Korean Weddings Have Some Interesting Traditions You May Not Know!

Wedding Traditions in Korea

Weddings are an important part of many cultures, and the same holds true for Korean weddings. Whether you’re just interested in Korean culture because of K-pop and K-dramas or you’re Korean-American and want to take part in some special Korean wedding traditions, there are plenty of interesting things to learn about this special day! Here are some of the most interesting traditional and modern Korean wedding traditions.

Korean Traditions Include the Parents for the Wedding Experience

Parents are an extremely important part of traditional Korean weddings. Introducing your future spouse to your parents is an important affair — usually, parents don’t meet casual boyfriends or girlfriends, and may only be introduced to a significant other once an engagement is ready to take place. After being introduced to each other’s parents, the groom’s family and the bride’s family are introduced to each other. Korean culture places huge emphasis on family members, which means that a marriage isn’t just joining two people together, it’s joining two whole families.

After the wedding, there is a traditional ceremony called a p’ye-baek, where Korean couples visit the groom’s family to exchange certain symbolic gifts. Nowadays, this ceremony may include both families of the newlyweds and be set right after the reception, rather than a few days after the wedding. During the p’ye-baek, the parents throw dates and chestnuts at the bride, who uses her large skirt to try and catch them; the number that she catches is thought to symbolize how many children she will have.

The incorporation of parents into the wedding doesn’t stop there. It’s considered traditional for both sets of parents to invite everyone they know to the wedding, regardless of whether the couple also knows them. This can lead to a huge guest count, with sometimes over 500 people attending a wedding! However, despite the headaches that may come with such an impressive number of guests, both North and South Korean wedding traditions consider it as a respectful way to honor parents, so many Koreans and Korean-Americans still maintain it.

Wedding Traditions in Korea Place Importance on Traditional Dress — To an Extent

Wedding Traditions in Korea

With the incorporation of modern Korean wedding ceremony traditions into more historical ones, the bride and groom will often both wear multiple outfits to show respect for today’s culture as well as their heritage. However, this varies greatly between the bride, groom, and wedding guests.

Bridal Dresses and Groom Suits

Historically, the couple and their parents wore traditional Korean dress during the p’ye-baek. The bride and groom would wear a special wedding hanbok, and the bride would have special makeup meant to ward away evil spirits. Nowadays, many Korean-American wedding traditions include the couple wearing a white dress and suit for the ceremony, and changing into hanbok for the reception. The p’ye-baek may be held at the reception, though it is still usually reserved only for close family.

Dresses and Suits for the Families

Regardless of whether the couple chooses to wear Western wedding clothing for parts of the ceremony, the parents of the bride and groom will often be more attached to historic Korean wedding traditions and customs, as they are more likely to have grown up surrounded by traditional Korean culture. Usually, the bride’s mother is dressed in a pink or purple hanbok, and the groom’s mother wears blue garments.

Guest Dress Code

Guests will generally wear a wide variety of outfits, ranging from suits and dresses to even extremely casual attire like sneakers and jeans. Still, most guests will wear more comfortable formal attire, somewhere in the middle between the two extremes. It’s also not taboo to wear white to a Korean wedding — because hanbok are very colorful and rarely even incorporate the color white, it’s never really been considered a problem.

Korean Wedding Tradition Includes Important Gift-Giving Etiquette

When it comes to Korean wedding traditions, there are often gifts aplenty. Traditionally, the parents would pay for the wedding, and the groom’s family might even pay for a home for the couple! Now, while the parents may still pay for the wedding, it’s less likely that they will shower the couple with such a large amount of money. Still, gifts given to the couple and exchanged by the families may be valued at thousands of dollars.

An important Korean ritual actually includes the groom giving a gift to the parents. Because geese are known to mate for life, the groom would usually present wild geese to his new mother-in-law to symbolize his lifelong commitment to his bride. Now, the wedding ducks or geese are usually made of carved wood, but the tradition lives on.

Gifts are also usually given by the guests attending the wedding. Korean weddings rarely include a gift registry, and although it’s often considered tacky to give money at an American wedding, it’s actually expected at Korean weddings. For a friend’s wedding, it’s customary to give about 30,000 won, equivalent in South Korea to about $25, and close friends may give as much as 50,000 won, a little less than $50. Guests are expected to use one bill if possible, to get the bill new from a bank before giving it to the couple, and to give the bill in a clean white envelope.

Wedding Traditions in Korea Dictate a Short and Sweet Wedding

While many Western weddings are a big deal, often taking over an entire night, a Korean wedding ceremony tends to be extremely short. The Master of Ceremonies leads the couple through short vows, then the couple bows to each other and drinks wine from a gourd grown by the bride’s mother; all in all, it takes about half an hour. The reception is short too, and is generally comprised of a simple meal of noodle soup with long noodles, which symbolizes a long and happy life, as well as dok, a sticky Korean rice cake. In fact, the banquet is called kook soo sang, which directly translates simply to “noodle banquet.” After eating the meal, the guests will simply say their thanks, give well-wishes, and leave. The entire process, including the reception and the ceremony, only takes about two hours at the most.

All Korean Weddings Use Different Traditions, Especially in the Modern Age

While traditional Korean weddings are definitely still practiced, both in Korea and by people with Korean heritage living worldwide, they’re not all the same. Many couples, especially those who live in Western countries, may choose to mix Korean marriage customs and traditions from their ancestors and more modern customs that symbolize the new era. All Korean weddings are different, and that’s not a bad thing. By embracing both traditional customs and wedding traditions from the 21st century, Koreans around the world are reinventing the way they view weddings.