Popping Your Wedding Dress Cherry!
Walking into a bridal salon can either go two ways: You feel absolutely overwhelmed or, you feel you've died and gone to white dress heaven. A lot of the time it's the first option! I have had countless brides step foot into the salon scared and filled with dread. IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE LIKE THIS LADIES! Trust me, this experience does not have to be scary or intimidating! Open your mind, have a champagne and you might even enjoy yourself a little. To help you along in this very important journey, have a read below for my best tips on your first time trying wedding gowns.
1. PINTEREST, PINTEREST AND PINTEREST
Let Pinterest be your best friend. Before your appointments, make sure you do some research - even if you have no clue what you want to look like. Save photos of your dream dresses, dresses you like, dresses you hate, the vibe of your wedding, colour schemes of your wedding...literally anything. This helps your consultant SO much! What you might call a fishtail might actually be a fit and flare. What you call classical might not be what your consultant calls classical - photos as reference are gold.
2. BOOKING APPOINTMENTS
A whole day of trying on gowns may seem like a fantastic idea..you know, just bang it out all one day. Unless you have the stamina of an Olympic marathon runner, do not do this to yourself. The first couple of appointments will be great but you will soon find yourself burning out, confused as hell and absolutely exhausted. Not only does this suck for your guests but also for the poor consultants copping a confused, tired and disinterested bride at the end of the day. I would suggest limiting yourself to 2 or 3 appointments in one day MAX. Also have a think about on who you bring. This one is super hard as you don't want anyone feeling left out but you also don't want too many opinions. Select those that are most important and who have your best interests at heart. The others can always come to the collection appointment or once you have selected a dress, you can always make another appointment so that they can see you in it.
3. SIZE EXPECTATIONS
Now here is where it can get a bit hard. Please do not stress about fitting into the wedding dresses. Number one, no one will actually perfectly fit a wedding dress regardless of size. Number two, there are a lot of things us consultants can do to get you in a dress - pins, panels and extra bits of material. And lastly, wedding dress sizes make NO sense - you could be an average size 10 but wedding world that could mean size 14 or 16 - PAY NO ATTENTION OF THE DRESS SIZE! No one will even know anyway. If you do struggle a little with confidence, I would suggest calling the salon ahead just to make sure that there are gowns for you to try on.
4. UNDERWEAR
Please, please, please make sure you wear appropriate underwear. I have had girls come in wearing bright red g-bangers, tight black undies and bright blue ones - sure it makes my day a little more colourful but they will absolutely be visible through the dresses. Just go for a normal skin coloured pair of undies or even spanks if you think you will wear them on the day. Now onto bras... obviously it is completely up to you and your comfort levels on whether you wear one during the fitting or not. However, if you are not planning on wearing one on the day, I suggest you not wear one for the fitting. Trust me, we are not interested in seeing your boobies - someone could literally walk down the street topless and we would not even bat an eyelid. If you do want to cover up a little, just pop on some nipple covers.
5. THAT FEELING
Ahh yes. We are all guilty of watching Say Yes to the Dress and watching all of the brides cry knowing that they are in THE ONE! OMG this is it, shut up and take my money. In truth, this really happens way less than you think. I'm pretty sure I've only had a handful of brides have this reaction (me being one of them but I am also way too emotional). How will you know its the one if you don't get that feeling? I always tell my brides that if you cannot fault a single thing about the dress, you're comfortable in it, you can picture yourself walking down the aisle in it and then.. if you were to get married this afternoon and you needed a dress, would you be happy to be in this one?. Stop trying more and more dresses trying to chase "that feeling" because it's probably not going to happen for you. However...if you do get that feeling, the butterflies, the teary eyes - just say yes!
Overall, go into your appointments with an open mind. Sometimes it's the gowns that you don't think will suit you that you end up walking out with. Sometimes, you won't find anything in that store, sometimes you find multiple gowns that you love. Don't feel pressured to find a gown the first try, don't feel pressured to make a decision on the spot. Try to have fun with it, try some fun gowns on that aren't your normal, have some champagne, laugh with your party and I promise this will actually be an amazing experience.
