Bringing the North in the South and vice versa

Since I have been a wedding planner in both the north and the south, I felt that introducing the traditions of each would be a wonderful blog topic. In the south people know nothing about a northern wedding and in the north people know nothing about a southern wedding. So....my fiancé and I thought we would do a little introduction at our wedding. :) Northern weddings are almost 95% of the time a plated meal with offering the options of a chicken or steak dish. All of the seating arrangements are predetermined by the bride and groom. The meals are typically a three, sometimes four, course meal, salad, meal and desert. A traditional northern wedding is nice, but not our style. At southern weddings (which when I discovered this my mouth dropped open being I grew up in the north) typically seating is not offered for all guests (insane I know), it’s 95% of the time a buffet (can be shrimp and grits), there are no seating arrangements at all. It’s more of an actual party where there’s a bride and a groom ….. this is completely different from the north. In the north, guests sometimes tend to miss the ceremony, where in the south the guests arrive for the ceremony and don’t stay for the reception. In the north gifts are always brought to the wedding and in the south the gifts are either sent early or not given (at showers they are). All of the wedding traditions like the dances and cake cutting are kept the same. So my fiancé and I are having a cocktail style reception where we are offering seating for all our guests, however not assigned by us (which may confuse and make our northern guest feel a little out of their element but, oh well). For the meal, we’re offering 2 stations (not buffet style) and passed hor d’ourves to each table. We also have taken out (our own preference) the bouquet/garter toss and the cake cutting, however we are bringing back a classic tradition of changing into our “going away” outfits. Saying bye to all of our guests and then leaving to our night alone before the honeymoon. We really want our wedding reception to be a party to celebrate the start to our life together and our love for each other with taking a little piece of the north (where we grew up) and the south (where we got engaged) and placing them together to make a fabulous time for all.