Matilda & Fredrik | Swedish intimate wedding in Vadstena

18.02.2017 in: Weddings

Matilda and Fredrik are a swedish couple living in Stockholm, but they decided to get away from all the city fuzz and have an intimate wedding in charming small town of Vadstena, where Matilda originates from. As this was my first Swedish wedding, I was happy to notice differences in comparison to weddings in Croatia. I was amused by some, so I wanted to share them! This is what I found out about Swedish Bröllop (wedding):

In Sweden there is no tradition of the father of the bride giving his daughter away to her husband and the bride and groom will typically walk down the aisle together.
In some wedding traditions it’s forbidden to see each other before the marriage ceremony, but in Sweden, since the tradition states that the bride and groom actually walk down the aisle together, it’s not such a big deal to meet before.
At the reception, when the bride leaves the room it’s traditional for all the women to line up to kiss the groom. And when the groom leaves the room to go to the bathroom then all the men get up and kiss the bride.
Swedish weddings also have quite a lot of speeches.
In Croatia, it’s typical to have a maid of honour or best man. In Sweden there is no such thing. There are often just one or two bridesmaids (brudtärna) and groomsmen (marskalkar).

This was also my first time in Sweden, so I was anxious to see and explore as much as possible in those 7 days. If I was to describe Sweden in just few simple words, I would say it is a country of very polite people, breathtaking nature and excellent, quite healthy cuisine. I was genuinely astonished by their architecture, interior design, art and the fact everyone there spoke English. And their pastry. Let's not forget the pastry! Few months after their wedding, I visited again. This time as a friend. As we were all sitting by the table, having dinner and talking about Life, Fredrik said to me "You know, our wedding photographer was the most expensive one." - "How come?", I asked. - "She cost us a long distance friendship." Fredrik smiled, and my heart was full.