Italian Wedding Traditions You Too Can Add To Their Own Wedding

Wedding brings happiness not only for the couple but their friends and families too. In Italy, that happiness is even greater, nobody celebrates wedding like the Italians do. The beautiful and romantic aspects of the Italian wedding has often swayed couples who come to Italy to get married. Why don't you add some of it to your own wedding, whether you're getting married in Italy or your own country. After all, there could never be too much romance and beauty in a wedding.
Here is a list of Italian wedding traditions which Americans, British, Asian and other brides can borrow to add to their own weddings:

Italians prefer to get married the weekend. They avoid celebrating weddings on Fridays.

Another uber romantic custom is, the night before the wedding, the groom arranges a serenade under the window of his bride. And of course the family and friends of the bride are often alerted of the serenade before it takes place but are required to keep it a secret - from the bride. The groom then organizes the serenading with musicians and takes them to the bride's home to sing under her balcony or window. The idea is to wake the bride up with a beautiful song. In Italy, the serenade is considered a mini celebration before the wedding.

The groom is tasked with supplying the bride's bouquet. The act is considered to be his final gift to his girlfriend before she becomes his wife. The bride is allowed to decide on the the floral arrangement and the groom required to pay for it, and ensure it's delivered to his bride. Some some parts of th north of Italy, the groom is even required to wait with the bouquet outside the church for his bride to arrive, and personally hand it to her before the whole wedding procession begins.

In Italy the bomboniere are sugar-coated almonds, that come in many different colors. They are often packed in 5s, in pretty organza bags or tied in small piece of cloths with ribbons and other ornaments. Traditionally, they are given to wedding guests as a thank you. The bomboniere is also present at communions and christenings and differed slightly
from favours used in other parts of the world. Generally, the bomboniere isn't just a wedding favor, it symbolizes health, wealth, happiness, fertility and long life.

This is a funny tradition followed in certain Southern regions of Italy. It entails throwing the bride's garter towards the guests at the end of the ceremony. The bride is supposed to wear a garter which is then removed by the groom and thrown at the guests. In Italy, this little ritual is supposed to bring good luck - whoever catches the garter would have good fortune. In the absence of a garter, the groom throws the bride's right shoe at the guests - the wedding tradition is known as “La giarrettiera” in Italy.

One more interesting tradition is that the bride may not look into the mirror once she wears her wedding dress. It's very tough as every bride wants to look into the mirror to see how her dress fits, and how she looks. The good news is  she can look into the mirror one the condition that she removes one of her accessories; earring, gloves or shoes. This is a rather unique Italian tradition, it's not for everyone, but it sure is interesting.