Happy New Year from the Bodleian Weddings Team! Now that the new year is upon us, get ready to learn about the 2025 wedding trends. Settle in and scroll through the trends this year!
Ceremonies
In last year’s journal about 2024 wedding trends, we predicted that 2024 would be the year for the bright and the bold, but 2025 is more about the neutrals. We’re expecting Italian-inspired décor and coquettish charm in the wedding venues, with more neutral colour palettes than we saw last year. Pops of colour are forecast to appear popular too, including red lipsticks or a rosy blush in the bride’s make up, citrus fruits on the cake and colourful details in the wedding dress or the cake. Balancing the neutrals and colours to a level you want is the most important thing – your décor should reflect your tastes.
Moving on to the ceremony, both micro-weddings and multi-day events are predicted to be popular this year, depending on whether you want a smaller ceremony or a big event. If you want a smaller wedding, consider a micro-wedding – with only 20-25 guests, these events are cost-effective and more sustainable, and they allow the happy couple to spend more time with the guests than worrying about the little details. If a micro-wedding isn’t your thing, multi-day events might be! A multi-day wedding spreads the festivities across a few days and means you can spend time with all of your guests. The Bodleian is happy to accommodate your wedding wishes as best as we can, either by helping you plan the perfect small ceremony, or coordinating a multi-day event to spread out your special day.
In the spirit of making the day your own, in 2025 couples are expected to incorporating more of their cultural traditions into their services as well as introducing traditions of their own. Creating a bespoke wedding service is something you can organise with your celebrant, and you can work special traditions into your wedding agenda throughout the day. We’re expecting to see more private moments between the couples, such as a private cake cutting or the bride and groom getting ready together. At the end of the day, this is your wedding and you can make it whatever you want!
To make sure you and your guests remember the day, you may want to try wedding photo apps or a live wedding painter. Wedding photo apps are the modern counterpart to disposable cameras – your guests can download an app ahead of your ceremony and all of the wedding phones they take can be uploaded to a shared drive for everyone to see. Some examples of this include WedShoots (free), WediBox (paid) and Guestpix (paid).
Dresses
Sometimes, it’s true less is more – but in 2025, more is more! Wedding dresses are expected to be bringing the drama this year, with bold and interesting shapes on the dresses, and fun details. Predictions for dresses in 2025 include sculpted silhouettes and drop-waist Basque bodices, as well as peplum and bubble hemlines and long-sleeves. We’re also expecting to see more bows on dresses, as well as neck scarves for brides that don’t want a veil. For the pop of colour we mentioned earlier, lots of brides are adding cartouches (small designs potentially featuring a hidden detail) on their dresses. These dresses are drawing inspiration from a variety of sources across time, from the 1920s and 1980s with the shapes of the dress, to the 1950s and 1990s for the length.
Brides are also trying to prioritise sustainability in their dresses. One way to prioritise this is by having a wedding dress made from thoughtful fabrics – those which are made using sustainable processes at every stage of production, and include fabrics such as bamboo, hemp or organic cotton. Other brides are using less fabric in their dresses, and while the dresses of 2025 have lots of detail, understated dresses are also expected to be popular with year continuing the modern minimalist trend.
Bridesmaids’ Dresses
If a big and bold dress isn’t for you, don’t worry! Little white dresses and shorter wedding dresses are also predicted to be big this year. Drawing again on the ideas of longevity and sustainability, brides are being more conscious about their wedding wardrobe and re-wearing their wedding dress again, and a good way to do this is with a shorter dress you’ll be able to re-wear.
For bridesmaids, the trends are a bit different to the bride’s dresses – but that’s to be expected. The dresses that bridesmaids choose often have cowl necklines and flutter sleeves, but in the interest of sustainability, mismatched bridesmaids’ dresses are expected to be seen even more this year. This trend is good for sustainability and is in the interests of the bridesmaids, because – let’s face it – we don’t all suit the same dresses. Mismatched dresses, usually also picked by the bridesmaids rather than the bride, are much more likely to be worn again, and they are more likely to suit the bridesmaid wearing them.
Sustainability
Sustainability has been a running thread throughout this journal, from the dress choices to the wedding ceremony. In 2025, couples are aiming to make their ceremonies mindful of the planet as well as a beautiful occasion. At the Bodleian, we strive to be an eco-friendly venue, and work with locally sourced vendors to promote sustainability. We also encourage couples to use reusable or recyclable materials in their ceremonies, as well as locally sourced flowers. In a previous journal post, we discussed how the florals used in our weddings change with the seasons, and not only is this beautiful, but also mindful – which is on trend for this year!
That’s all, folks! We hope you’re looking forward to the year ahead as much as we are!
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