5 Tips for Planning a Military Wedding

I married my Army man almost two years ago and had so much fun planning it that I decided to try to get into event planning. I’m super excited to share that with you, so soon after writing this post last month, expressing my fears about my burgeoning career already stagnating. Turns out, I was offered a job as the Director of Catering and Events at a country club! This new experience has been amazing, and I’m learning new things constantly, including about a military wedding, especially after planning my own.

Here are a couple of my top wedding planning tips as both a milspouse and event planner:

1. Know your formal wear options. 

There’s no way around it: military uniforms of any stripe are incredibly sharp and add quite a touch to any ceremony. But, there are a lot of variations of the dress uniform, and depending on how formal you’d like your wedding to be, you have several options. These options will be Army-specific, so if you’re not Army, make sure to check with your service for uniform options.

Option 1: ASU

The Army Service Uniform is the basic “dress” uniform and equivalent to a civilian suit and tie. This will be your most “casual” option, but it’s still a good one.

Option 2: ASU with Bow Tie

This is the option we went with. We weren’t going quite formal enough to require mess dress, but we still wanted Andrew to wear a bow tie, so this was the ideal compromise.

Option 3: Mess Dress

If you’re looking for a black tie wedding, mess dress is the way to go. It’s a shorter, more formally adorned jacket and is the civilian equivalent of a tux. (Note: the maroon is specifically for the medical corps. Each branch of the Army will have its own color.)

If you’re getting married in a military chapel or anywhere on a military installation, a uniform is required for the groom if he is in the military; however, the bride is permitted to wear a traditional white wedding gown even if she’s a member of the military. But, if you’re getting married outside a military chapel, you can feel free to wear what you please and add military elements to the rest of your ceremony if you’d like.

2. Remember your regulations.

Keep in mind that no additions are to be made to military uniforms—that means boutonnieres are off-limits for military members in uniform. This is especially important when considering wedding parties that have a mix of military and non-military members—some of your groomsmen can wear flowers while others cannot.

If you do have a mixed party, think about whether you want boutonnieres at all. For our wedding, we had eight groomsmen, only one of whom was in the military, so giving the other seven boutonnieres didn’t look bad at all. But in a party with a more even mix of military and non-military, you might not like the look of some men wearing boutonnieres and some not. Something to consider instead is a subtle pocket square for your non-military members, so they’re still wearing something special without the boldness of a boutonniere.

3. Be flexible on your date, if possible. 

If you don’t have the luxury of a long engagement to plan your wedding—and many military couples don’t—consider getting married on a Sunday. Many venues will have almost every Saturday booked for a year or even eighteen months out, but many have Sundays readily available. Plus, they will probably be more willing to be flexible on pricing on Sundays. Consider Fridays as well!

4. Cut your cake like a boss.

Regulations on this can differ, but if it’s available to you, I definitely recommend using a saber to cut your wedding cake. Using Andrew’s grandfather’s West Point saber to cut our cake was the hit of our wedding! It was surprisingly tough to cut our cake, though—being so far away and lacking leverage didn’t help—but I swear they put something between the layers to stabilize them that makes it almost impossible to cut.

5. Make it optional for military guests to wear their uniforms.

We inserted a card into military members’ invitations inviting them to wear their uniform but also assured them it was optional. We probably had about a half and half split—many of our friends and relatives in the military chose to wear their uniforms, but there were plenty who probably relished the thought of wearing a regular suit since they often wear their uniforms for military events.

 

Is there anything that you wish someone had told you before you planned your military wedding? What are your best tips for other milspouses-to-be? Join the conversation and leave a comment!