I Stand Corrected...

I received this email from one of my favorite people at High Point. She realized that I misspoke about the history of wedding dresses. So here is the email so we are all a bit more knowledgeable on the wedding dress.

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Just thought I'd share some of the vast amount of trivia I've soaked up reading over the years.

White wedding dresses aren't actually historical in the broad sense of the term. Queen Victoria started the white-only trend in 1840 when she wore white for her wedding. Generally, brides before that wore rich materials, white or pastel or even bright colors (though you're right - not red). I do believe the traditional Chinese wedding gown is red, though.

Apparently the color associated with purity was blue, not white.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wedding_dress

I do know, however, that white and other pastel colors were considered the only appropriate colors for younger girls of the aristocracy during their coming-out (debutante) year because that was a sign of purity and innocence, so I suppose the concept is there (I think this is true today as well - sorry, not sure - didn't grow up in the debutante society). However, in the past a light dress probably more signified wealth, since it was a sign that the owner had the money to have dresses cleaned or replaced.

And, that's probably far more than you cared to know about white wedding dresses. I'll quit now ;)

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I had a laugh when I read this and just had to share it. What other trivia do you know about weddings?

Comments

[Brenda]

My German great grandmother had a nice dark dress for her wedding with an enormous corsage.........
I'm sure there wasn't money for a fancy white dress, but the pictures all look a little stoic, course those giddy Germans, ya know........

[Corinne]

I'd heard that the wedding veil was used in the early Saxon days to mask bad breath.... so I did some wikapediaing (yes, it's a word) and found this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil

Reference to the tricked marriage of Jacob and Rachel and also the veil being a protector of evil spirits.

And an interesting tidibit: in a tribe in West Africa it's the MEN who wear the veil, not the brides. How's that for interesting!

Still, nothing on the veil being there to keep the bad breath at bay. Maybe it was the wedding boquet that did that? hmmmmm.... more homework for me!