… or the father of the groom! Weddings, as I’m sure we all know, tend to be about the ladies, at least insofar as we’re constantly being told that weddings are supposed to be about the ladies. There’s the bride, of course, and her mother and grandmothers. And the typical attendants chosen by brides are the maid of honor, bridesmaids, and one or more flower girls (as opposed to the less common man of honor and bridesmen). There’s a groom floating around in that estrogen bath somewhere, but his role is perceived as obvious. Less clear these days is the role of the father of the bride. Once upon a time he might have been the one writing the checks to wedding vendors, but nowadays brides and grooms are paying for some or all of their weddings.

So what are those dads doing while their kiddies are knee-deep in wedding planning mags, anyway? Sometimes the father of the bride and the father of the groom take that old, annoying advice given to guys and simply stand back and shut up. But it turns out that there are dads who don’t want to be relegated to playing the part of another piece of background scenery! And these dads are often left wondering what exactly they should be contributing to the wedding planning process. With that in mind, here are three out of the ordinary ways the father of the bride and father of the groom can help out:

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Forget boudoir photography for brides because there’s apparently a whole new way to show off your Future Mrs. So-and-So panties on film! I’m talking about in the bridal chamber, post-makeup but pre-dress, perhaps while you wait for your mom to finish straightening your train. Picture this: You’re sipping a mimosa in your bra and underpants, while your wedding photographer hovers around snapping shots of you and your bridesmaids. The question is, do you keep those photos? Did you even want them? Are you going to care when they end up in your photog’s online portfolio?

According to the Wall Street Journal, of all places, in these salacious days of baring it all, more and more brides are letting their wedding photographers take pre-wedding pictures that look an awful lot like they came from a boudoir photography shoot instead of a wedding.

For the many brides who have been living with their fiancés for years before taking the leap, mugging for risqué shots can be a way of playing up the irony of donning a traditional dress. “The white gown and veil is a kind of performance or drag — like Madonna in her video for ‘Like a Virgin.’”

What now? I’m all about brides (and grooms, too, rawr) having pictures of themselves in their undies taken on the morning of the wedding, but I think that framing it as some empowering blow aimed at traditional wedding culture and gender roles instead of just harmless fun strikes me as a little weird. I can’t say I hate the idea of the pre-wedding bra and panties shots, but I would suggest leaving them out of your coffee table wedding album. And maybe also your online gallery. Sexy and lucious as you no doubt are, your family and friends might just not care to see you in your bridal underwear.

Thoughts? Should the bride’s choice of panties be left to the imagination or is there a place for that sort of thing in today’s wedding album?

Photograph by Ron Capobianco

Looking for an alternative to the traditional wedding veil? You could do like the ladies of Bourg en Bresse in France once did and, er, wear a lampshade on your head.

…I also think I see some wedding wear ideas for the groom who would describe himself as a “creative type.” (via)

In case the novelty cake toppers featuring the bride dragging the groom to the altar or the much less common groom dragging the bride to the altar, we now have those wacky toppers in stunning reality in the form of staged wedding photos.

You know, just in case the stereotype of women having to trick men into getting married was prevalent enough. Oddly enough, I couldn’t find any images of a real groom dragging a real bride to the altar, which might have something to do with the fact that forced marriages are alive and well in many parts of the world, and more often than not, it is the bride who is the unwilling participant.

My take: Hate. Hate, hate, hate. This is one so-called funny stereotype I wish would just die already because the fact that it’s still around and has made its way into wedding photo albums doesn’t make anyone look good. What say you? Am I just being a fuddy-duddy, or what?

Some people walk down the aisle and some people roll – if you’re one of the latter people, you might just want to see pictures of brides and grooms who look a little more like you. That was my reasoning when I went looking for photos of disabled (differently-abled?) brides and grooms – specifically those in wheelchairs. As I usually do, I figured it would be a walk in the park, but you’ll remember my usual rule: I want to find great, or at least good wedding photographs featuring brides and grooms in wheelchairs. Not, you know, some grainy, scanned in snapshot taken 30 years ago.

Turns out it wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be – when is it ever? – to find beautiful photographs of brides, grooms, bridesmaids, and groomsmen in wheelchairs. But I did find some:

It’s not always easy for a bride-to-be who’s in a wheelchair to find an accommodating reception venue or the perfect wedding dress, but it can be done! Katie Kirkpatrick Godwin did it while battling the cancer that ultimately took her life. (Note: Not safe for people who cry easily.)

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A while back, the magnificent Megan had this to say:

You know what I would love to see? A post about and with lots of photos/poses where the bride is taller than the groom. That’s sort of a “common but unusual” thing and I think many people aren’t sure how to handle it. Do brides still wear heels? Are photo poses different? Do they embrace it? And so on.

Easy-peasy, I thought, there are probably hundreds of photos of taller brides posed with shorter groom out there since tall ladies do marry compact gents. But, no. I thought wrongly. The problem is not that there aren’t brides who are taller than their grooms, but rather that so many couples and/or wedding photographers go to great pains to hide what everyone can clearly see.

So instead of hundreds of photos, I found one great photo, some really crap photos, and then hundreds of blog posts and forum discussions all about how to hide the fact that the groom is shorter than the bride. Here are some highlights:

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It used to be easy to know what – more or less – a bride and groom would wear at a formal wedding. The bride would wear a white or ivory gown and a veil. The groom would wear the rented formalwear appropriate to the time of day and level of formality.

For a daytime ceremony, one wore a morning suit:

After five pm, a tuxedo was the way to go:

And for ultra-formal, there was always white tie and tails:

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