Weddingbee Blog

We recently started shopping for the guys’ gear and, unfortunately, it’s been slightly more rocky than dress shopping was. We debated between suits and tuxedos for quite some time. Tuxedos seemed too formal for a daytime wedding, but suits seemed difficult to coordinate. We finally decided on a compromise that suited our style, fit our theme, and was easy for nine men in four states to obtain.

We found a gray tuxedo, which seemed slightly less formal than the traditional black, at Men’s Warehouse. We then paired this tuxedo with an ivory shirt. Now, I know the topic of white vs. ivory has been highly debated on the ’Bee. We didn’t go with the ivory shirt because it would match my ivory dress. Frankly, I don’t really care whether the shirt matches or not. We’ll have different shades of white in our bouts and bouquets, so I figure it’ll all come together somehow. I chose ivory because I just liked the way it looked with gray! I think it captured the vintage-but-whimsical look we’re going for.

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We’d decided on a look and we’d found an accessible store, but the smooth sailing ended there.

Mr. Lion wasn’t really feeling the bow tie and cummerbund look (which was a shame, because I thought cummerbunds would look really cute with the girls’ dresses). He also didn’t like the idea of a vest. We decided to use a simple tie to bring the look together. The Men’s Warehouse lady brought out several options for ties to “match” our wedding colors…and all I heard was the Psycho theme in the background.

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They just didn’t fit the look I was going for. You know, something like this:

Source: Red Ribbon Studio via Style Me Pretty

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Nothing we found seemed to pull the gray look together. I really wanted something that fit our color palette and matched the bridesmaid dresses, but it was hard to pull off the vintage gray and ivory combo with these bright colors:

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This Vineyard Vines tie was the best match I found, but it was a little out of our price range.

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I found this one at Banana Republic, but ultimately vetoed it because the colors just weren’t quite right.

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I really liked this one, and I don’t think anyone would notice that the green is a little off because the detail provides enough distraction. The only problem is that it’s not even close to Mr. Lion’s style.

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Well, you know my motto: if all else fails, try handmade!…Or maybe just try handmade in the first place. Anyway. I headed over to Etsy and found these:

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Sigh. There are lots that I like, and none that I love. What do you think? Are any of these a winner? Have you seen any awesome green and pool blue ties out in stores that you could direct me to? Or is this an Alchemy kind of purchase?