests may not like it so much.
A tip for requesting cash, or indicating that you would prefer money over items would be to have the message spread by word of mouth. You could have your parents and friends casually mention this to others, and make your gift registry short.
Thank you notes rules
Yes, for sure send thank you’s for each gift you receive. It’s the least you can do after all! Expressing that gratitude will display respect and appreciation that go a long way.
One thing to keep in mind is that the younger generation may not need as formal a thank you as a card, a text or call could suffice. Anyone not in that age group should have a physical thank you, for sure. The gesture is well worth it.
Who can bring a plus one?
In terms of plus-ones, you should plan to invite anyone who is in a long-term relationship or married to bring their person. You can expect that some other guests may want to bring a date, and it may be nice to allow. This is not required though.
Best of luck as you continue with your planning. Hopefully these 13 wedding planning etiquette rules help you as you make any tricky decisions that come up!
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