Evening v Daytime Royal Weddings
 

How do the various Royal Houses decide if a wedding will be evening or daytime? Is it up to the individual couple?

All royal weddings are formal but obviously the decision affects the dress code as well, so we have some weddings where the guests are in tiaras and evening gowns while others have suits and hats.

Which Royal houses had evening and which had daytime?

well... let's do a review..

BELGIUM
Philippe & Mathilde - Morning
Astrid & Lorenz - ?
Laurent & Claire - Morning

DENMARK
Frederik & Mary - Evening
Joachim & Alexandra - Evening
Alexandra Berleburg & Jefferson - Evening

GREECE
Pavlos & Marie-Chantal - Morning (?)
Alexia & Carlos - Morning

NETHERLANDS
Willem-Alexander & Maxima - Morning
Constantijn & Laurentien - Morning
Friso & Mabel - Morning

Vollenhovens brides all have separate civil & church weddings (well, constantijn & laurentien also)
all of them (Maurits & Marilene, Bernhard & Annette, PC & Anita, Floris & Aimee) have Morning weddings.

NORWAY
Haakon & Mette-Marit - Evening
Martha-Louise & Ari - Evening

SPAIN
Felipe & Letizia - Morning
Elena & Jaime - Morning
Cristina & Inaki - Morning

well... it seems like the scandinavian countries prefer evening wedding, while the rest prefer morning wedding. so, will we expect an evening swedish royal wedding next?

I think the morning versus evening thing is just a custom of certain countries. Although I would have thought the Spanish Royal Family would have evening weddings as Spaniards know how to party and have a good time!

Probably it has to see with the schedules of every country. The Nordic countries have fewer hours of sun and schedules very different from the countries that are more on the south; because of it they do more ceremonies of evening - night and great show. :confused:

that's true in the winter, but in summer, Northern European countries have more sun hours than anyone else

what I've noticed is that those royals who opted for morning ceremonies, often had preceding evening events/balls the days prior to the church weddings, to even it all out I guess for guests or perhaps for joe the taxpayer ;)

I think the majority of the royal weddings within the last decade have had pre-wedding balls precede the big day itself, regardless if the actual wedding called for a hat or a tiara.

Some couples had multi-day events that combined both casual and formal attire.

Frederik and Mary had several days before their wedding including a visit to City Hall (hats), a theatre night (tiaras), a youth night, and a ball (tiaras).

Haakon and Mette-Marit also had a multi-day festivity including a boat ride (casual) and a pre-wedding ball.

In Spain Prince Felipe and both of the Infantas had pre-wedding receptions the night before their weddings, as did Pavlos and Alexia of Greece. (Aleixa also rounded out her wedding with a breakfast the next day.)

It is a very old Catholic tradition that weddings take place in the morning. Why I don't know which I am ashamed to say. In the US it is only in the past few years that you see a lot more weddings at 5 or after; from what my mother told me weddings used to be at 10 or 11 am or at 2 pm.

you know, this may be silly but what I've always wondered about those royal day time weddings is what the very last 'activity' is of the day and at what time that tends to end. For example, if we take Maxima's and Alexander's morning wedding: if I'm not mistaken, that day, after the civil and church ceremonies, all guests gathered for some sort of luncheon/meal time event in the Paleis op de Dam, right? What was unclear to me was whether after that lunch, was that it, did Alex & Max leave to go on honeymoon and everyone went to their respective hotel rooms to pack their suit cases and leave for the airport? Or, did they all go to, say, Huis ten Bosch for a night cap and a rehash and then call it a day? Or, out on the town to enjoy the Amsterdam night life? Anyone happens to know what the protocol tends to be with this kind of thing? Can people even leave before the Queen does?

as i remembered on Felipe & Letizia's wedding, they had a formal luncheon following the morning wedding, then the party continued without the bride & groom, in which that incidental 'Vittorio Emanuel' took place.

but, yeah, i'm curious about this too.. perhaps someone could give more elaborate answer..

And I believe that at both Floris and Aimee and PC and Anita's weddings, there was a luncheon after the wedding and then a "disco" at ?(I need some help here on the Palace) that night. I wonder if Beatrix is the type to "kick back" with her sisters late that night in her own home and have a drink and re-hash the events of the day?

purple_platinum,

what about British?

Prince Charles & late Diana,Princess of Wales (July 1981) - morning clothes & uniform clothes

Prince Andrew & Sarah,Duchess of York (July 1986) - morning clothes & uniform clothes

Prince Edward & Sophie -Rhys Jones (June 1999) - morning clothes? or evening clothes?

Prince Charles & Camilla Parker-Bowles (2005) - morning clothes

Princess Anne & Mark Philips (1973) - morning clothes & uniform clothes

Princess Anne & Tim Lawrence (1992) ?

In a Catholic wedding there is always a mass and in a mass there is communion so you need to be fasting («Être à jeun», empty stomach so you do not mix God's food and human food or something like that?). That might explain why in our great-grandparents' times, when the masses were much longer than today, people would sometimes faint. And nobody would have wanted a fainting bride... so that's my little explanation for the traditional morning Catholic wedding.

Today, at least here, you cannot eat about 1 hour before the mass (which gives us about 2 hours before communion).

In catholic countries like Spain and Belgium weddings are usually always before noon whether you are royal or not
My country is also mostly catholic (more than 85%) and that's the tradition; and about the communion (according to the Vatican), you can eat till 1 hour before the actual communion, so most of us ate breakfast and then go to mass and receive the communion without commiting any fault:)
The only thing that is forbidden for taking the communion is when you haven't received absolution from your sins in a while, then you are not deserving of that, people usually confess in Good Thursday/Friday to get to Eastern in a "clean" slate

ah you are right, I'd been wondering where Letizia and groom were when that "unfortunate incident" took place!

true, I also read that: after the church ceremony they all had lunch at the best restaurant in Naarden. After that, everyone hoofed it over to paleis Het Loo (Pronounced LOWE, as in Rob Lowe) for a disco party of sorts.

MMM according to whats-his-face, princess Margarita's soon to be ex-husband, the infamous Edwin de Roy van zuidewijn, she is: Beatrix loves her red wine and even once fell asleep after some family dinner & a few too many glasses of wine (actually an endearing story if you ask me, makes her more human)

i'm not really well informed on this one, sara.
perhaps someone else can help. i think most british weddings are morning weddings with hat and all.
so does Edward & Sophie's. :)

here in malta, a very catholic country we have both types of wedding. those at about 11am, and those in the evening starting at about 7pm. both involves a mass before the reception.

Mmmm In the summer(which is the high season for weddings) we have alot of light, it hardly gets dark at all and in the most nothern parts the sun does not even set at night.

Most "normal" church wedding takes place between 11 and 15 and its common that the ladies wear long dresses (or national costumes) and then its a dinner in the evening often with dancing and party afterwords.

For a royal weddings everything is a little more complex since they usually want to entertain the guests the whole time and not have them wait around 3-4 hours after the church ceremony, so they scheduel the wedding a little later like 16.00 or 17.00 and have the dinner and ball directly after

I wonder what a swedish wedding will be like, When Carl Gustaf and Silvia got married there were hats and dresses, no tiaras, I hope they will choose and evening wedding, its more fun to watch IMO

What was the "Vittorio Emmanuel" incident?

He started a fight with the other suitor for the Italian throne in the middle of the wedding reception, King Juan Carlos was very upset and said he'll never invite those people again