I have been following these forums for years at this point and have been religiously using the knowledge I have picked up here to guide my sartorial decisions. I haven't really had much opportunity to post, as I feel I still feel I have more to learn than contribute, but wanted to thank everyone for all the great information (and photos/illustrations) with which you have filled this forum.
I am to be married in October, and as I respect the opinions of many on this forum, I wanted to post my plans for the wedding attire and invite any comments or advice that any of you may have.
The bride and I have decided to host an early wedding with the ceremony beginning at 4:00PM and reception to follow. The event will be very formal all around--the ceremony will be hosted in an ornate church with the reception in the ballroom of a historic hotel with a very old-world feel--and the reception will be black tie. The bride's dress will be very formal with sleeves and a long train, and the bridesmaids will each be wearing navy floor-length gowns. The early start time, however, introduces some complexity.
Personally, I will be wearing full morning dress. I plan to have a peaked-lapel cutaway in charcoal tailored along with cashmere-striped trousers and a db peaked-lapel waistcoat. White shirt with single cuffs and detachable high imperial stiff collar (believe it or not I wear these shirts regularly in a variety of colors--though obviously not with the imperial collar. Regularly get complements on the crispness that the look with the detachable collar provides) and modestly patterned grey cravat.
With the groomsmen is where it starts to get a little more challenging. I don't want to have them renting polyester morning coats that look like an ill-fitting throwback to the 1970's; nor do I want to make everyone go out and spend the $$$ to have quality cutaways custom-made. A decent compromise we came up with (though would be open to suggestions if anyone else has ideas) is to ask the groomsmen to purchase the formal trousers and waistcoat that they clearly won't have, and provide (purchase if necessary) their shirts, ties and shoes. The bride and I are then prepared to have each of them fit for a custom affordable MTM suit. We will let each groomsman decide if he wants the jacket to be sb or db and choose between oxford, charcoal or black. The tailor will then be instructed to cut the suits formally (wide peaked lapels, 1 or 2 button, etc.) so that the jackets can then be combined with the ensemble for daytime semi-formal (stroller). That way at least they can then ditch the striped pants and have a suit they can easily wear for more formal occasions.
As far as ushers are concerned, I don't know that we are prepared to have another 4 suits custom made, so we were planning to pick up the cost of renting morning dress for them. While sub-optimal, I'm not sure what else is to be done without breaking the bank.
The other problem we run into is that we are not sure what to tell people when asked what the dress should be. We plan to include a separate reception card in the inviation on which will be printed "black tie," and include no dress code on the invitation itself (the formality of the invitation should be a give-away of sorts). While we are realistic and certainly don't expect people to a) own morning dress b) rent morning dress c) even know what morning dress is or, I guess most importantly, d) change outfits between the ceremony and reception, I find myself shuttering at the thought of actually suggesting to one of my guests that he wear his black tie to the church in the mid-afternoon. I know that people will do exactly that when they see that the reception is black tie, and that is perfectly fine and expected--I just don't want to feel like it was my doing
. I'm sure many on here can relate and would be interested to hear your thoughts on the matter.Thank you all in advance for your comments--really look forward to hearing any feedback you can provide!
