WEDDING DAY RECEPTION

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 1 May 1937, Page 14

WEDDING DAY RECEPTION

(By M. Hamilton)

A change is coming over the manner of receivirrg wedding guests, for it is steadily becoming the fashion to omit invitations

to the ceremony itself and to substitute a cocoktail or sherry party for the reception. The new “after the wedding party” is usually timed for 5 or 5.30 p.m., an arrangement which gives the bride time to go home after the ceremony and change into her travelling costume. When the marriage is solemnised at a church, members of the family only are invited under the new regime. Otherwise, it is not at all unusual for the couple to go off to the registrar’s office unaccompanied. “At Home”

Rather an appealing wedding day reception arrangement is that by which the little 5 p.m. gathering of friends takes place in the couple’s new home, where the guests can see their gifts actually in use—an experience which most people find pleasant and gratifying. Relatives can, as a rule, be relied upon to undertake the small amount of work which a simple party of this description entails, while friends appreciate the more intimate character of the entertainment, as compared with the impersonal atmosphere of the hotel or restaurant. The economy effected by substituting a reception on this scale for the costlier affair that necessitates floral decoration, carriages, red carpet and a towering wedding cake, often results in the ability to purchase something extra for the new home.