What is Cruise Elegant Night?

[Casino Player]

Could someone explain to me what Cruise Elegant nights on Carnival ships are? I believe they took the place of Formal Nights - a link to more information would be much appreciated.

 

Thanks.

 

Suzi

 

Greetings Suzi: Elegant nights have replaced formal nights. I can remember when people used to love to dress up for formal nights. Now you don't even have to wear a jacket, with the exception being the specialty resturant. I expect that will change too. I will admit though, I don't wear a Tux on formal night.

[Sailfish]

I will post my oberservations on how people dressed on our three day cruise when I get back; I embark on the Paradise out of Los Angeles June 12, 2009.

 

As an FYI: I found no difference in the way people dressed on Formal Night with Princess aboard the Emerald Princess in Nov 2008 and on the Valor a few years before that. The biggest difference I saw was on the non-formal nights, where people on the Emerald dressed up more at night than those on the Valor; country club casual or garden party chic I guess would describe it best. I am comparing 7 night or longer voyages, so it doesn't seem fair to compare this to a 3 night cruise! Atleast, that's what I have been led to believe. I'll know in a little over a week!

 

Suzi

[mcnairtravel]

I appreciate the input very much; Thanks! It was very helpful and I learned something! We have always enjoyed our cruises with Carnival, but going on a three day cruise is not what we normally do. We also have not cruised with Carnival since 2006.

 

I still am not sure what I will take with me on the cruise. You are right that my little black dress won't take up much room, but I also don't want to look out of place, and based on the input I have been getting from friends and from the web, it's a bit more dressy that what one normally would see on this ship. We had a friend recently tell me that people still dress up on 7 night Carnival cruises, but not so much on these shorter trips. We are okay with this; like I said earlier, it's just good to know so we don't deviate too much from the norm.

 

A few friends have told me that these short cruises out of L.A. are going to be really different from our last cruise aboard the Valor; a much younger, more party crowd. They themselves have said they would not recommend we do a three night cruise, but we are fine and know a little on what to expect now. Since this trip was such a bargain, we decided to combine it with a short visit to the L.A. area.

 

Thanks again for all the input.

 

 

:o

Well, do you have early or late dining?

If you have late dining, You could do this... Take 2 outfits, the one you want to wear, and one that is a little less dressy...

You or hubby watch how others in early dining are dressed, and then dress accordingly.

OR you decide what kind of pictures you want to take, and wear what you want, and Dont worry about what others think, this is your Vacation.... :)

Happy Sailing.

[Sailfish]

:o

Well, do you have early or late dining?

If you have late dining, You could do this... Take 2 outfits, the one you want to wear, and one that is a little less dressy...

You or hubby watch how others in early dining are dressed, and then dress accordingly.

OR you decide what kind of pictures you want to take, and wear what you want, and Dont worry about what others think, this is your Vacation.... :)

Happy Sailing.

 

We are confirmed for late dining. I think I will stick to my plan. Though we are driving down from Northern California, we don't want to pack too much.

 

I am fine with a "middle of the road" approach; I will save my nice formal for Princess in November. I still intend to dress well, just not in a cocktail dress. We'll get formal photos from the cruise in November.

 

Thanks.

 

Suzi

[Kurbanfan]

Unlike our cruise in November on Princess (a 10 night cruise) I have decided that my usual "little black dress" might be a tad too formal, so I am instead going to take a nice strapless sundress - a palm beach style party dress - and wear it with nice sandals. My husand will also simply take his raw silk beige jacket and pair it up with a nice shirt and no tie - he might skip the jacket. This typically would be our get-up for non-formal evenings on most cruises we go on.

 

 

 

A little black dress will not be too formal.......

[Ladyvdr]

We still dress up. I love wearing my evening gowns, and DH likes wearing his tux and suits.

 

Whatever they want to call it, it is still formal night for us. :)

[Sailfish]

Hi Everyone!

 

I am the OP and I have returned from my three night cruise aboard the Carnival Paradise. If you'd like to read my full review, please double click this link.

 

Like I said before, it's been a while since we cruised with Carnival, and when we did, it was on an 8 night voyage in the Caribbean. I was hungry for honest input as to how dressy (or not) this voyage would be prior to our sailing - everything I had read up until now concerning three night cruises indicated they were very casual. Reading reviews and soliciting input from past passengers here at Cruise Critic left me somewhat confused; some said to go casual, some recommended dressing to the nines on formal night, so I began looking elsewhere on the web for input!

 

Now that I have been there, done that, I can verify that although all passengers from what I can tell dressed appropriately, they did so more casually on Formal Nights aboard the Paradise than on other Carnival cruises we have done. On past cruises with Carnival, we have always made note how casually people dressed on non-formal nights (much more so than Princess, for example). However, our 8 night cruise aboard the Miracle and 7 night cruise aboard the Valor saw nearly everyone dressing up on Formal Night - not so on the Paradise. I never saw anyone look sloppy or unkempt, however, we saw very few men in suits and most women wore nice sundresses, no gowns and very few cocktail dresses. My black chiffon strapless cocktail dress remained in the closet; instead, I wore a nice sundress, and very happy I did.

 

Despite what I had been reading on the web, I took my little black dress, but it proved to be too dressy. My husband wore a dark shirt and dockers to dinner, and took his silk sports coat, but returned the jacket it to our cabin after noting very few men wore them. We sat in a booth with one other couple in the formal dining room; in my opinion, the formal dining room has a casual feel to it thanks to this arrangement.

 

Now please don't misunderstand - I was fine with dressing down as opposed to dressing up! I felt everyone around us dressed the way they would if they were going out to a nice dinner. Remember, you don't have to dress up to go out to a nice restaurant anymore. On our longer cruises, Formal Nights were definitely more festive, and had a New Years Eve dress-up atmosphere to them - which I also enjoy!

 

Now here is the thing - there are two types of cruise passengers out there on the web; the ones who miss the formality associated with cruising and will always recommend you dress up, and the ones who don't care. I for one like Formal Nights and enjoy dressing up, but I don't want to stick out like a sore thumb. I took the input I got on the web with a big grain of salt - and so should you!

 

Here's what I learned: 1) If you do a three night cruise during spring break or in the summer, you'll find a younger demographic on the cruise who tend to be more casual. 2) When in doubt, take something more dressy just in case!

 

All those people who recommended I dress up weren't on my cruise! I asked several young ladies who worked on the ship as to how the majority dress on Formal Nights - all confirmed that most people dress nicely, but very few wear true formal wear.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Suzi

[Mikel1733]

Isn't it when folks wear their leather flip flops instead of the vinyl ones?

.

 

Leather and shiny vinyl :p