Wedding tips · for the groom
The other half of the morning, sorted.
Groom preparation tips from nearly a thousand wedding mornings spent in the room nobody writes about: a few lads, a suit bag and a bow tie nobody can tie.
The morning
Do whatever you want. I’ll be there.
Give a group of men a free morning on a wedding day and a fair few will end up in a pub or in front of a television. Getting suited takes two minutes, and most grooms would rather not have the process photographed. Fine by me. I document the morning you actually have. Go-karting, nine holes, the first half of the football: I have shot all of them, and they make better pictures than a staged cufflink shot every time.
The tie
Learn the knot before the day.
That is a smashing bow tie. Crisp, new, and untied. At almost every black-tie wedding I photograph there is a huddle around a phone watching a YouTube tutorial at ten past eleven. Regular ties are no safer if someone has decided today is the day for a Windsor knot. Practise twice the week before. It saves the panic, and the pictures of you getting dressed will look like you have done it before.
The drink
One for the nerves. Not three.
I am all for something to take the edge off, and you will want it: standing at the front of a room with a hundred pairs of eyes on you until she arrives is not a walk in the park. Enjoy the morning with your mates. Just be the one who still knows where the rings are.
Cards and gifts
Say it in writing.
A card swapped on the morning is the best way to talk to each other without breaking the rules, and reading it is often the most emotional photograph of a groom’s morning. Grand or modest, it is the words that count. A small something for your groomsmen with a note in it goes a long way too. They are about to spend a day doing whatever you ask.
The ceremony
Pick your best man for this bit, not the stag do.
The morning ends, and suddenly you are at the front with every head turned your way. You will hear “doesn’t he look nervous” and “still time to run, Steve” more than once. This is where your best man earns the title: a hand on the shoulder, a bad joke at the right moment, someone to stand next to. Choose accordingly.
