The wedding dress is probably the single most important purchase for a bride in preparation for her wedding. I have been talking to people however, and was starting to get scared. My friend's daughter spent $3,000.00 on her dress, and I have a client that just spent $2,200.00 (on sale!). Holly crap!!! There is NO WAY I can afford that. But, then I remembered that I have the most thrifty, practical, amazing daughter there is. Our cost? When all is said and done it will be about $200.00. Yes, you are reading all of the zeros correctly in this post. Let me tell ya how we did it!
1. SHOP AT THE END/FIRST OF THE YEAR
There are a lot of dresses on clearance at this time of year so that they can clear out all of the old styles for the new. Like we really care about wearing last years style! If you love it, then who cares. Jess's dress was found on the clearance rack.
2. BUY A FLOOR SAMPLE
If you can find one in your size buying a floor sample is a cheaper way to go. Does it really matter that a dozen brides have tried your dress on before you? Don't fool yourself - the average article of clothing purchased in a department store has been tried on an average of 9 times, so you are already wearing clothes that have been tried on by someone else. Besides, I have a thrift store queen for a daughter, so she is completely used to it. Sometimes you might have a few simple fixes on the dress, but the hundreds you save will be worth the time you will need to make the fixes.
3. GO MORE SIMPLE
The more beading, sequence and lace that you have on a dress the more expensive it will be. The dress Jess picked was just satin. It was a beautiful design, and fit her personality perfectly, but it wasn't bogged down by a lot of bling. We ended up buying a beaded sash to sew on it at the waist to add a little sparkle. That extra sparkle was only $60 (plus a little sewing time) verses the second dress she was looking at that had beading in the train and waist at $400 more. Yup, worth $400 to add our own bling!
4. PICK A TIE-UP BACK
My daughter is extremely blessed in her build. She has a tiny waist and a large chest, so finding things to fit her perfectly can be challenging. A great way for us to get out of serious alteration time and money was to pick a dress with a lace up bodice. This way we can let it out on the top a bit and cinch it down in the middle. A perfect fit and very flattering!
5. SKIP THE ALTERATIONS
Don't buy a dress that needs a ton of altering to fit your needs. If you have to completely change it to love it, it's not the dress for you. If you have any sewing chops at all, or know someone who does, then you can save on the alterations at the dress shop. They wanted to charge us $90 just to hem Jess's dress, which is almost the price of the dress itself. I can totally do that myself for free and an hour or two. Even if you don't know how to sew, you can probably find someone around who does, and will charge a lot less than the shop does.
Of course, I cannot show you the dress that Jess actually picked, that just would be downright unlucky and will have to wait until after wedding day, but here are are a few pictures of my daughter having fun being a princess for the day.
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