Episode 26: The Do’s and Don’ts of Modern Wedding Etiquette

Episode Summary

Wedding etiquette is always changing, friends, and today I’m sharing how I think about some of the questions couples and guests are navigating now. We’ll talk about social media and respecting a couple’s wishes, gifts and guest experiences, and how to communicate a creative dress code. I’ll also share my thoughts on writing meaningful vows, using digital RSVPs, and sending thank-you notes. Whether you lean traditional or want to do things differently, I hope this conversation reminds you that etiquette starts with helping the people around you feel comfortable.

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julianleaver.com | @julianleaver

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello friends, and welcome back to Mind Over Matrimony. As some of you may know, but some of you may not, my, actually, this is funny, the original name of my business before it was Julian Leaver Events in the concept stage was the Dapper Diplomat. And I was weirdly given that title, I think mostly because I used to wear a bow tie to work every single day for many years. And I also studied international studies. And so when I went back to work with Rosewood Hotels and Resorts, they did an article in Modern Luxury Magazine and they named me the Dapper Diplomat. That was the title of the article. And I thought, oh, this is a great title. And I should take this at some time in the future when I am gonna start my own business and use this as the name.

And so I thought that would be a great name and it stayed that way probably for the first year. And then it really did switch over to Julian Leaver Events. And so in that vein, today our topic is really going to be about etiquette and modern etiquette and traditional etiquette and how etiquette is being broken and what the rules of etiquette look like in this new age of social media and oversharing and all the things. So let's just start with the first, I think controversial piece of this, which is about how things are shared on the internet, how things are rolled out from a guest perspective and also from a vendor perspective and also from a client perspective.

And I think this is ever shifting and there was very much, I think probably around five years ago when things really started picking up in the social space, there was a massive rush for everyone to share immediately, right? For guests to share immediately, for vendors to share immediately, for planners to share immediately, for the couple to share immediately. It was this era of we want the sneak peek like immediately it must go up, it must be online, it must be tomorrow, it must be everyone has to move fast. We're all moving fast at this kind of crazy pace, which was a flip from where things were before in more traditional etiquette of kind of keeping things under wraps.

And so what I think we're now seeing is a flip back to the traditional in some ways in this space of really putting the brakes on a little bit about what gets shared and how it gets shared and the intentionality with which it gets shared. As we've seen with the Taylor and Travis wedding, they selected a planner who doesn't even have a website, right? This is just a good example of like at the highest level in terms of sharing information. The only way you can experience a wedding of his is to attend it. There's something very special in that. And I think probably most couples land somewhere in the middle of this, right? From the spectrum of literally no sharing of anything at all to the extreme sharing of everything instantaneously.

And so people are trying to figure out how to navigate this, how to get to a place that makes sense for them. And I think the thing to really look at first is the couple and their families and how do they want this to be shared and rolled out and examined because ultimately it is someone's very special, very intimate day. And whatever their wishes are is really, should basically be the wishes of everyone else, frankly. We all just need to get on board with whatever the couple would like to share and not share. And I think we've moved to this new space of a more NDA type of environment where not really a lot is being shared or just small little details are being allowed to be shared. And I think that's magical. Whatever it is that speaks to you is what you should actually move forward with.

And I think that on the backside of this, that then becomes my job as the planner to communicate the couple's wishes to all of the various vendor teams who now not only have cell phones at the event and the setup, but they have their own video teams at the setup. So the band has a video team and the florist has a video team and the caterer has a video team. Everyone has their own content creation team because the content has clearly become so important for us all to share. But the way that we've been doing it here at Julian Leaver Events is really just putting a big brake on it right from the beginning and letting everyone know that we are, that we're gonna take a minute before we share any of it, before we look at any of it. We're not in a hurry to get a sneak peek. We're not in a hurry to release anything immediately.

We wanna look at it. We wanna see it. We want actually everyone to produce their best work, not their quickest work. And so I'm not opposed if you bring a BTS team or whatever you're gonna do, but we really have just been saying no one is allowed to post anything until it's been reviewed, until we've been able to have a chance to look at it, until we have an understanding of what's actually going on with it. And so I think that's one of the newest flips in Etiquette is we're going from this extreme oversharing to a more measured approach of sharing online and allowing the couple to really be at the forefront of that. The next piece I think of Etiquette that's shifting and moving all around and is a little bit nebulous at the moment is this whole idea of gifting.

And gifting to the couple, gifting from the couple to the guests and who is doing what and when is it being done and how is that all happening. And I think for a long time the tradition has been that if you're invited to a wedding, then you should give a gift that's the equivalent basically of the cost of your seat at the wedding in some ways. And that's been done in a variety of different ways and it's done through gift registry, it's done through cash donation, it's done through donating to a trip, et cetera, house fund. It's been lots of different iterations. I think it's really changed. That has been one big shift is that it's now being done in a lot of different ways. It never used to be like this. That really has changed. We used to only be gifts at the wedding or cash basically.

And then now there's all these different ways to do gifting and ask for gifting. I think the etiquette here really has become a little bit more fluid in terms of a lot of couples are getting married a little bit older. And so they are, they're not really coming to the wedding needing a whole household of items anymore. They have a lot of the times two very full households that they're then trying to merge and now you're gonna gift them a third thing, right? They already have two wine openers. They don't really need a third wine opener, right? They're already trying to figure out which wine opener we're keeping, which glass set we're keeping, which china set we're keeping. They already have all of these things. And so I think that has been something that's a little bit interesting.

I think where this is going is more experience driven, right? Like I do love the idea of gifting about and around the honeymoon or a trip in some way. I haven't really seen it done well. Frankly, I think if you're listening and you have an idea for that, by all means take my idea and run with it. I think there needs to be something a little bit more elegant in terms of gifting around experiences. I've also seen lately some more, I hate to use the word curated because I feel like it's so overused, but there are more curated registries that are more heirloom type items that people would actually want to keep. I'd personally love to see an art registry. How cool would that be?

I think there's a lot of space to move around in the gifting conversation and where this is going because I think a lot of people have the things already that most people would traditionally gift them. And so it's shifting. In terms of gifting from the couple to their guests, I actually think this has shifted into the more experiential elements of the wedding, right? We're seeing it in these really cool photo booths. We're seeing it in these experiences that happen where you get to take something away from a wedding, whether that's an art drawing of the guests or some kind of interesting hat experience.

We've been doing that a lot lately in rehearsal dinners of branding experiences and hats and keychains or chain stitch embroidery and all these kind of experiences where you actually get to take something away that maybe you would want, right? We even had this chain stitcher and these hat people and then they were chain stitching the hats, right? So it's kind of cool, it's different. People were using the elements of the experience in different ways and doing it and exploring it in their own way. That was not even our idea. They just like literally picked up the hats and took them to the chain stitcher and said, please put my name on this hat and they did it. And then every single person at the party was like, I want my name on the hat and jumped on the bandwagon. And so that's cool.

And I think that has really shifted away from this like favor piece of things or something that you must take away or give at the end of a party. What I did love recently in terms of gifting was we did see at Taylor and Travis's wedding, we saw that beautiful handkerchief that was given at the ceremony to everyone to dry their happy tears. And I thought that was really a sweet memento. It's something to actually take away but also something that you could use. And so it's shifting, right? It's ever changing. I think the thing to remember just in this like broader conversation about etiquette is that etiquette is really making the other person feel comfortable. And so making your guests feel comfortable, making your guest experience as comfortable as possible. And so that's really what the modern etiquette is about.

It's not so much about like this rule book of following these very specific rules and doing it always this exact certain way. I think the other place that this is all shifting to is within destination weddings and giving a gift and you've spent all this money to come to a destination wedding. I would say the expectation more recently has been no, that gift giving is not really expected when basically the gift of your presence is the thing that the couple would really care for, right? They're not really worried about getting an actual physical gift from you. They really would like you to just come and attend and make this journey to be part of the experience. And so definitely that type of gifting expectation has shifted. The other interesting facet in etiquette that's been shifting is surrounding guest attire.

And for a very long time, guest attire was in basically three different categories. Cocktail, black tie, white tie. Those are really truly the only actual traditional attire categories. But as things have gotten more accessible, as dress codes have changed, as experiences have changed, as the culture has shifted, these codes have really gotten jumbled. And so now a lot of people make up their own dress codes. We see a lot of boots and blazers. We see a lot of creative black tie. We see a lot of black tie optional, which I would just like to get on my soapbox and say is not an attire that is an inability to choose between cocktail and black tie.

But to each their own, I think it is important if you are going to want to move away from one of these three categories, that's very straightforward and traditional that people understand that you do communicate what it is you are thinking so that you are not sitting in a position where you have to field 9 million questions. And so that is where the Pinterest board attire board has come into play in terms of translating what it is that you actually want to see from your guests. And it's kind of all over the board in terms of are people doing an attire board for every single event? Are they doing it for just one event? We have weddings that are doing all of the above basically.

And I think it really truly is up to the couple in terms of how deep they would like to go down this hole of directing what it is that guests are wearing or really interpreting that vision. I think it's more really, we need to look at it as like an interpretation. We had a wedding a couple of weeks ago that was creative black tie and that specifically needed some assistance because it was really asking the gentleman to really step outside of the box. And that when you ask the guys to do something a little bit different, we definitely need a board friends because they need some help. They need to know what you mean. Do you mean color? Do you mean brooches? Do you mean different bow ties? Do you mean different shoes? What it is that you mean?

It is visually helpful to provide some input there when you are asking them to totally stray out of black tie. Okay friends, let's talk about vows. Because literally one of the most intimate moments of a wedding is when you're exchanging vows with your partner. It is the place that you're making some promises for the future. It's a place that you are recommitting to a relationship. It's a place that you are standing before your higher power and being willing to set some things aside that maybe you have participated in the past. And you're doing this all in front of your closest friends and family and acquaintances. And this is the place where this should come from you. I know there's this whole conversation about AI vows and should AI help you with your vows? Could AI write your vows better?

And yes, I think in a lot of ways like AI could be used to help you enhance your vows, but the intent and the real meaning should come from you. It should start with you. Maybe you can throw it in there and refine it slightly and help you eliminate some run-on sentences and correct your grammar, but it really should come from your heart and from deep within your soul and speak directly about and to the person that you are about to marry. My advice is start it on your own, friends and jot some ideas down and take some time to do it. I do think there is some controversy there in that there are a lot of people who are writing their vows the night before, the day before, the morning of, and this is something we should not be waiting until the last minute for. It is really one of the most special and sacred parts of a wedding.

My advice is start early and take your time. You don't have to make a ton of progress right away, but begin and don't procrastinate that because when you are standing in front of all of those people and you wrote it the morning of, you're going to think of something else that you should have, would have, could have said. Another really shifting piece of etiquette at the moment is in regard to the RSVP card friends. And this is unfortunate because this RSVP card situation is actually truly due to the United States Postal Service and their issues and the broken nature of that system and how difficult it has been to actually mail things in the United States recently, which is really sad because the USPS has always been literally the most reliable. And I know they deliver millions of pieces of mail a day.

And the job that they are doing is very daunting, 1 million percent, but where this has become a problem is in these RSVP cards. And so super controversially, I'm going to suggest that everyone just move to a digital RSVP because it really is so much faster. You, I still think you should send out a traditional formal invitation. It is really lovely to receive that in the mail. It's so nice because all we're receiving is junk mail basically and bills. And so when you actually get an invitation, it feels very special and remarkable and a once in a lifetime situation for a couple. But the RSVP is not a sacred piece of the suite, right? It's being shipped back to you. You're basically putting it in a stack and we're throwing it away. It's not anything that's special. And it's something where you can do it a lot more efficiently online.

It can be actually on your website and you can collect a lot of guest data from your RSVPs as you are gathering that information. So if you didn't get phone numbers or you didn't get dietary restrictions or you didn't get where they might be staying when they come for the weekend, you can gather all of that information in a lot more efficient manner by doing it online. So that's something where I definitely err from the traditional standpoint. It's not, that was I think probably even two years ago I would have never said this, but I do think it's gotten to a dire place where we just need the information and everyone seems to be tech savvy enough to be able to go to the website and RSVP. The last little bit we're gonna talk about today is the thank you note, the thank you card, the thank you email, the thank you text.

This is where like I lean towards the traditional. Okay, I'm gonna say this is actually very controversial for me to say, because I do lean towards the traditional here, but I also understand the time constraint that is actually within this whole situation. And so I do believe in the handwritten note I always have. Am I the best at the handwritten note? I used to be. I feel like I've actually slacked off. So this is pot kettle friends, okay? I am not the end all be all of this one, but I do try to write the note when I actually can do it. And I do believe that handwritten notes, just like an actual mailed invitation, are still the most formal and traditional way to say thank you to someone who's taken the time to get you a gift. So for those of you who might not have gotten one from Francisco and I for our wedding, we deeply apologize.

So pot kettle, we're all just trying to be better. And that's really the point here at Mind Over Matrimony is to just try to do your best, right? And sometimes I think the thing with etiquette is that we get in our heads a little bit about doing it exactly this perfect way when really the most important thing is to make sure that the person that you're interacting with feels comfortable. So don't feel worried about etiquette. Don't be afraid of etiquette. There's many questions in etiquette and it's always changing. It's always adapting as a culture and the tradition shift. Then it's okay to ask questions. It's okay not to always have the answer. If you have any questions, you can always write them here in the comments. You can email, you can text, you can call. And we look forward to seeing you next time.

A The Media Socialites Production