Crown Princess Marie-Chantal of Greece has revealed wedding plan ideas, etiquette and previously-unseen photos of her own 1995 wedding to Crown Prince Pavlos of Greece on her official blog.
“Time has absolutely flown by and looking back and reminiscing about our wedding I thought I’d start to share some of my wedding photographs and stories,” Marie-Chantal writes.
“Most importantly I thought I’d start talking about wedding etiquette. What to do and what not to do.”
The Crown Prince Couple of Greece were married on 1 July 1995, and they had only six months to plan their massive wedding once their engagement was announced (Crown Prince Pavlos had proposed six months earlier than when their engagement was announced, Marie-Chantal also reveals. They kept it secret for six months). Marie-Chantal writes that once they’d compiled the guest lists from their respective families, there were 1,400 guests to accommodate.
“Preparing for a wedding is quite an organisational feat, and the bride and her family will put their heart and soul into making it a memorable occasion for everyone, so guests should really take that into consideration.”
Marie-Chantal writes that she and her mother threw themselves into wedding planning and that her mother “was amazing and was able to get things done correctly and efficiently as I had never thrown a proper party and she was the expert.”
When it came to picking the wedding dress designer, Marie-Chantal reveals that she only ever had one person in mind: Valentino.
“I adored his dresses from such an early age, we had become good friends, and on top of it all he was just the best at wedding dresses.”
For the wedding invitations, the couple decided to have an illustrator paint a watercolour of their venue, and on the card, Crown Prince Pavlos’s coat of arms. The wedding needed a creative head (the late Robert Isabel) and a logistics manager (Lady Elisabeth Anson, cousin to Queen Elizabeth II).
“The day was amazing,” Marie-Chantal writes of her wedding at St. Sophia’s Cathedral in London. “My father walked me down the aisle, handed me to my future husband, he gave me a kiss, I curtseyed to my future in-laws and off it went. Everything I wished for happened. It was such a memorable time.”
Marie-Chantal’s rules around wedding etiquette are as follows: respond to a wedding invitation as soon as possible; know the dress code (she relates a story of how she wore a pale blue dress to a friend’s wedding and internet trolls tore her apart because it photographed white. “Trust me, I know the rules and the dress was blue.”); show up on time; always host a reception line or greet all of your guests (and keep a make-up artist on hand for touch ups if you have 1,400 guests like Marie-Chantal); know the rules around social media – some couples use it, some don’t; and turn off your phones so you can enjoy the service and the festivities.
