Requesting Changes at the Wedding Rehearsal
Today’s brides and grooms at our West Orange, New Jersey wedding venue are active participants in their wedding rehearsals. They know what they want, and they’re not afraid to speak up about any changes they wish to make in any element of their wedding celebration. So at the wedding rehearsal, you are perfectly within your rights to request changes on anything from the lineup order of your bridesmaids to the speed at which you wish to walk down the aisle.
Wedding Rehearsal
Here are the top details that may be up for discussion and change at your wedding rehearsal:
• The order in which you’d like your bridesmaids to walk in the processional and thus stand during the ceremony. Some brides like the look of a tallest-to-shortest order, to avoid any presumption of favoritism or ranking among bridesmaids.
• The order in which you’d like the groomsmen to stand next to the groom, again arranging by height, or by what the groom feels would be a natural order.
• The positioning of your two maids of honor, or your groom’s two best men, according to the roles you’ve assigned them. One maid of honor, for instance, may be the one to hold your bouquet during the ring exchange, while the other may be the one to sign your NJ marriage license.
• The order and pairings in which your bridesmaids and groomsmen will walk in the recessional. When you have an uneven number of bridesmaids, one groomsman may escort two bridesmaids down the aisle, for instance.
• Child attendants’ walk down the aisle in the processional, including if they will each walk alone, in pairs, or holding the hand of a bridesmaid.
• Where child attendants will sit or stand during the ceremony. It often works best for child attendants to sit in the front row during the ceremony, to reduce distractions.
• The reading of vows. If you find that it’s too nerve-wracking to memorize your vows, you may ask the officiant to read them off line-by-line, for you to repeat more comfortably.
• How you will be introduced as husband and wife.
• The location and order of the receiving line, if you wish to have one.
Additional, non-ceremony elements such as where the guest book will be placed and where wedding programs will be located at the wedding ceremony venue.
Some elements cannot be changed if they are already printed in your wedding programs, such as the order of the readings or the musical performance, but much of the wedding ceremony is yours to fine-tune as you wish.
Best,
Michael Mahle, Director of Communications, Pleasantdale Château
