French Wedding Toasts: Cheers, Speeches, and Customs

Who speaks, and when

• The témoins, the witnesses, are the closest thing to a best man and maid of honor, and they often organize an 'animation': a slideshow, a sketch, a quiz about the couple, a song rewritten with their names.
• A parent of the bride or groom may give a short, warm toast at the dinner.
• The couple thanks everyone, usually around the dessert or the 'pièce montée,' the tower of cream puffs that stands in for a cake.

How long

A parent's toast is two or three minutes. The friends' animations can run longer and are more show than speech. Nobody gives a four-minute best man speech in the English sense.

What you’ll see

• The 'vin d'honneur' is a drinks reception after the ceremony open to a wider circle than the dinner. Toasts here are informal and many.
• The pièce montée, a tower of choux pastry, is cut together late in the evening, with 'Vive les mariés!' from the room.
• Dinner runs to midnight. Dancing runs past four. A late soup, the 'soupe à l'oignon,' may appear at dawn.
• Friends' animations are a point of pride. Expect a video with embarrassing childhood photos.
• In some families the groom's friends 'kidnap' the bride during the evening and the groom must find or win her back.

If you’re the guest from somewhere else

• If the témoins ask you to be in a sketch, say yes. Refusing is stranger than being bad at it.
• A short toast from a visiting friend goes over well at the dinner. Keep it to a minute and end on 'Vive les mariés.'
• Do not leave before the pièce montée. It can be very late.

A toast you could give

Short, warm, specific to the couple, and ending on the phrase. Swap in your own names and your own detail; the shape is what matters.

I met Camille in a kitchen in Lyon ten years ago and she has fed me ever since. Thomas, you are the luckiest man in France, and I think you know it. Santé, and vive les mariés!