First things first, let’s state the obvious: Mr. Road Trip is fully capable of dressing himself.

And I don’t mean in the sit-com-ish man-child ‘oh, look, he pulled something together that doesn’t look half bad, here’s a cookie’ way. I mean that when I met him he regularly wore ties to work. And he irons on a somewhat regular basis–even I don’t do that! So I’m not really worried about what he’s going to want to wear to our wedding, you know?

Still, I have thoughts on the subject–boy, do I!–but they’re more preferences than anything else. And if it comes down to 2 ensembles that are equally good and I prefer one a little more and he prefers the other, I’m not going to pout and fuss because he picks his preference. After all, I want him to be just as comfortable in his get-up as I am in mine.

And since we’re more than likely going the suit route, he actually has a prayer’s chance of wearing his again, which is more than I can say for my dress!

We’re not having a super-formal wedding. It’s going to be in the morning, in fall, with a small group of people and a brunch reception. A tuxedo strikes me as a bit too much and the sight of a cummerbund makes me think of high school formals. If he did go with more of a tuxedo-style jacket, I do prefer the long tie over the bow-tie, but in the store one day, T made a very good point:

I can wear a tie any day, I want something a little more special.

And who am I to argue with that?

That said, it was just recently that we even ventured into a Men’s Warehouse to look at what they had and start to figure out his jacket size.

Can I just take a moment, here, to say DAMN, the man cleans up nice.

But you’re going to have to take my word on it, for the moment. Because just as I was thinking ‘oh, maybe I should take some pictures of this’ a salesman (who I think might have helped me out when I bought some French cuff shirts for T the Christmas before our cruise) walked up and started to assist us.

A few things we learned, aside from his jacket size, were that we both preferred the European cut (straighter shoulders and more tapering to the waist) to the Continental cut (sloped shoulders and less tapering), and that there is a distinct difference between a suit coat, a sports coat, and a blazer. To which I replied, “I don’t care what you call if as long as it looks good.”

Since my dress is a creamy ivory, we were thinking a tan or taupe suit would look good with it, but their idea of taupe has a lot of grey in it. And then, come to find out, several coats that looked the correct color on the rack and against my skin-tone when I picked them up looked almost green against T’s skin! Mr. Trips also made the point that we were under store lighting and not in natural light, and that could make a difference, too, but I still think the color change is worth being aware of.

Our salesman pointed out that if we went on their website we could have free range of the colors they offered in various styles and cuts. If we made a note of the color codes (a particular part of the item number on all their wares) he would order them in (give it a week as some might be making a cross-country trek) with no obligation by us, and then T could try them on in person.

So that was our homework, but we decided to look around the rest of the store just to see.

And the one thing I took a picture of was this shirt and tie combo (see, we’re back to the tie for the time being, at least). The dark chocolate shirt with a creamy tie really struck a chord with both of us.

What we’re thinking, based on this little Saturday side-trip, is that a dark shirt with a light tie, a light-colored blazer (sports coats tend to have patterns that could conflict with the tie, etc.), and dark or neutral-colored slacks might be the direction we go for the grooms wedding day look.

All things subject to change, of course.

How involved were you with the groom’s attire?