NYT: planning a wedding before you have the groom

[v]

This is a gem...

Blame the Princess
Chasing the Fairy-Tale Wedding


In a Vogue magazine spread before Amal Alamuddin married George Clooney, the fashion designer Oscar de la Renta proclaimed that the wedding gown was “the most important dress in the life of a woman.” He probably wasn’t considering what a woman would wear, say, as she accepted a Nobel Peace Prize, or was being sworn in as the president of the United States.

It was an interesting comment, especially in 2014, but it signaled a larger point: that even though women may be leaning in, branching out, cracking glass ceilings and forging vibrant careers in multiple sectors, for many of them, it is their wedding day that heralds true success.

It’s that way in the eyes of popular culture, too. Entire TV shows are dedicated to the bride (there has yet to be a program called “Big Bucks for the Tux” targeting grooms). Millions tuned in to see Kate Middleton morph into a real live princess.

And, of course, the wedding dress is the pièce de résistance on runways around the world.

“That night is the gateway to the rest of your life,” said Sami Horneff, 24, an actress and guide with On Location Tours in Manhattan, who has been planning her wedding since she was a girl.

Ms. Horneff has no idea whom she will marry. She isn’t even dating seriously at the moment. But that hasn’t prevented her from plotting every detail of the day, from the color of the bridesmaids’ dresses (champagne) to the floral arrangements (white and pink roses, along with white hydrangeas, lilies and orchids).

She is not alone. Never mind the bleak statistics on marriage (about 45 percent end in divorce). Many women still dream, feverishly, about their wedding, even those with no groom or boyfriend in sight. They pin photos of fantasy event spaces, dresses and flowers on Pinterest; they design their ideal engagement rings on sites like Ritani.com; they turn to MyKnot, Lover.ly and Project Wedding for ideas on invitations, gift registries and seating charts.

They know it all, except — oops! — whom their partner will be. But why let a small detail like that interfere with preparations?

A 2014 study conducted by Brides magazine found that approximately 25 percent of its readers are not yet engaged. In 2013, 37 percent of the brides who visited TheKnot.com did not have a fiancé.

Sue Johnson, a clinical psychologist and author of “Love Sense,” finds this mentality worrisome. Women are planning the show before the script is written and “before the leading man shows up,” she said. She understands the desire for companionship. Marriage, she said, “speaks to our longing for connection and our fear of aloneness.” But, she added, the emphasis on weddings and marriage is also somewhat dangerous. “In North America, we’ve made progress,” she said. “Hillary Clinton might be the first female president, but a woman still wants this badge of legitimacy that she is wanted and desired by a man.”

Emily Fairchild, an associate professor of sociology at the New College of Florida in Sarasota, who specializes in gender and culture, also agrees that marriage is still a sign of validation for women, just as it has been for generations before. “Weddings are moments when gendered ideas become really clear,” she said. “A wedding is a coup for women, because they’ve met their gendered expectation. By having a wedding, you prove your worthiness, your womanness, in a way that a man doesn’t need to. A man can be a man by having a job, in ways that aren’t tied to his family.”

And what better way to advertise this achievement (besides announcing it in a newspaper) than hosting a grand affair centered on the woman who has fulfilled her dreams?

Ms. Horneff plans to have 150 to 200 guests at her wedding at the Breakers in Palm Beach, Fla., during the second weekend of some future June. She will drift down the aisle to Pachelbel’s Canon in D, dazzling in a form-fitting, strapless satin dress, a floor-length veil traipsing behind her. Later, guests will nibble on passed hors d’oeuvres and cocktails, followed by an elaborate sit-down dinner.

“I love the idea of weddings and ceremony and feeling like a princess,” Ms. Horneff said. “I love the idea of being in love. I love fireworks. It’s the most amazing thing to commit yourself to someone and share it with the world.”

Paige Sassu, 25, a middle-school teacher in Manhattan, has been contemplating her wedding day since her teens, flipping through magazines and “always having a vision of what I wanted,” she said. (Her ideal event: summer in Central Park, surrounded by flowers and 100 guests, and bridesmaids in gray.)

Her Pinterest board “One Day ...” featured wedding dresses, flowers, bridesmaid gifts, cards, rings and table arrangements. Because she was afraid her friends might steal her ideas, she made her board private. Although she now has a serious boyfriend whom she has been with for four years, he doesn’t know the extent of her research.

Nor is he aware (or “was,” should he read this article) that her mother has scouted actual wedding sites for her, and that together they search online for potential locations. “I tell him some things — like rings that I like, or possible wedding sites like this vineyard in Connecticut — but I don’t want to freak him out,” she said. “I don’t think he wants to get married this year, so I don’t want him to think, ‘Oh, she already has everything planned and I’m totally not even thinking about it.’ ”

Beyond a good party, what is it about the wedding that makes some young girls, and grown women, swoon?

Ms. Horneff holds Walt Disney responsible for her fantasies. “I grew up on Disney, and Disney made me think of princesses,” she said. “And what do princesses do? They get married.”

In a culture in which wedding gowns inspired by Disney characters like Belle or Ariel really exist, and the designer Christian Louboutin unveiled an actual glass slipper, it’s easy to blame the house that Cinderella built.

“Western culture socializes young girls to want to have a grand wedding,” said Patrick Markey, director of the Interpersonal Research Laboratory at Villanova University. “Think about any children’s movie where there is a wedding. The woman getting married, usually a princess, is often the center of attention, she wears a long white dress, has a huge bouquet of flowers, a huge wedding party and so on. As girls age, they mimic this script.”

While little boys also get scripts, those usually focus on empowerment, “like being a superhero or firefighter,” he added. Dr. Markey also believes the wedding is the “biological imperative” made manifest. “Women tend to be more selective when picking a mate and have a greater desire for monogamy and a stable relationship than men,” he said. “Thus, they are more likely to dream of a wedding, which symbolizes this desire.”

Ruth B. Bottigheimer, a research professor in the Department of Cultural Analysis and Theory at Stony Brook University and the author of “Magic Tales and Fairy Tale Magic,” dates the obsession with weddings to the 1500s, when the first fairy tales emerged in Europe.

Those stories all culminate in a wedding, usually that of a woman who elevates her status in the world by getting hitched. “Weddings historically have this long association with material well-being,” Ms. Bottigheimer said. “If not, you have a miserable life as a maiden aunt, a lady in waiting, where you serve someone else’s life. A wedding is social success.”

Interestingly, these tales were about weddings but not, emphatically, marriage. For that, readers had to scour folk tales. But rather than living happily ever after, the protagonists in these stories are “lazy husbands or stupid wives,” she said. (Clearly, it’s no wonder that weddings, and not marriage, with its endless negotiations and compromises, were the high point.)

Peggy Orenstein, the author of “Cinderella Ate My Daughter,” speculates that weddings may be so popular precisely because the divorce rate is so high. “Maybe people think that if they do the wedding, it’ll mask the hard work later on,” she said. “Maybe it’s that marriage is such an anachronism you have to go into it with a big bang.”

Ms. Horneff insists that finding a partner she adores is more important than anything; her parents have been married for 27 years, so she has good associations with marriage. “You can definitely elope,” she said. “But a wedding is such a stereotypical part of American culture. It’s a milestone and a cliché for a reason. If I don’t get married, I’ll feel like I failed. I have career goals and my own personal goals, and they are important to me, but on my deathbed, if you asked me whether I wished I’d been on Broadway or had a family, I’d say 100 percent had a family.”

www.nytimes.com/2014/11/23/fashion/weddings/chasing-the-fairy-tale-wedding.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share

[cheezer]

Thank god none of my friends are like this although now I'm worried all of them have secret Pinterest boards.

[Deleted]

I swore adamantly that I would never get married pretty much until the day H proposed so obviously I wasn't like that. I did know several girls in college who bought wedding dresses before they were engaged. One right after her bf broke up with her because she knew they would get married some day. They actually did end up getting married but it didn't make her look any less crazy.

[dirtyred]

My dream wedding was to elope. I'm not a princess girl.

[noodleoo]

I always thought I was weird in that I never fantasized about getting married. When I finally got engaged I had no idea what I wanted to do.

People who plan all the details without the guy in the picture are nuts. I feel bad for the guy. Does he have no input? They seem like Bridezillas in the making. I'm also curious if they ever think of how they are going to pay for it or if they just assume either the guy or their parents will foot the bill.

[v]

Nov 23, 2014 10:03:33 GMT -5 noodleoo said:

 I'm also curious if they ever think of how they are going to pay for it or if they just assume either the guy or their parents will foot the bill.

(huh)  I mean, some women earn money?


But how much does anyone want to bet that the specific tour Sami works for is the Sex and the City tour?

(She did go to Brown, though, so presumably she has more brains than this article would suggest.)

[Deleted]

This type of thinking is the same reason I avoid the Disney princess stories with DD (I wish we could have avoided princesses altogether, but we've at least avoided the Prince Charming stuff so far). I hate it. I want her to grow up thinking she can get married or not (to a man or a woman) and be happy either way. I met H young, so who knows what would have happened if we hadn't met. But I also have my own life and am happy independent of our relationship. Banking your ultimate happiness on someone else (or a hypothetical someone else) is setting yourself up for failure.

[raangoli]

Before getting engaged I always joked that I wanted a big wedding. My parents believed me. I had the opposite (or almost the opposite) when it came down to it. By then I didn't care and it was just a day to celebrate with friends and family. I never had things planned or my heart set on anything. My taste changed a lot over the years between 20ish to when I got married.

(But we still spent $$$.)

[y4m]

It's a wedding you're planning sans groom, right? Not a weekend?

[genet313]

Gee, what a surprise!  Yet another shining example of the "me" generation going nuts to the max.  

[v]

Nov 23, 2014 18:35:22 GMT -5 y4m said:

It's a wedding you're planning sans groom, right? Not a weekend?

Yes.  Grr ipad autocorrect.  Corrected now

[tacosforlife]

Is this where I should post that apparently my mother was planning my wedding for my entire life? Like a lot of women, I'd occasionally thought of it and if I went to a wedding, I might think, "Oooh, I like that style of dress" or "Terrible colors for the bridesmaids" but nothing beyond that.

After I got engaged, I realized I had no clue what I wanted and didn't even care that much, either. Well, my mom sent me a folder full of planning ideas - programs she had saved and annotated regarding the music, notes she'd made on invitations, flower ideas torn out of magazines, etc. Except one of those programs she saved was from 1994. THE YEAR I TURNED TWELVE. What the shit, mom?

I was super freaked out and suddenly glad my mom lived 1,000 miles away.

[rbp]

Nov 24, 2014 8:50:15 GMT -5 tacosforlife said:

Is this where I should post that apparently my mother was planning my wedding for my entire life? Like a lot of women, I'd occasionally thought of it and if I went to a wedding, I might think, "Oooh, I like that style of dress" or "Terrible colors for the bridesmaids" but nothing beyond that.

After I got engaged, I realized I had no clue what I wanted and didn't even care that much, either. Well, my mom sent me a folder full of planning ideas - programs she had saved and annotated regarding the music, notes she'd made on invitations, flower ideas torn out of magazines, etc. Except one of those programs she saved was from 1994. THE YEAR I TURNED TWELVE. What the shit, mom?

I was super freaked out and suddenly glad my mom lived 1,000 miles away.

My mom also had wedding programs from the 90s. But I think we've established that she's cray-cray.

[treedimensional]

I think it's really sad if girls are doing this. Imagine if they spent this much time planning their careers, their budgets, and their retirements.

[FishChicks]

Nov 24, 2014 8:50:15 GMT -5 tacosforlife said:

Is this where I should post that apparently my mother was planning my wedding for my entire life? Like a lot of women, I'd occasionally thought of it and if I went to a wedding, I might think, "Oooh, I like that style of dress" or "Terrible colors for the bridesmaids" but nothing beyond that.

After I got engaged, I realized I had no clue what I wanted and didn't even care that much, either. Well, my mom sent me a folder full of planning ideas - programs she had saved and annotated regarding the music, notes she'd made on invitations, flower ideas torn out of magazines, etc. Except one of those programs she saved was from 1994. THE YEAR I TURNED TWELVE. What the shit, mom?

I was super freaked out and suddenly glad my mom lived 1,000 miles away.

Programs from the 90s? That is both terrifying and rather funny. Did you wind up using any of her ideas? 

[tacosforlife]

Nov 24, 2014 9:46:22 GMT -5 FishChicks said:

Nov 24, 2014 8:50:15 GMT -5 tacosforlife said:

Is this where I should post that apparently my mother was planning my wedding for my entire life? Like a lot of women, I'd occasionally thought of it and if I went to a wedding, I might think, "Oooh, I like that style of dress" or "Terrible colors for the bridesmaids" but nothing beyond that.

After I got engaged, I realized I had no clue what I wanted and didn't even care that much, either. Well, my mom sent me a folder full of planning ideas - programs she had saved and annotated regarding the music, notes she'd made on invitations, flower ideas torn out of magazines, etc. Except one of those programs she saved was from 1994. THE YEAR I TURNED TWELVE. What the shit, mom?

I was super freaked out and suddenly glad my mom lived 1,000 miles away.

Programs from the 90s? That is both terrifying and rather funny. Did you wind up using any of her ideas? 

Maybe 1 or 2 pieces of music? But that was more coincidence. We got married in a church and were limited to sacred music. So the church music director just played us a few pieces and we picked the ones we liked. I'm pretty sure they were all commonly used in weddings; nothing was obscure. But we didn't go in and request certain music. And as far as flowers and the rest went, my strategy was, "I want it red and pretty and under $1200," and the florist did the rest. I had zero "vision" about my wedding.

[Susie]

I'm positive my brother's fiancee is the "secret pinterest board" type. But fortunately the furthest she went was saving $ and brainstorming for a someday-wedding before she met him. She didn't actually plan anything. I feel kind of bad, but when I was thinking of what to get them for Christmas, I didn't know what besides their dog or their wedding she is really interested in.

[Deleted]

I think this is a bit silly, but in the age of Pinterest I also don't think it's a big deal. You see something pretty, you can pin it. Having the exact plans figured out is a bit extreme, but having general ideas of what you'd like when you get married can be helpful, I imagine.

I was never a girl who dreamed of her wedding either, and it was really hard planning my wedding. I wished I had done more thinking beforehand, because my wedding was about 7 months after I got engaged and it was a lot of work trying to figure out WTF I wanted to do.

[mrsukyankee]

The only reason I had a wedding rather than elope was to please my parents (who I love and who loved it plus gave some money to help). I didn't really care. I did end up with a fun wedding without going crazy and I didn't spend all that much time planning it either. Little did I know that my mom had a huge folder that she had put together for me with wedding ideas. I'm glad she didn't give it to me before the wedding - i think she knew better.

[mbcdefg]

Her Pinterest board “One Day ...” featured wedding dresses, flowers, bridesmaid gifts, cards, rings and table arrangements. Because she was afraid her friends might steal her ideas, she made her board private.

lol at Pinning someone else's ideas and then being afraid that friends would "steal" them from her. I had some ideas in a Photobucket account (this was pre-Pinterest) while MH and I were still dating, but it was locked down from friends so that they wouldn't think I was a lunatic. Not because I didn't want them using them for their own weddings.

MH and I started dating when we were 18, so any wedding ideas I had between 18-25 were all for our eventual wedding, but prior to him I didn't think I'd get married. I didn't date anyone in high school (well, one that was set up by "friends" but it turned out it was all a colossal joke, lulz), so I thought I was some sort of mutant and I'd have to become a nun, but I blossomed once I got to college and within a few months I'd already dated a few people.

The only pre-MH wedding plans I remember were drawing sketches of Cinderella's fairy godmother ballgown (mainly because I thought that's what wedding dresses HAD to look like). I also wanted to copy Lisa Simpson's wedding dress - that episode came out in 1995 and I was 12 years old. Her gown would probably stand up pretty well today, actually, and I'm actually sort of disappointed that I didn't look for something similar when I got married. Pre-Kate Middleton it was tough to find anything non-strapless that wasn't matronly. Lisa's portrait collar was really nice.

[drloretta]

I'm with buckybells.

And I can't get up in arms over this. Something along these lines has happened for a while, in various forms and places. My parents knew a woman who lived in Annapolis, and followed the tradition of booking a wedding at the Naval Academy Chapel for the day after graduation 4 years later. Then she had all of her college years to find a groom.

[magdala]

Since this is a MM forum, did anyone notice that the article did not mention how these women planned to pay for their dream weddings? The wedding industry supports all these articles and television shows as a way to advertise weddings and manipulate the general public into spending more money.

If you want the fancy pretty-princess day, figure out how to pay for it too.

[v]

Nov 24, 2014 13:05:20 GMT -5 magdala said:

Since this is a MM forum, did anyone notice that the article did not mention how these women planned to pay for their dream weddings? The wedding industry supports all these articles and television shows as a way to advertise weddings and manipulate the general public into spending more money.

If you want the fancy pretty-princess day, figure out how to pay for it too.

I assume they'll fund it the way pretty much anyone else featured in NY Times fluff pieces about 20-somethings funds their lives: ample parental support.