Hi Sars,

Question for you! Why do Americans have wedding rehearsal dinners?I have seen the practice on movies/TV and wondered if it was just the movies? But then someone on your site asked a wedding-related question and mentioned the wedding rehearsal dinner.I just do not get it.Does it mean that exactly the same thing happens the day of the actual wedding?Is everyone who is invited to the wedding supposed to attend the rehearsal and does it mean two outfits need to be bought?Does it make an already expensive and stressful event even more expensive but less stressful?

We have a church rehearsal for the immediate wedding party prior to the wedding and I can see the sense in that, but dinner?

Confused but not for long hopefully

Dear Confused,

The purpose of the wedding rehearsal is obvious: you walk through the ceremony, get a rough idea of how long things take and where you need to go/stand, give any children in the ceremony a chance to get comfortable with what they’re doing, et cetera.

The rehearsal dinner is sort of an adjunct to that — it’s for the wedding party, plus other family members who aren’t in the wedding, plus, sometimes, guests who have traveled from a long way away.At some weddings, members of the wedding party haven’t met before that night, so it lets them talk and get to know each other.It’s sometimes also a chance for a bride and groom who are having a large wedding to spend a little more time with close friends and relatives in a more casual setting — and, you know, if you have the rehearsal, and most of the people present are staying in the same hotel, it’s a bit weird if everyone just kind of wanders off to do their own thing for dinner that night.

Yes, it makes it more expensive, but in many families it’s just expected, so it’s automatically part of the wedding budget.”More stressful” depends on the circumstances.Most of the ones I’ve been to, the stress level is quite low, because basically, you’re done — the planning’s done, the main event is tomorrow, and you’re just sort of running out the clock until then.Guests don’t wear the same thing to both (and to do so would raise eyebrows), but it’s much less formal than the wedding, usually; even the rehearsal is generally a pretty easygoing deal, at least in my experience.

I never considered it a peculiarly American tradition, so I’ll have to take your word for that, and it’s not required; not everyone does it.But I would probably have one, come the day, because the day of the wedding is pretty intense and busy, obviously, and I’d want to make more of a weekend of it so that I’d get to see and spend time with everyone, especially friends who don’t live nearby and who I don’t see that often.Plus, like I said, the worst of the stress is over by that point; you just have to put the dress on, say what the minister tells you to, and dance.

Share!