Keepin’ It Classy: Can I Bring A Date To A Wedding If The Invite Is Only Addressed To Me?
Posted by: Simcha Whitehill
Filed in:
style
1:45PM, Monday June 1st 2009
While we’d like to raise a glass to any happy couple, this week, The Frisky is celebrating weddings. Sometimes the protocol can get a little cloudy, and you don’t want to rain on someone’s special day so we’re going to cut through the cake and give it to you straight. First things first: arm candy. Can you bring a date if they’re not explicitly on the invite?
With this kind of party, the hosts don’t always feel the more, the merrier. Weddings are expensive, and, a lot of times, brides and grooms don’t want to pay for a plus-one you’re going to dump before they come back from their honeymoon. Or they want to keep their affair to a close-knit group of BFFs and family. Or they already invited the exact capacity of the hall where the reception is being held. No matter what the lame excuse, frequently, they’ll send us unmarried ladies and invitation for one. Boo, fo’ sho’. But before you just give up an go stag, here’s what you can do about it!
Even though weddings can be a great place to meet someone, no one should have to go solo. (Heck, I’m dragging my bestie to one this weekend so I don’t have to dance with myself.) But the standard, proper, way to extend someone an invitation to a wedding is to invite them and a date. So, if your invite is addressed solely to you, here’s what you can do: Ask the bride or groom if you can bring someone. The bride is preferable, since she is typically the one doing the planning. Call or email to inquire if your invite includes a date and mention the person you were hoping to have escort you. Often, if you just ask, they’ll totally be down for two of you. Hey, if there’s anyone who should understand that you want your special someone by your side, it should be people getting married!
However, if they say no, know that you can, too. Sure, the reason will be obvious, but you don’t have to go to something that’ll make you feel uncomfortabe… unless it’s family, in which case the wedding will always be awkward and you have to attend it.
Whatever you do, do NOT:
- Just show up with someone without checking with the bride and/or groom first.
- Trash talk or even mention your inability to bring someone at the wedding, despite how naturally it’ll come up when you’re open bar-drunk and have no one to smooch.
- Ask the mother of the bride or some other high falutin’ person involved for the extra spot. Be a lady, respect the peeps and their special day by going straight to the bride and groom with your plus-one issues.
- Pester them after they’ve told you “no,” because you might push them into admitting something pathetic about their financial situation which will embarrass both of you. And then you’ll feel about bad not giving them a big cash gift.
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caligirl
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 02:42 pm: [report]
If you really want to keep it classy, definitely follow the what not-to-dos on the list. Depending on the relationship with the bride or groom, I would venture not even to ask. Weddings cost someone some money and the guest list is something that takes a long time to configure. If you aren’t close enough to the bride or groom to where they do not know if you are dating someone, you probably should go solo or not at all.
snap
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 02:55 pm: [report]
i agree with caligirl. i don’t think you should ask unless you feel like you absolutely must. like cali said, if they don’t know you well enough to know your SO (or that you have one), then they probably don’t care to pay for your SO’s $200 plate. just sayin!
wouldntitbenice
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 04:16 pm: [report]
Simcha is not keeping it classy, ladies.
If bringing a date were an option for you, it would have been extended to you. Period. Asking to bring a date is not only rude, but creates an uncomfortable situation and extra chore for a bride—dealing with you whiny butt. This is not your day, whether you have to expierience a few awk or lonely moments is not a priority.
“But the standard, proper, way to extend someone an invitation to a wedding is to invite them and a date”?!!?! WRONG. Weddings are not social gatherings, they’re ceremonies.
juliePS
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 05:07 pm: [report]
I would only even ASK if the couple were really close friends.
Although I have to admit that I’m a little irked about the wedding I went to this weekend where I wasn’t given a plus one, simply because (a) I knew absolutely no one there besides the couple, and they knew that was going to be the case (and thus I would have loved to bring my, ya know, boyfriend or something), and (b) this was a huge-ass, horrendously expensive, 200-person affair. For some reason, having to drive out there on my own was made more irritating by the fact that they clearly invited pretty much everyone they knew. If it had been a small, intimate affair, I wouldn’t have been at all hurt but for some reason it bugged me. Probably because I had to sit at this horrible table full of people who ate four or five appetizers at a time and by three hours into the reception were drinking beer out of the centerpieces. (I love the couple, but it was one of those “oh hai, we’re young and our parents are paying for this” affairs.)
And based on what I overheard, lots of people at the wedding got +1s, just not me. I dunno, it just really bugged me.
Wendy Atterberry
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 05:10 pm: [report]
As someone who is in the middle of planning a wedding, I have to agree with the other commenters. It breaks my heart I can’t afford to invite everyone I’d like to (we’re paying for the wedding ourselves and getting hitched in expensive NYC), so extending a “plus 1” to everyone just isn’t an option. Significant—like, truly significant—others are welcome and invited, but I’ll be damned if someone wants to bring some date-of-the-month just for the hell of it when my own grandmother isn’t even going to be at the wedding (she can’t afford the trip from Missouri, so we’re having a second reception there a week later). It’s not a “lame excuse” that couples are on tight budgets or don’t want to share an intimate ceremony with someone they’ve never met or heard of before. Sorry, Simcha—I love you, but you’re off-base on this one.
retro chic
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 05:13 pm: [report]
I’ve received plenty of invites that say “Plus One” extended to either my (ex)BF or daughter (my choice, when both were not possible). I might not ask out of respect for the bride, but speaking as one who had 11 people in her delivery room during childbirth, I’m not all about the rules for my day. I for one would be crestfallen if I found out that a friend of mine was afraid to ask me the question, even if I had to decline, since there are always omissions and errors in large lists. I would consider each request on a case-by-case basis. It’s my day.
Kate2009
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 10:33 pm: [report]
I think it’s rude not to extend the invitation to your plus one. Depending on how close I was to the bride/groom, I probably wouldn’t go. If they can’t afford to invite you and your date, then they shouldn’t invite you. Or don’t spend so much on the rest of the wedding. The amount we spend on weddings these days is rediculous anyway.
DancerNinja
wrote on June 1 2009 @ 11:00 pm: [report]
All the weddings I’ve been to have not been to me “and guest”. Hell, if they can’t write the other person’s name on the invite, they must not be THAT significant. To think it’s rude to not be “allowed” a date is presumptuous. Does a couple really owe anyone TWO meals for each of their friends? I think not.
PS - I had fun without the dates. Just have fun, seriously.
Karmatir
wrote on June 2 2009 @ 01:38 am: [report]
I agree that it would be rude to ask however last fall I was invited to a wedding for my cousin who did know I had gotten divorced but was invited with my ex-husband anyway. And to top it off they couldn’t remember his name and got it wrong. Nevermind they went to the wedding. Oh and the invite was sent to my mother’s house. I’m 28. I’ve lived on my own, in the same spot, awhile now. They did all of this just to be rude, but make it look like they weren’t being rude. That was definitely one of those that I said no to.
If they can’t be bothered to find out if I have a SO, name and all, and I’m invited by my lonesome the answer will be no and I won’t be asking about a guest. Save everyone the rudeness involved.
Chebs
wrote on June 2 2009 @ 05:27 am: [report]
I would only ask if I were close to the couple and the +1 I wanted to go with was a close friend or long-term bf. And even then, I’d still try to only ask that if I could get the invite if someone else can’t make it (that sentence isn’t coming across the way I want it to, it still sounds rude and crass to me). But, if it wasn’t a couple I knew well, I wouldn’t ask.
WeddingGal
wrote on June 2 2009 @ 11:19 am: [report]
I would not ask to bring a date, unless I was a bridesmaid in the wedding, but that is also because I strongly feel that if you are in someone’s wedding they should give you the option of bringing a date.
Otherwise, read the invitation and see if it is addressed to you or you +1 to know if you are flying solo. Plus, you never know who you may meet…you are never going to be the ONLY single guest at a wedding.
For more check out a tip by Vicky Choy - a DC-based wedding planner - all about wedding guest date etiquette at Survive Wedding Season: http://surviveweddingseason.com/?p=995