Grooms offered advice to look their very best
For most men, there may be two occasions where they will wear a tuxedo: their prom and their wedding.
For the prom, the tux may come in pastel colors and be accompanied by accessories such as top hats and spats.
But for a wedding, the tuxedo and, hopefully the wearer, will have more of a grown-up appearance.
Make no mistake, while a man's suit and a tuxedo might look similar, a tuxedo is not a man's suit paired with a bow tie.
The biggest difference between suits and tuxedos is the use of silk satin in the design of the tuxedo, most prominently on the lapels.
Suits are almost always made with a consistent fabric on both the jacket and pants — no special lapels, no satin leg stripes. And most tuxedos have silk-covered jacket buttons while suits have normal buttons.
Deciding to wear a tuxedo to your wedding is a decision to elevate your appearance above the usual Sunday-go-to-meeting suit.
If you're wearing a tuxedo, you're probably celebrating something special.
And it's rare that a bridegroom can decipher the dress code called for in such a situation, although James MacDonald IV did just that during his October wedding in Miami Beach, Fla., said his father, James MacDonald of West Sunbury.
“He decided on a white dinner jacket,” said the elder MacDonald. “The wedding was at 2 in the afternoon on the top of a hotel. The groomsmen wore gray and he wore a white dinner tuxedo.
“I gave away the bride because her father couldn't be there and I wore a gray suit.”
Usually, a bridegroom has input, in some cases a lot of input, from the bride, said Haley Ward, branch manager for Tuxedo Junction, 20215 Route 19 in the Cranberry Shoppes in Cranberry Township.
“More often than not, it's a couple that comes in the first time,” Ward said. “They'll go through the styles and she'll say, 'What do you think? You're the one that has to wear it.'”
“It's a compromise between the bride and groom,” said Lindsay Briceland, co-owner with her mother, Grace Wright, of Second Time Around Consignment and Tuxedo Shop, 136 S. Main St. “The bride might get a little more say when it comes to choosing the color.”
Briceland said Second Time Around began renting tuxedos three years ago.
“We sell a lot of formal wear on our basement floor. We have a lot of prom dresses and wedding dresses,” she said. “People would come in to purchase a formal dress and ask if we had tuxedos.”
Briceland added, “We added it to the store. And we rent out a lot of tuxedos.”Right now, Briceland said customers tend to be more high school students scouting around for tuxedos for the prom.But, said Ward, you would be surprised how many tuxes are being rented for holiday weddings over Christmas and New Year's.“We've got a couple with a wedding night of Dec. 31,” she said. “The date might have a sentimental meaning or it could be because all the relatives are in town for the holiday already.”As for what the well-dressed bridegroom will be wearing down the aisle in early 2019, Briceland said, “We rent out a lot of black tuxes or blue tuxes. We rent a lot of slim-fit tuxes.”“For weddings,” said Briceland, “a lot of brides want the slim-fit black classic look, but I've seen a lot more people chose the gray charcoal or gray color for weddings. Navy blue is popular, too.”Older brides and bridegrooms are opting for tuxedos with tails, Briceland said.Ward agreed that more grooms are going for a slim-fit tuxedo than a more relaxed fitting one.As far as colors, Ward said, “People kind of do what they want to do. They choose all black or charcoal or navy.”Ward added that prospective tuxedo renters shouldn't be intimidated by a multitude of tuxedo styles and accessories.“Customers should realize that the people here are going to guide them,” Ward said. “They're not going to let them make a mistake.“Sometimes there's a little hand-holding as well as measuring,” she said.Ward added that the best advice she could give prospective brides and bridegrooms is to start planning — the earlier, the better.“Don't put it off for a really long time because you are intimidated and don't know what to do,” she said. “The best thing to do is just do it.”Any mistakes can be corrected with enough lead time, she added.Procrastinators might want to try Second Time Around, Briceland said.“Since we're a small business, we don't need a six-month window,” she said. “We can order a tux in a month, two months.“If they are looking at base black tux, white shirt, tie, vest and shoes,” Briceland said the whole package would be around $100.
