LOL.

No, what makes a preppy wedding is tradition. True preppy would never have the groomsmen wear blazers -- well, maybe if the wedding was on the beach, but they'd be Brooks Bros. blazers -- much less faux-preppy popped collars. Plaid cummerbunds would, however, be acceptable.

I hate popped collars, loathe them :mad:

But what makes it a preppy traditional wedding vs. a traditional wedding?

As it's being used here, preppy is just the name of a certain style aesthetic. We're not talking about actual boarding-school WASPs. Anyone can have a wedding that takes its style inspiration from New England coastal summer style.
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You have traditional Italian weddings. You have traditional Indian weddings. And then you have traditional preppy weddings, which might be called traditional middle-to-upper class WASP weddings.

I guess what I'm saying is that if one is thinking of preppy as a style, a true preppy's style would be very traditional -- or perhaps in some circumstances, a traditional casual. A preppy "look" along the lines of what's in some of these pictures doesn't necessarily equal real preppy, at least not Southern preppy as I've seen it.

ETA: Low C Sharp beat me to it, but what she said.

See, I didn't know preppy was New England coastal summer?

Meh, I give up. Preppy around here referred to students, not generally adults and never weddings. And traditional weddings here traditional "American" AFAIK whether Catholic or Protestant

It's not something I can explain that well because I just grew up in a preppy world but here goes...

There are different kinds of preppy, like MC said he's going off of southern preppy. My mind was more New England coastal summer preppy, which is like a laid back look but still really preppy in it's essence.

When I think of preppy I think of WASP old New England families, whose children go to prep schools. They tend to summer in the popular/traditional New England WASP locations etc...

^^^ This. Think Brooks Brothers, LL Bean, (old) Abercrombie & Fitch. A lot of Ralph Lauren draws on a preppy style.

Drolefille, you need to find yourself a used copy of The Official Preppy Handbook. It explains much, and is way funny.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA300_.jpg

Speaking of which, 30 years later Lisa Birnbach is coming out with a new book this fall -- True Prep: It's a Whole New Old World.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA300_.jpg

*shrug* And yet again the Midwest is passed over and presumed to be nothing more than farmers and Chicago. :p

There's more?

:) Either New England or (Deep?) South. Everyone else is copying.

To further respond to Animate's question, as indirectly illustrated by MysticCat and Nanners, traditional preppy doesn't refer to "our kind of people." But, "our kind of people" (a la Lawrence Otis Graham's book) traditionally has a version of preppy that mirrors much of what is considered traditional preppy. Preppy has also become the trend for groups that don't have preppy or high social class roots. Therefore, when you hear some people talk about preppy, or say they are being preppy, it isn't what others would consider (traditional) preppy.

There's Peoria that's stuck in late 90's grunge vs. Country, but that's about it.

The more I think about it, Preppy is an awful lot like the Old Guard Rec System, only a bit less genteel.

What's the Old Guard Rec System?

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