Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have ignored a major tradition when it comes to their upcoming nuptials as not every married guest will be able to bring their spouse as their plus one.
The royal and the US actress sent out invites, crafted by London-based Barnard and Westwood to their May 19 ceremony at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, earlier this week.
Six hundred people have been invited to the day do and the subsequent lunchtime reception.
It’s believed there’ll be a more intimate evening knees-up hosted by the Prince of Wales at Frogmore House with a further 200 guests in attendance.
While 600 people may seem like a very long guestlist to some, it’s been revealed that the pair have only invited one half of some married couples.
ITV royal editor Chris Ship said he had seen the invites, writing on Twitter: Unlike most other weddings, Harry and Meghan are inviting only one half of couples. Seen an invite for a husband but not his wife.
Sounds a bit tight, but I’m sure they’d claim space is limited in St George’s Chapel.
A Twitter user replied: They only have 600 seats to fit more than 600 very important people they would like to invite why invite the wife/husband you never met?
Some are important enough for both to be invited others are not so they (the spouses) are skipped for the next one on the list.
Presumably the pair also adopted the no ring, no bring rule for unmarried attendees which Meghan was made an exception for at Pippa Middleton ‘s wedding to James Matthews last May.
Despite not being engaged to Prince Harry at the time, the bride-to-be made it on the guestlist.
It comes after fans noticed something else odd about the invites, with people quick to point out they’d used Meghan rather than the star’s real name Rachel.
Giving an explanation for why her real name was left out, etiquette expert Grant Harrold told Good Housekeeping: Buckingham Palace does things by the book, so they will list your full name.
Even though it’s an official occasion, they’ve obviously decided that she’s known to as everybody as Meghan Markle and issued the invitations under that name.