Main image by Quinn Miller
Dear Ladies, Gents, all soon to be Newlyweds – here at WOL, we’re all about helping you make your wedding day the sweetest, best, most memorable, yummiest, smiliest it can be. But, truth must be told – you can plan everything you want down to the precise amount of marshmallows to be found next to your chocolate fountain… but you can’t plan the guests.
So, here’s a list of wedding guest etiquette that sometimes – okay, often – goes sort of… forgotten. Or ignored. Or unknown. And tips to help you sort it all out. Go ahead and share it with anyone you want, even cheekily with your guests…
1. Not returning RSVPs. Basically, when the guests get the invitation a number of weeks before the wedding, it seems the due date is so far away… they’ll reply ‘later’. The invite goes in the drawer, or gets put under a magazine, and forgotten. Several of your guests will probably think they don’t have to RSVP, after all they’ve known you since you were building forts out of blankets, or maybe even earlier.
Solution: Your duty as a bride/groom is to give them every imaginable way to reply. That is snail mail, email, telephone, text, wedding website, pigeon, kid on a bike who wants to make some extra money. Any way they reply is fine, as long as they do it. Once the invites go out, make a spreadsheet and keep track of all returns and non-returns. Two weeks before the due date print a list of all those who still haven’t replied and give it to anyone you can trust to be polite on the phone (mum, chief bridesmaid?) Get them to call around and chase people up. The only thing you have left to do is to decide what you’ll do with those who’ll reply too late. Are they fired, or are they in?
2. Wearing white to a wedding. This is a big worry for many brides. There’s white, and there’s bridal white. There’s white with cute navy polkadots, and then there’s a swingy lacy number that’ll make a leggy girl look like one of those carefree Vogue brides. Ugh. The nerve.
Solution: You’ll be glad to know the older guests usually know what’s acceptable and what isn’t, so you don’t really need to worry about them. The younger guests – your teenage cousins, or those 20-year-olds who go to weddings to catch a single guy, they are the ones whose first objective is to look great – upstaging the bride isn’t even their second objective. The best thing to do is to just… ask them. Yes! Don’t worry, this isn’t awkward, it’s just girl talk. If they answer ‘white lace’ and it’s exactly what you’re wearing, don’t worry – speak to their mum, or your own mum, and ask them to gently tell the young lady that wearing white lace to another person’s wedding isn’t really the done thing. And also, do keep in mind, dear bride – only your outfit is a secret until the big day, no-one else’s.
3. Bringing an uninvited ‘plus one’. Could they have possibly thought there was a buffet? Even if it was, it’s just not okay. Especially without letting anyone know first. But it does happen. It may be okay if it’s one of those ‘the whole street is invited’ affairs, but these rarely happen nowadays. It’s not ever okay to bring an extra guest to an affair where you had to RSVP and the only name on the invite was yours.
Solution: The first thing to do is to mark all invitations clearly. If Mr and Mrs Smith have two children, don’t address the invitation to ‘The Smiths’ – they’ll think it’s all of them. Say clearly, ‘Mr Edward Smith and Mrs Eleanor Smith’. If you’re extra worried, list every name on the invitation with a tick-box next to it. People not mentioned aren’t invited. But, say worst comes to worst and two people show up at the wedding. If it’s a terribly formal affair where every chair is accounted for, well one of them may just have to sit in the other’s lap – or at the staff table in the vicinity of the kitchen. Trust the venue to do what’s best – here’s why the presence of a wedding coordinator is a blessing. Wedding venues have seen it all, so they’ll know exactly the right thing to do. Also, nearly every wedding has a person or two who won’t be able to make it at the last minute – and the newcomer may take their place.
4. Bringing kids when it’s an adults only wedding. As we already mentioned, some families may assume they’re all getting invited. This is always a touchy topic, and you can’t afford to be ambiguous about it – you have to be sure whether you do, or you don’t, want to have children there.
Solution: If you do want the kids, skip to point 5. If you don’t, make it clear on the invitations. Put someone’s contact information on there too (your mum’s number, your fiancé(e)’s email, your chief bridesmaid’s mobile) in case anyone has any questions. Don’t do it yourself – you have your plate full with the planning anyway. If they show up at the wedding with the kids, see point 3.
5. Putting pictures of the bride on Facebook. If you’re a guest, don’t put pictures of the wedding on the social media, unless you are sure she’s completely okay with it. Put pictures of yourself instead. You look great. The venue is gorgeous. There are lots of nicely dressed people. Strike some cheeky poses on the grand staircase, like you own the darn place. Sure, you can take pics of the bride and even if she is okay with photos being shared left, right and centre, whatever you do don’t post a picture of her before the ceremony (like, ever!)
Solution: If you’re the bride – decide whether you care or not. If you don’t, then skip to the next point. If you do, there are several ways to let the guests know – in the invites, in the orders of service, and in the speeches. This is a thoroughly modern problem – there was no such thing as recently as the 1990s… who would have thought…
6. Getting so drunk you can’t even remember there was a wedding. Usually, a wedding is a decorous occasion. Think about it this way – if you’re going to dress up, you should act the part too. You’re probably not going to a reception in the middle of a muddy Glastonbury field. There’s that YouTube video of a drunk wedding guest who toppled a marquee and gave the bride a bloody nose. Do you want that to be you? Nope.
Solution: Well… adults are adults, you can’t stop them from being legless. There isn’t a clear answer on how to resolve this problem. However, you could appoint a member of the wedding party (because, they do have a bit of authority) to ensure anyone getting out of hand is kept away from the bar. Or, do what they do in pubs, and instruct the bar staff to stop serving alcohol to guests who are clearly on their way to point of no return.
7. Being late. Things do happen, and guests do get delayed – traffic, baby, hitting McDonald’s drive-through on the way to the ceremony… but the only person allowed to arrive fashionably late is the bride herself. So it’s absolutely imperative to leave in plenty of time. So what if the guests arrive a little early – it’s an extra half hour of looking extra fabulous. And taking selfies.
Solution: There’s no answer for people arriving late – but you can certainly decide what to do in case they do. Agree with the ushers to keep the last pews or chairs empty for the latecomers, so they can discreetly sit down after their arrival. If you’re getting married at an unconventional venue, ask the coordinator what they recommend. The key is to cause as little distraction as possible.
8. Taking stuff from the venue. If you even needed one more reason to take your wedding insurance, it’s this one – occasionally, people display an alarming lack of manners and take stuff from a wedding without asking. This is a true story – a bride was getting married at a hotel that provided gorgeous birdcage centrepieces as part of the package. There were 14 tables… after the wedding, nine birdcages were gone. The guests simply took them. Of course, who had to pay for them at the end of the day? The newlyweds. Stealing at a wedding is pretty much the worst thing a guest could do. Don’t do it.
Solution: Wedding insurance – just make sure to check such a scenario is covered by your policy. As an extra precaution, you may choose to do your own decorations, or you can simplify as much as possible – an added bonus of this is the reduced cost of decorating the venue, of course.
9. Knocking out the other ladies for a chance at that bouquet. Outside of a wedding, most people would dismiss the bouquet toss as a charming bit of fun that doesn’t mean much. But at the wedding itself… well, the flowers become a magical talisman, guaranteed to bestow a band of gold on the lucky catcher’s finger. There have been serious injuries reported, and quite a few comparisons to bowling pins being knocked over. You get the picture.
Solution: As a guest, a bit of politeness goes a long way. Giving it a good go is fun, but knocking others out of the way isn’t cool. And, frankly, do remember it’s just a nice tradition that probably won’t have much bearing on whether you’re getting married next. As a bride, take precautions – throw your bouquet where there’s lots of space, make sure nobody is holding a glass in her hand, and that the guys are around to break up any fights. And try to throw straight, of course.
