The Journal · The Brantford Club

The Rehearsal Dinner: What It Is, and the Private Room That Holds It the Night Before

A rehearsal dinner is the meal given on the evening before a wedding for the wedding party, both families, the officiant, and the out-of-town guests, and by custom the groom’s parents give it. The Brantford Club at 98 George Street seats sixteen for it upstairs, or up to sixty in the main-floor dining room. The wedding itself happens elsewhere.

The run-through at the church finishes at five, and by half past six the same people are hungry and a little nervous in a different building. That meal is the rehearsal dinner, and a settled custom stands behind it. The Brantford Club does not hold weddings; the ceremony and the reception belong to the halls and country houses of the Journal’s venue register. What the house at 98 George Street holds is the dinner before, behind a door that shuts, as it has since 1898. Neither family needs a member among them to book that room; Sabrina Van Leeuwen, the Club Manager, answers the enquiry.

What is a rehearsal dinner?

A rehearsal dinner is a seated meal, held the evening before a wedding, at which the two families and the wedding party eat together for the first time as one party, and at which the toasts that would otherwise crowd the reception are given instead. It takes its name from the wedding rehearsal, the run-through of the ceremony, which by custom happens earlier that afternoon at the ceremony site itself, with the officiant walking the couple, the attendants, and the parents through the order of service. The dinner follows in another building, and the Emily Post Institute’s page on the subject says it generally falls on the evening before the wedding whenever the rehearsal itself is held. Its work is practical: the people who have to stand up together the next morning meet the night before, in a room where nobody has to be introduced twice, and go home early. A rehearsal dinner runs about three hours, at a table laid in the order the courses come.

Whose Dinner It Is, by Custom

By custom in Canada and the United States the groom’s parents give the rehearsal dinner and settle its bill, the one part of the wedding that traditionally sits on their side of the ledger. The Emily Post Institute puts the custom plainly and leaves room inside it: “It is customary, but not obligatory, for the groom’s family to host the rehearsal party.” When the groom’s parents cannot, the couple host, or the bride’s family does, or the two families divide it, so long as one name goes on the invitation as host. The host makes the first toast, by custom the groom’s father, and the order after him is his to arrange, under what a private room does to a speech. Whoever hosts also decides the size of the thing, because the guest list of a rehearsal dinner stretches in a way the wedding list cannot. At The Brantford Club the confirmation goes to the host by name.

Who Sits Down the Night Before

The guest list of a rehearsal dinner has a fixed core and an elastic edge. The core, by custom, is everyone who took part in the rehearsal: the couple, their attendants with spouses or partners, the parents, stepparents, and grandparents on both sides, the siblings, and the officiant with his or her spouse. That party alone often comes to sixteen, which is why a table of sixteen is the first size The Brantford Club is asked for, upstairs among the rooms the house keeps. The elastic edge is the out-of-town guests. Custom holds that people who travelled a long way should be fed the night before, and many families widen the dinner to take them in, with godparents and the couple’s closest friends. Then the count moves to forty or fifty, and the room changes with it. One rule carries over: anyone invited to the rehearsal dinner is invited to the wedding.

The Night Before at The Brantford Club, on the Clock

The Brantford Club runs a rehearsal dinner from the door to the last coffee in about three hours; the times below assume a rehearsal that ended at five and a table called for seven. The party takes a drink standing for half an hour, which is where the two families meet properly, and the couple stand near the door to greet every arrival. Chef Eric Wasylenky’s kitchen serves a menu usually settled in writing a week ahead, dietary needs confirmed by name, and the bar runs on the host’s account. The toasts come after the main course, and the service stops for them: the plates stay, the bar is quiet, the door is shut, and the host stands first. A retirement dinner keeps the same order, speeches after the main course.

What to Wear to a Rehearsal Dinner

A rehearsal dinner is dressed one notch below the wedding. Under a black-tie wedding the dinner is a suit or a cocktail dress; under a wedding in suits it is a jacket without the tie, or a dress that would do for a good dining room. The invitation sets the standard when it names one, and by custom the bride’s own choice for the evening sets the ceiling. A rehearsal dinner dress, for the guest searching that phrase, is a knee-length or midi dress in any colour other than white, cream, or ivory, in a fabric that reads as evening without competing with the next day; a jumpsuit does the same work. Men wear a collared shirt, proper trousers, leather shoes, and a jacket in a dining room. The dining rooms at The Brantford Club have a published code, quoted from the Club’s standing rules: “Dining Room dress code is ‘Smart Casual.’ Collarless t-shirts, shorts, ripped jeans and hats are not permitted.” A guest dressed one notch below the wedding clears that line without a thought. The Journal sets out where the smart casual line falls.

Sixteen Upstairs, or Sixty on the Main Floor

The guest list picks the room. The core party sits at one table of sixteen in the Large Dining Room upstairs, where a toast is given from a chair and heard without a microphone. A dinner widened to the out-of-town guests takes the Main Floor Dining Room, up to sixty at round tables, with a projector for the rehearsal photographs. The same rooms take a board meeting on a weekday as well. The counts for every room in the house are on the booking page, with the terms in full. Two of those terms decide most rehearsal dinners. A deposit equal to the room fee holds the date, which matters in June. And everything eaten and poured comes through the Club’s own kitchen and bar, except a cake, which may be brought in and is plated for a fee.

Settled before the invitations go out

Sources: the Emily Post Institute, “The Rehearsal Dinner” (read September 2026); the Club’s own hosting sheet, “Hosting your event at the Club” (September 2026), for the room counts and the terms; and the Club’s page of menus for a private dinner.