Traditional Libyan Wedding Dress

Wedding customs vary in the Muslim world. I wrote before about Morrocan wedding dresses; today I'm going to write about Libyan weddings. One of my Libyan friends informed me that brides wear the traditional Libyan wedding dress (see an example at right) one day and often the Westernized white wedding dress another day. She also said that weddings last at least two days. From what I understand from another friend, they are incredibly lavish affairs! One practice included in the wedding festivities is the application of mehndi which I will write more about in my next article. For more details, read this account of one Libyan wedding which was written by Carolyn McIntyre for her blog, Girl Solo in Arabia (a very interesting blog in its own right). I wanted to include a video of a Libyan wedding, but since it's not appropriate to show the women at their party, the only ones I could find were of the men's parties and, frankly, they're not as interesting fashion-wise!