Wedding Day Etiquette: The Guests

January 4, 2017

I’m so very excited for the third and final installment of the wedding day etiquette series! It has been so much fun to write these sorts of posts especially because they are a bit different than the traditional ones that you’ve been seeing. There will be more Matrimonial Monday’s and Wedding Wednesday’s coming your way extremely soon! Especially because this New Year’s Eve we had five different weddings. Five. And I can’t wait for all of the gorgeous pictures that are to come from the photographers!

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But until then, you get to have the lovely posts like this! So if you haven’t been keeping up with things over the past two weeks (don’t worry with the holiday’s I don’t blame you) we have been talking about different wedding day etiquette tips. The first week focused on bridal etiquette, last week we covered bridesmaids etiquette and now it’s time for the guests. And this applies to anyone and everyone that is not part of the bridal party. a groomsmen, or the parents of the bride and groom. So unless you are any of those people this post definitely applies to you. And it is super important for a bride to know what to expect of her guests and the people that are being inviting to the special day!

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The most important thing I can tell anyone attending a wedding is no matter what, under any circumstance should you wear white to a wedding. White and ivory are colors that are reserved for the bride! And you need to make sure it stays that way! Not only will everyone be talking about you, and how rude you are for doing that, but you are stealing the bride’s thunder! I know you’re sitting there reading this and saying Lou, duh. That’s a given. But you would be surprised. We had a wedding a little bit ago where the mother of the groom wanted to wear a white dress…let’s just say the bride was not thrilled about it at all. So even if the wedding is in the summer and you have a killer tan, DO NOT wear white.

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If you have been to a wedding lately you have probably seen these new signs that brides and grooms have been putting up signs that say no smart phones or cell phones! If you see this then follow it! This 1). keeps you in the moment and 2). gets out of the photographers way which is extremely important. So many wedding photographers have said that these “IPhone Photographers” are getting in the way of the real photographers work and then imagine wedding pictures with everyone standing with their phones in front of their faces. Use this time to detach from the outside world and celebrate love!

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A big no no for guests is, If you didn’t RSVP DO NOT show up! If it slipped your mind and then you remember that the wedding day is coming up, or just whatever the case is don’t just decide to stroll up to the ceremony and the reception. A lot of planning has gone into this day and since you failed to RSVP the bride and groom didn’t account for your presence meaning, there is no seat for you, there is not enough food for you, and you’re just causing more stress! So if this is the wedding of someone that you really care for don’t forget to RSVP. And chances are, if you did forget….they aren’t that close to you anyways so it’s probably for the best!

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Something that I can not stress enough is to dress to the invite. If the invitation says black tie, wear black tie. If it says cocktail wear cocktail, but for the love of god do not show up to a black tie wedding in khaki shorts because you will stick out like a sore thumb and chances are the bride and groom won’t really want you in pictures!

And the last piece of advice that I can give wedding gifts is to shop from the registry! There’s a reason for these things and it’s simply because the bride and groom don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings and chances are if you choose from something they put on there…They will definitely love the gift!

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I hope some of the tips from this series helped you guys out! Sometimes you just aren’t as well versed in weddings as you’d like to be, and that’s ok! Not everyone attends 300 a year!!! With that in mind we are so excited for the Richmond Wedding Expo at the Altria Theater on January 15th! We would love to meet a ton of you there and get to know some of our new brides! We will be there all day (it starts at 11:00) and the first ten brides that book with us right then and there at the expo get a special goodie bag!

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