Victorian Wedding Traditions

In Victorian England, namely the Victorian Age, certain wedding traditions were popular. Then again, Queen Victoria herself was responsible for setting some new ones.

Victorian White Wedding Gowns

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert’s 1840 wedding

Queen Victoria was the person who made wearing a white wedding dress popular. At her 1840 wedding she wore a white gown trimmed with Honiton lace. Before that, blue was the most popular color, as blue was the symbol for purity. Women most often wore their “best dress”, and if you were wealthy, you showed off your status with rich fabrics like silk, satin or velvet in beautiful hues. Red and gold were popular colors.

The veil was attached to a coronet of flowers, often containing orange blossoms. The bride also wore accessories such as kid gloves, an embroidered handkerchief, silk stockings, and flat shoes decorated with ribbons and bows.

In Victorian England, the entire wedding was intended to be white, with bridesmaids, attendants, and girls also wearing white. You still see this in the British royal weddings of today.

Victorian Men’s Wedding Clothing

The groom’s fashion at a Victorian wedding changed throughout the years. At the beginning of the Victorian era, men wore a frock coat in blue, claret or mulberry, but by mid-reign, this went out of fashion. Men then began to wear the dark coats and black top hat that we still see today. The father of the bride dressed similarly to the groom.

Children’s Wedding Clothing

Children were included in Victorian weddings, with white muslin dresses for the girls with a wide ribbon sash, and green, blue, black or red velvet jackets and short pants for the boys. A round linen collar for the boys was fastened with a large bow.

Bridal Processional Music

Victorian wedding dress

Queen Victoria’s daughter, Victoria, is said to be the person who popularized using the “Bridal March” by Richard Wagner to walk down the aisle to her groom in her 1858 wedding. Since everyday people wanted to emulate the royals, style was often set by the monarchs and their family members.

Victorian Wedding Flowers

Queen Victoria carried orange blossoms in her bouquet, and to this day, British royal brides also carry orange blossoms tucked into their bouquets.

Victorian Engagement Rings

Victorians were said to have started the tradition of giving an engagement ring as a promise of commitment. A Victorian engagement ring often featured a snake with ruby eyes rather than a diamond as we have today. With Victorians big on symbolism, the snake symbolized eternity.

Victorian Wedding Dates

Previous weddings often took place according to the agricultural calendar with the summer harvest months being less popular. October was the most popular month to marry (as it is today). With the advent of the Industrial Age, people had more freedom as to when they would marry. Weddings took place on Sundays when people were off work, and until 1886, they took place between the hours of 8 am and noon. Later, these hours were lengthened to 3 pm to accommodate working hours and social schedules.

Victorian Wedding Ceremony

A 1942 Currier & Ives print of a Victorian wedding

By the year 1900, two-thirds of Victorian weddings took place in an Anglican church. One-sixth of couples held a civil ceremony in a registrar’s office, made legal by the Marriage Act of 1836. From 1856, non-Christian places of worship could also be registered for marriage ceremonies. Girls could marry at age 12, and boys could marry at age 14, but the marriage was not considered “binding” until they reached the legal age of 21.

Victorian Wedding Breakfasts

Since Victorian weddings most often occurred in the morning, guests were treated to a breakfast or brunch instead of an all-night reception. Three wedding cakes were prepared: a fruitcake for the guests, a light-colored cake for the bride, and a dark cake for the groom. The bride’s cake was not eaten, but packed away for the 25^th anniversary.

Secret Honeymoons

It was consider in bad taste to brag about where a married couple would honeymoon. Following the cutting of the cake, the best man delivered the newlyweds to the train station where they would head off to their destination.