Every country has its own wedding traditions. Some of them are passed through the centuries, others are fresh and modern. Today, we’ll talk about the traditional British wedding. This subject is huge. There's so much information that we could give you, but first, let’s have a general overview of the British wedding. The wedding traditions mentioned in this article are used in the UK in modern days. So, let’s see how do Brits celebrate their big day.
When you meet the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, depending on your circumstances, you can choose from three options: you can either have a civil partnership, a civil marriage, or a religious marriage. But what's the difference? Civil partnerships are only available to same-sex couples, so two boys or two girls who want to spend their lives together, can choose to have a civil partnership. It's very similar to a marriage but there are a few differences. For example, adultery is not recognized as grounds for divorce. Same-sex couples also now have the option to have a civil marriage or a religious marriage.
Civil marriage and religious marriage are pretty much the same. It's just that a religious marriage contains religious content, like religious songs and religious readings will be held in a place of worship, like a church.
It's not uncommon these days for a couple to spend a lot of time together, sometimes years, before marriage. Many couples even live together for many years, and in some cases, couples will have a child before they decide to get married. And actually, marriage isn't always a step that a couple decides to take – some people don't believe that it's good for a relationship or even necessary to get married.
And whatever decision that people make surrounding marriage, it's all accepted in the UK.
Who can get married? Well, there are 3 basic rules:
- both parties have to be 16 or over;
- you have to be available to be married, so you either have to be single, or you have to be divorced from a previous marriage, or a widow;
- you cannot marry someone you are closely related to.
The Engagement
In a traditional heterosexual couple, in the old days – and still quite a lot now but it is changing – it's expected for the man to propose to the woman. A woman can propose to a man but it's traditionally done in a leap year. In the old days, a man would first ask permission from the woman's father or at least the woman's family to ask if he could propose to the woman. These days, a man generally just goes straight to the woman and asks her. He would get down on one knee and he would present a ring, typically a diamond ring, and he would ask the question, “Will you marry me?” And then, the lady gives her answer: either yes, no, or I need some time to think.
Something to note: a proposal is also sometimes referred to as asking for a lady's hand in marriage, so if she says yes, everyone's happy, the engagement is announced to the world, and everyone celebrates. There would normally be some form of engagement party. And then, the planning starts.
Of course, it depends on when you decide to book your wedding. Some people decide to have a very long engagement. People can be engaged for years and years and years. And there are 2 reasons for this. Perhaps, it's because the timing to get married is not quite right, because of illness or family issues or work. But also, some people delay the wedding because weddings in the UK are very expensive.
The invitations
Once the date is set and everything is being planned, one of the first things to do is to send out invitations and find out which of your guests will be coming along. The invitations can be two-tiered. Some people are invited to the whole event: the actual service of marriage and the party that happens after the marriage. Other people are invited just to the party afterwards. And this can be for a number of reasons. Perhaps, the church in which you're deciding to marry in, is very small and won't hold many guests. Or perhaps, you have a very tight budget and you can't afford to feed everybody and to get everyone into the church on time.
Stag & hen do
As the wedding date approaches, there is a celebration that happens with both the bride-to-be and the groom-to-be. The bride will get together with her female friends and have a “hen do” – this is a party for the bride-to-be and her friends. And the groom-to-be will get together with his friends and have a celebration called a “stag do”. Sometimes this is one night, sometimes it's a whole day and evening, some have a stag do which is a whole weekend, some even have a whole week, which is a bit greedy, don’t you think? But each to their own.
The hen do and the stag do are designed to celebrate their last moments of freedom, their last moments of living as singletons before they tie the knot and become a married couple, bound to each other for the rest of their lives.
The wedding itself
When the big day arrives, the guests get together. And they are there with the groom, as well as his Best Man (a special man, a best friend or a brother or someone who's chosen to support him on this day, who look after him), and along with the ushers (helpers, they help the congregation to find their seats and help everything run smoothly).
The seating in the venue will normally be split into guests of the groom on one side and guests of the bride on the other, leaving a walkway right down the middle, known as the “aisle”. And the groom will stand at the top of the aisle with his best man, waiting for his beautiful bride to arrive. Once the guests are all seated and everyone is ready, then the bride arrives, usually in style – in a very posh car or a horse-drawn carriage.
Just before the bride enters the venue, she gets together with her bridesmaids and pageboys, if she has them, she will also be there with the father of the bride, if she decides to go in with her father. Traditionally, the bride and father of the bride would enter together and first, followed by the bridesmaids. But these days, it tends to be the bridesmaids who go first – they walk down the aisle, everyone looks at them, and it creates a sense of anticipation.
The wedding march
Then, the music starts and traditionally, the music is, “Here comes the bride” or it's also known as “The wedding march”. And they walk down the aisle to this music. And she'd be wearing a beautiful white dress, sometimes an ivory dress or cream dress, and in some cases, they wear all sorts of colors, but traditionally, it's a white dress. And she'll have a veil potentially over her face to cover her beauty until she arrives at the top of the venue, faces her groom, who will remove the veil and reveal her beautiful face.
The ceremony
So then the ceremony begins. The bride and groom are stood at the altar with whoever is running the ceremony, and everyone else takes their seats. There are a few particular points that everyone expects in a wedding, that you should definitely look out for, if you attend a British wedding – they are “objections”.
This is such an awkward moment. During the ceremony, the congregation are asked, “Does anybody object to this wedding? Do you have any legal reason why you think these two can't be married?” And everyone goes quiet and everyone looks around to see if anyone will do the dramatic thing of going, “They can't get married because… I love him” or “because he's married to me”.
The exchange of vows. So this is a really lovely moment when the bride and groom face one another and read out the vows that they have decided to give to one another, the promises they want to make. This is always quite a special moment.
The exchange of rings. And then, of course, the exchange of rings, which often is a hilarious moment. Maybe because they get hearts and nervous, their fingers swell and the rings don't always fit. So it's always a little bit of a struggle for them to try and get those rings to fit properly. It always causes a few giggles.
First kiss as man & wife. Then, once they've been pronounced “man and wife”, once it's official, then the groom will be told that he may kiss the bride.
Signing the register. Each ceremony will also include a signing of the register. This is a legal requirement, so they can make the whole thing legal and official. During this time, usually, because it's not that interesting to watch people signing official documents, normally there is a performance of some sort, a musical interlude. Someone might get up and sing or play the guitar or there might be a nice track that's playing so everyone can have relax and listen to the music.
Throwing confetti. And then, when it's all done and dusted, the bride and groom walk hand-in-hand out of the venue together. This is when the congregation can go outside and throw confetti or sometimes rice over the bride and groom as they exit the venue. It depends on the venue though, because some venues now ban it because it makes such a mess, but traditionally, that's what you would expect.
Photographs
At this point, the photographs will happen. When everyone is still looking fresh, there's a good amount of daylight, the photographer's will come around, gather different groups of people together, and make sure there are sufficient photographs of the day. While the other guests are waiting – there's, usually, a drinks reception and canapes going around so they don't get too hungry and too bored.
Reception
Then they'll be asked to take their seats. Everyone will be seated according to the table plan, with the bride and groom on the top table, usually overlooking all of their guests. And there'll be a meal. This is called the “wedding breakfast” – the first meal after the marriage.
As the rest of the day continues, there are a number of things that will happen.
Keepsake. Firstly, most of the guests will receive a keepsake. This might be something like a tiny little charm or a coaster with your name on it or a special handkerchief or it's just a small gift to remind you of that special moment and that special day.
Speeches. A traditional British wedding is never complete without a lot of speeches. Anyone can give a speech, but, usually, you have to have a speech from the groom (he will normally say something wonderful about his new wife, thank the bridesmaids, thank everyone for coming – he has certain things he has to fulfill in his speech). You will always have a speech from the father of the bride as well, who will again say something wonderful about his daughter, tell the new groom to look after his daughter, that kind of thing. And the most famous one is the best man’s speech (this is normally or should be the comedy speech, the light relief, the time when the groom starts to feel very nervous because, normally, the best man will tell lots of secrets and stories about the groom, that the groom is very embarrassed by).
Cutting of the cake. Carrying on. There is also a moment when the cake is officially cut. A traditional wedding cake will have lots of tears. In the old days, you used to keep some of the tears for a very long time: for instance, you would keep it until your first child's christening or something like that. Nowadays, it's normally just cut by the bride and groom, they make the first cut, then it's separated out and everyone gets to enjoy a piece of cake.
First dance. Then, there is the first dance, where the bride and groom take to the dance floor. A very special song is played for them and everyone watches them have a little bit of a dance before everyone jumps onto the dance floor and boogies the night away. In recent years, we've seen a trend of brides and grooms learning a set routine and surprising their guests with a fully choreographed dance routine. In some cases, it's led to people being hospitalized because they try to do things after having a few drinks, which they probably shouldn't be doing.
And then, everyone just has a wonderful time. There's, usually, some sort of book or something going around, that people can sign or add their mark to, so that the bride and groom have a keepsake of their own, which has an input from all of their guests.
And after all the celebrations have finished, the bride and groom usually go on a holiday, known as a “honeymoon”.
So this is a traditional wedding. And more often these days, people are getting more imaginative and feel like they have more freedom to create a celebration that is tailored to them and their friends and their families.
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