Weddings can be a really fun time, but they can also be tacky at times. Sometimes the trashiness comes from obnoxious guests, but sometimes the trashiness comes straight from the wedding party themselves. People share stories about the trashiest things they saw at weddings they were either invited to, or worked at. Content has been edited for clarity.
The Bride With A Dolphin Tattoo
“Out of politeness, I once attended a wedding back in the town where I attended high school. I didn’t know much about most of the guests; their interests, ideas, taste, etcetera. But I did, unfortunately, surmise correctly as it turned out, that it might be somewhat of a low-brow event.
The bride was about seven months pregnant. She had chosen to wear a strapless dress that was now too tight at the top due to her ‘blossoming bustline.’ This resulted in a very eye-popping experience for all in attendance, each of whom can probably recall at least one incident throughout the evening in which they came face-to-face with her.
To complement this look, she also wore a tiara and made some alterations to the rest of her dress in the form of a circular hole, about fifteen centimeters, cut around her belly button. The purpose? To expose her tattoo of a dolphin (above the belly button) diving out of the water (below her belly button).
The blushing bride walked down the aisle to Bon Jovi’s hit ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ which for those who aren’t familiar with the song, is a 1980’s pop-rock classic about living tough in New Jersey, USA (it was 2005 in subtropical QLD, Australia, which at the time was probably one of the wealthiest places in the world). This in itself wasn’t exactly tacky, but it is mentioned because the groom, instead of beaming at his voluptuous bride walking towards him, made air-guitar strumming actions in time with the music.
After the ceremony, we went to the reception which was held in a function room at the local RSL. For those who aren’t familiar, the RSL is the ‘Returned Services League,’ an organization for returned service people in Australia, like the VFW in the states. And whilst the philanthropic arm of the RSL does great work for our returned service people, they also own clubs around the country stocked with poker machines, drinks, plastic furniture from the seventies, and dry roast meals accompanied by soggy peas and carrots designed for the tastes of 85-year-old folks (which to be fair, was once the target demographic of these clubs). Now, RSL clubs are open to the public, and are frequented by poorer families (not a problem), older people who stink, looking for love (again, not a problem), and people with gambling problems (the problem). Our bridal party fell into the latter category.
Our meals (dry roast with soggy peas and carrots) were substantially delayed because neither the bride nor groom could be coaxed away from the bar and poker machines, respectively. Yes, you interpreted that correctly. The heavily pregnant bride was unable to be lured away from the bar after our meal was when the real ‘fun’ started, however.
Some club-style music came on before the first dance, and it was time to remove the garter. Instead, the groom flipped up the dress, cut off the garter with a small pocket tool he’d been carrying the whole time, and proceeded to remove it interestingly. This was met with cheers and screams by the equally ‘out of it’ crowd.
It didn’t end there. The bride then bit into an apple (there was a fruit bowl on the main table) and knelt on the chair, whilst her husband and the groomsmen each took turns in doing something raunchy with the bride.
Then it was time for the first dance. The song was picked by the bride, because, as she had screeched into the microphone just minutes before, it was symbolic of her ‘words from the heart.’ When the song came on, I initially burst out laughing because I thought it was a joke/someone had put on the wrong song. The glares that I got from the rest of the enthralled crowd told me differently.
One of the friends standing next to me hissed, ‘Why can’t you be serious? This is important to her! She means it when the song states that she “can’t find a better man!’
The first dance was to a song called ‘Better Man’ by nineties grunge band, Pearl Jam. The aforementioned line in the song is pretty much the only one in the entire song that could be interpreted as being symbolic of love or feelings ‘from the heart, as the song is about domestic violence. I seemed to be the only one aware of this in the whole room who knew this though, despite the obvious lyrics.
At that point, I snuck out and drove home.
I later heard that the poor child of this alleged loving union was born just two weeks later, and sadly, a later paternity test established that the groom was not the father.
I gave my ten-year high school reunion a miss.”
They Forgot About Grandma
“As the hired pianist, I’ve been to a lot of tacky weddings.
I’ve seen the best man pee on the bride’s gown during the ceremony, afterward sniffing the maid of honor’s butt. Of course, both were dogs so their behavior might be excused.
(I thought it was funny. Was it tacky to laugh?)
Then there were the weddings where the guests behaved worse than dogs.
I’ve attended more than one reception where I’ve witnessed scantily clad brides in their low-cut gowns accepting dollar bills during the ‘dollar dance.’
They giggled as dozens of inebriated men tucked money as deeply into their dresses as possible. Beforehand, the men were given straight pins to attach the money to the bridal gown. The pins were quickly discarded so they could stuff the bills down her dress and cop a feel!
Treating the bride like a bachelor party girl is never okay. I was mortified to see blood relatives groping their nieces, cousins, or even their daughters.
Speaking of which, I attended one wedding where the father of the bride kissed his daughter full on the mouth (like a movie kiss) right in the middle of the dance floor.
That marriage didn’t last.
The tackiest of the tacky, however, had to have been the time the happy couple parked grandma in her wheelchair at the farthest table from the dais, who then sat alone even after every last guest had cleared the buffet, and who sat watching the other guests dine because nobody thought to make a plate for her.
I decided to stop playing my dinner set to attend to the grandma.
Under the watchful glares of bride and groom, I arose from the bench behind the piano, and as soon as the music stopped so did the conversation.
Like a record scratch; stopped dead silence.
Nobody was listening to what I was playing in the background, beforehand, or so I thought. Nobody listens to the dinner musician. We are merely there for background ambiance, just like speakers in an elevator or canned shopping mall music that nobody pays attention to. But when the music stops, people notice.
Lesson learned.
I went through the buffet line, collecting scoops of salads and fruit dishes. I felt the eyes of a hundred guests burning into my back as the caterer shaved a few slices of prime rib from the roast, gingerly setting it upon the fine china with a serving fork.
Then, in awkward silence, I made my way over to Grandma and served her the plate.
She smiled and thanked me profusely as I returned to my station and played some oldie-but-goodies on my keys.
A week later, papers showed up.
A uniformed clerk bailiff showed up at my front door and handed me the court order.
For taking a moment to feed Grandma, The bride and groom sued me for breaking my contract.
They wanted their money back.
I gave it to them rather than face time in court.
They sued me because they didn’t think Grandma mattered.
That was by far the tackiest thing I’ve ever seen at a wedding.”
Wedding Fight
“Interesting as I used to run sound and serve as a DJ for weddings, this means I have been to more weddings than most people.
However, I do have a gem from those days, it has to be about the tackiest thing I have ever seen, wedding or not.
The wedding itself went flawlessly. The sound equipment functioned perfectly, the bride and groom were perfect, and everything was perfect. But then came the reception.
It started with the bride getting extremely out of it and falling over on numerous occasions. I lost sight of her in the crowd.
The next thing that happened was I got a phone call. I could hardly hear the call because of the music but knew it was a potential customer. So I took off leaving my business partner at the board.
As I walked around the corner, I saw a Camaro with the door open. I saw the best man standing outside the door of the Camaro with his pants down around his ankles. Sticking out from the Camaro, I saw a fluff of a white dress and two legs wrapped around the best man.
About that time, the groom came around the corner and stumbled onto the same scene I just witnessed. The groom started to yell a bunch of profanities that I do not care to repeat. The best man jumped back, pulled up his pants without buttoning them, and started to run off.
The groom caught up with the best man as he got back to the wedding reception, and they started to fight. Then the bride jumped on the back of her new husband and started to hit him on the back yelling at him to stop. The groom pushed the best man, and he fell into one of my lighting bars. This caused my bar, lights and all, to crash down on the table, where the parents of the couple, are sitting.
Soon the wedding guest got into the mix and broke up the fight.
I did quite a few weddings after this happened, but none of them ever reached that level of tacky.”
Barbecue Your Own Meat
“A wedding that we went to early last year of an old school friend of my husband’s must have been the craziest and tackiest wedding ever.
This friend of my husband has a fantastic heart and was a nice guy, but had horrible taste in clothing, hairstyles, and women. He was adamant about getting married. After his fiancee left him for a woman, he went to his pastor and was essentially placed into an ‘arranged’ marriage. He and this girl were dating for a month before getting engaged and married within four months of meeting.
When we got invited to their wedding, we were both shocked, as we hadn’t heard from or seen him since he and his now-wife started dating (my husband and this friend weren’t very close). They held the wedding on a farm about 30 minutes outside our city, in March at one in the afternoon.
We arrived there in the sweltering heat at a ‘chapel,’ set up essentially in the middle of nothing. There were no trees, no shade, and only uncovered hay bales to sit on in the middle of a field. We sat down and waited for the ceremony to begin, and waited, and waited.
Eventually (after thinking she stood up the groom and sat in the sun for 40 minutes), the bride showed up, standing in the back of a tractor trolley/trailer in her white dress and veil. The dress was one of those mullet dresses and she wore boots; not Pinterest-type cowboy boots, but flat, plain, winter boots.
She walked down the aisle and the ceremony started. The whole ceremony was very old-school and focused on how the man was the ‘leader’ of the household, and the wife had to be submissive to him. I nearly burst into flames at that point from heat and anger. After the ceremony, the bride got angry at the best man and refused to take any photos. They talked her into taking photos, but she refused to smile or take a photo with the best man.
The reception was a ‘bring-and-braai,’ which in my country essentially means that they (the hosts) provide a fire and side dishes, and guests could bring and barbeque their own meat.
As if that wasn’t horrific enough as it was, the bride’s father changed out of his suit and into shorts, barefoot, with no shirt, as he was ready to ‘party’. It later came out that her father had issues with substance overuse, and that was why they chose to have the wedding at one in the afternoon, as he had a bigger chance of being sober at that point. The poor bride had another falling out and locked herself in her room. We sat at the reception waiting for the bride and groom to show up so the reception could continue with the toasts and speeches.
Eventually, the groom coerced her out of the room, and the reception started (bride unsmiling). When the best man started handing out the drinks for the toasts, the father started screaming and threatening him to ‘leave his drinks alone,’ and a fight almost broke out. It was chaos. As soon as an appropriate opportunity presented itself, my husband and I congratulated the bride and groom and excused ourselves. Many people started leaving at that point.
That was probably the tackiest thing I’ve ever seen at a wedding. From the poor bride’s family’s behavior to the father wanting to start fights, to the reception and the chapel. Even if one has a small budget, there are ways to make it a classy event. I cannot remember much about the details of the wedding, but I remember the heat and the anxiety, and the discomfort.”
Fancy Wedding Food
“I was once invited to a ‘Harley’ wedding held in the tiny living room of a small one-bedroom house. The bride and groom wore matching torn jeans, motorcycle boots (with chains), and bandanas on their heads. The ‘wedding party’ (three scary dudes escorting three equally scary-looking dudettes) entered the living room, followed by the bride.
The bride and groom constantly interrupted the ceremony by giving each other high-fives throughout the ceremony (don’t ask me, I don’t know why). That time, there was screaming and jumping up and down along with the high-five.
Once the ceremony was over, several burly guys carried in a table with the reception refreshments laid out. The food consisted of (I swear, I kid you not) stacked pyramids of cans of potted meat. Next to that, stacked like logs, were tubes of bacon-flavored Ritz crackers. They handed everyone a can of potted meat and a tube of Ritz crackers.
So, I was sitting there with a can of potted meat in one hand and the crackers in the other, watching everyone scarf it down. I was thinking this just couldn’t be real. Then I noticed that coming down the line was a bottle of Jack, with everyone taking a healthy swig before passing it on, followed by a big coffee can filled with pre-rolled ‘happy sticks.’ I was pretty uncomfortable at that point.
Since I didn’t want to stand out like a sore thumb, I thought, ‘Well, when in Rome.’
I do have to admit though, after a big swig on the Jack, I thought the wedding was pretty cool.”
Who Brings That To A Wedding?
“It was my wedding and my new father-in-law.
To set the scene, the wedding party and family sat at the front of the hall, and the remaining guests had their pick of seating for themselves. When everyone RSVP’d, they had a choice of prime rib or chicken as their entree, which was served individually. My new father-in-law chose prime rib. When they served dinner, they didn’t prepare his meal how he preferred. He notified the server how he wasn’t pleased with the meal, and she offered to correct it for him.
Instead of letting the server go and get another piece of prime rib, one that is cooked to his desired preference, he found me, the bride, while I was chatting with guests, to ask where the nearest McDonald’s was because he couldn’t get a good meal here.
He left the reception, found a Wendy’s, brought the food back to the reception, and ate it at the family table among everyone else enjoying their meals.
I suppose what struck me was tacky wasn’t that he wasn’t happy with his meal, but that he left the reception to find other food and didn’t just eat it then, he wanted to show all of the guests his lack of tact by bringing it back to the reception for all to see.”
Try Not To Laugh
“I am a professional cellist and have played for many, many weddings over a 35-year career. I have seen amazing things. Let’s try this one for tacky.
Sitting on the balcony, my string quartet had played our prelude and processional. There was also an organist there. We are professionals so we foresee the recording equipment up there. We don’t chat. The wedding was in progress. Suddenly the organist started playing. Funny because no piece was listed in the order of the service for here-we certainly hoped we weren’t supposed to be playing along! Now comes the time you must use your visualization talent.
Picture the bride and groom facing each other, so the congregation has a profile view. The music the organ was playing was the introduction to a song the bride was singing.
She belted out, ‘Because you come to me…’
And on the word ‘me,’ she turned and faced the ‘audience.’ She sang the whole tune not to her groom, but to the congregation, even raising her arms on the final high note.
Remember that recording equipment on the balcony? I think all four of us injured ourselves trying to stifle our laughter. We were professionals, after all.”
Theme Of Love
“The tackiest ‘thing’ I’ve ever seen at a wedding was a wedding cake. The cake was in multiple tiers, set on a series of columnar risers, with a plastic staircase up the middle and a water fountain in the center. They dyed the water in the fountain, and it looked like toilet bowl cleaner. They frosted the cake in white and decorated it with hundreds of blue foil leaves to match the blue water in the fountain.
Unfortunately, the leaves were like tiny razor blades. I’m not sure why the pastry chef put them on the cake because there was no way they were food safe. We spent an hour picking them all out before we could serve the cake. It was awful on so many levels.
The tackiest person I ever saw at a wedding was a groomsman who got very out of it and asked one of my bartenders if they had a knife because he wanted to slice the sleeves off his shirt.
He said, ‘I’m not a “sleeve” kind of guy.’
Just for fun, we found a pair of scissors for him.
Weddings are a pageant of weird, bad, silly things.
We were doing a walk-through with a bride once, and during the dining room layout part, the bride turned to my colleague and said, ‘You know, my wedding has a theme.’
She said it like we had forgotten to ask.
Anyway, my colleague took the hint and asked, ‘What is the theme of your wedding?’
With a perfectly straight face, the bride replied, ‘Love.’
It took every ounce of grace we had not to burst out laughing.”
Don’t Wear Pink To Her Wedding
“I attended a friend’s wedding, and the night before, she called everyone and informed them it was a pot-luck. (She had forgotten to add this to the invite). The ceremony was long, mostly because she insisted on doing all the singing and playing her zither (she can’t sing).
She screamed at me for my dress (pink) because I was upstaging her (also wearing pink). I explained I had no idea she wasn’t wearing white, and she demanded I go home to change. Another friend calmed her down, and the show continued. It was a surreal day right down to the Dixie cups full of M&Ms as the party favored each place setting.
She was my friend (and coworker) and proceeded to lament the next week at work how inappropriate my dress was. My coworkers in attendance were dumbfounded by her behavior. Oh, did I mention she was marrying her cousin?”
That’s All You Get
“I don’t think it was intentionally tacky but just cheap. My boyfriend at the time was asked to be the best man at a friend’s wedding in a small outport town in Newfoundland. On the day of the wedding, he was running around all day, doing best man stuff, and neither of us got much to eat. No problem. We figured we’d eat at the reception.
The wedding was over, and off we went to the reception, which was in a local place. Each place setting had a cold salad plate wrapped in saran wrap at it. It had a couple of slices of deli meat, a slice of cheese, some celery, carrot sticks, and some lettuce. Well, okay, we ate that, but we were still starving. Then we discovered that was it. That was the entire meal; not even a sandwich. The place we were at did not serve food beyond small packets of chips.
No other restaurants or stores were open at that time either (small town). We couldn’t even make a quick run somewhere. We ended up much more out of it than intended at the cash place due to very empty stomachs. You don’t have to provide fancy food, but some real food would have been nice.”
Very Much Tacky
“For me, it has been several weddings where members of the wedding party were beyond out of it. They failed at the very basic duty of wedding parties: to make the night fun and memorable for the bride and groom.
I can remember one wedding where the best man was so out of it that he could barely deliver his toast, which consisted of nonsense and ‘jokes’ no one found funny. I can also remember a similar time when a bridesmaid was so out of it that she kept interrupting all the moments of connection that the bride had with other people. Now that’s tacky.”
