Short answers, pulled from the story.
The white wedding dress was popularized by Queen Victoria, who wore a pure white gown when she married Prince Albert. At the time, white signaled both extravagance and virginal purity, and many people quickly copied her choice. Before this, white was already associated with young women being formally presented to the royal court.
Saptapadi, also called saat phere, is the central moment of a religious Hindu wedding in which the bride and groom, hand in hand, circle a sacred fire seven times. Each circuit represents a separate matrimonial vow. The fire, called Agni, is considered the prime witness to the marriage.
The groom smashes a wine glass with his right foot as a remembrance of the destruction of the Second Temple. The shattered glass also symbolizes the broken world and the lifelong process of repairing it. In Reform Jewish weddings, the bride and groom can break the glass together.
A chuppah is the wedding canopy under which a Jewish couple is married. It can be made from cloth attached to four poles, or from a large prayer shawl (tallit) held over the couple by four family members or friends. The chuppah symbolizes the couple's new home together.
The average cost of a wedding in the United States was twenty-nine thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight dollars. Research shows that couples who spent less than ten thousand dollars on all wedding-related expenses were among the least likely to divorce.
A humanist wedding is a secular ceremony performed by a humanist celebrant rather than a religious official. In Scotland, humanist weddings have been legally recognized since 2005 and became more numerous than church weddings in 2018. In Ireland, humanist celebrants can perform valid civil marriages and civil partnerships, and since 2015 Irish humanists have conducted more weddings than the Church of Ireland.