Here are our Top 10 Tips for Wedding Dress Shopping

Welcome back and we hope everyone is staying save and positive in these challenging times. In today’s blog post we are sharing our experience and advice on wedding dress shopping.

Here are best tips what to know before going into your wedding dress appointments at bridal boutiques.

Tip # 1 How many wedding dresses to try on?

Our recommendation is not to try too many gowns. It can quickly become an overwhelming experience. On average brides visit few different wedding boutiques and try on 15 maybe 20 gowns finding one that they love.

If you’ve tried on 40 or 50 different wedding dresses and still can’t find anything that you like you might have to reevaluate your priorities. You have to ask yourself what is it that you do not like. Is it the style of the gown? Is it the price point? Do I not like the way I look? Is it a confidence issue? There might be many reasons so make sure have an idea for your dress before you start your shopping experience, which brings us to our second tip.

Tip # 2 Narrowing down your vision when it comes to wedding dresses.

Be open-minded when it comes to different style of wedding dresses. Try few different styles so you can narrow down your choices. Some brides will say oh I don’t want to wear this style of wedding dress, and then the stylists say you know based on your feedback I actually would love for you to just try it on. Quite often the bride will love the new style.

Try to be unbiased and flexible so once you’ve tried on gowns and you know what you’re liking on your body, stick with that vision and compare every dress to that vision. Even if you have a favorite gown, try on few more and compare them to that dress. This is how you’re going to determine how you really narrow down to the final decision.

Tip # 3 Know when to stop shopping.

Again I’ve mentioned that you don’t have to try that many gowns to find your perfect wedding dress, so once you have actually found a gown that you love, and nothing is missing from it. There is no reason you need to keep seeing more what’s out there.

Tip # 4 Invite your support team to your bridal appointments.

Make sure that you invite people to your wedding dress shopping. You want to get as much constructive feedback as possible. When selecting your team invite only people who are going to be supportive.

If you are bringing somebody who is generally not supportive of you or able to be objective that is not going to be very helpful. You don’t want someone in this process which is a very special experience, telling you negative things just for the sake of being negative.

Tip # 5 Don’t let your opinion be overshadowed by someone else’s.

If you find a wedding dress that you are loving but aunt Karen hates it don’t worry about it. Stick to your guns and go for it. If you love it then go with your gut instinct. Let yourself make the ultimate decision about your wedding dress. Don’t let other people overshadow you even if you do value their opinion.

Now it’s really great when everybody’s opinions matching and that’s awesome, that can just reinforce your decision that you’ve made. But if you’re finding that your opinions are clashing with everybody else’s and you’re listening to their opinions. You’re deciding that it’s not really affecting how you feel about the gown that everybody love versus a wedding gown that you love to buy.

Tip # 6 Have a budget in mind.

This is a huge tip. Before you start shopping make sure you have a budget or a budget range for your wedding dress. If you don’t know this you need to figure out your total wedding budget and then allocate a percentage to your wedding dress.

If you just start trying to go to stores and you have no idea of budget than you set up yourself for a disappointment. What if you fall in love with a dress but ultimately decide that it’s too expensive – well now you’re heartbroken.

Always ask yourself what is my wedding budget or a budget range for my dress? Decide if it’s 3,500 or my max is 4,000? It’s nice to have a budget to work with because then you know the range of dresses to see. You don’t want to look at dresses that are outside of your price range. Be honest with yourself and what can you afford.

Tip # 7 Factor in the cost of alternations to your wedding dress budget.

When setting up the budget it is also important to consider whether you are thinking of alterations combined in that gown budget. If you want to make alterations make sure you add these costs to your overall budget.

The same thing goes for veil and accessories. If you have a $3,000 budget that is supposed to cover all of those things you cannot be spending $2,700 on your dress. You will have no room left for alterations which, typically can be anywhere from five to eight hundred dollars from an expert seamstress.

It’s best to have separate budgets. Make one budget for your wedding dress, then one for your alterations and a separate budget for your shoes, a veil, and hair accessories.

Tip # 8 Bring visuals to your appointment.

If it is your first time shopping I recommend that you bring a couple of photos of gowns you found on the internet that you love. You can show your stylist some ideas so that you can start with gowns that match that style or that exact dress. We recommend setting up a Pinterest board where you can pin all your ideas.

If it is not your first time shopping or if you’ve been to that place before, you hopefully took photos of you and some of the gowns that you really loved. Don’t take pictures of yourself in a gown during an appointment that you don’t love. It’s not helpful if you have to sort through all these photos of gowns you thought were just okay.

So try to save your photos for gowns you love that will make your narrowing down process easier and then compare every gown against those photos. If you start finding gowns that you love more than the ones at your past store go ahead and get rid of those photos. It is really helpful to have either photos from the internet or photos from your other shopping experience so the stylist knows either what she’s up against what she needs to beat for you to love that gown.

Tip # 9 Start shopping for your dress early.

Get on with shopping for you ultimate dress as early as possible. We recommend 8-12 months before the wedding date. Some custom dresses take up to 10 months to be made. If you order a dress from oversees factor in the shipping time.

Other appointments, fittings and alternations take time as well. If you running out of time there might be rush fees that you might have to pay. To avoid this additional stress leave yourself plenty of time for dress shopping experience.

Tip # 10 Have a list of questions for your stylist.

Once you book few appointments with your favorite bridal salons make sure you come equipped with questions that you will be asking once you’re there. Ask about time to make a dress if it’s a custom dress. Do they offer in-house alterations or recommend tailors. Do they ship the dress or do you have to pick it up. Finally ask the stylist to show you (and your bridal team) how to bustle the dress.

Top 10 Tips for Wedding Dress Shopping