Rise of the Feminist Wedding: No Veils, No Engagement Ring – and Don’t DARE Try to Give Me Away

Katy Winter
Daily Mail
July 26, 2013

The bride wore black.
The bride wore black.

The image of a veiled bride walking down the aisle on her father’s arm could become a thing of the past as a growing trend for ‘feminist weddings’ has been detected among modern brides to be.

Doing away with the engagement ring, choosing not to be ‘given away like property’ and wearing a colour other than white are key themes gaining traction in the feminist wedding trend.

The findings, revealed in a survey of 200 brides to be, revealed that almost a quarter of women planned on keeping their maiden name after marriage, while one in 10 were planning to wear a colour other than white on their wedding day.

Traditions such as the wearing of an engagement ring are also increasingly being rejected by brides who feel it is anti-feminist – with such an obvious token to be worn on the finger marking the woman in question as ‘taken’.

The tradition of wearing a veil is being similarly rejected, as some women believe it plays into the idea that a woman is ‘revealed’ to her husband as the virgin bride (though actually the use of a veil is steeped in history and has very different significance across multiple cultures).

However, while there is undoubtedly a stirring among young brides to be, parents can take comfort in the fact that while some women are beginning to push back against the patriarchy, the majority are still keen to uphold certain traditions, with 76 per cent of brides saying they really would like their father to walk them down the aisle.

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