When you’re invited to a wedding, the first and most
important question is: what kind of food will be served? Just kidding,
that’s the second most important question. The one million dollar question
is of course: what to wear? As I had never been to a full on wedding before,
I only went to a reception after a church service,
I found myself in a bit of an outfit-pickle.
Selecting a wedding outfit is kind of a big deal, I found out after browsing various articles about bridal dress codes.
So let’s first pin down what NOT to wear, shall we?
Why am I writing a blogpost about wedding dress codes you might ask?
Well, one of my oldest friends, who I’ve known since we were both 4 years old,
got married a week ago. I was super excited and honored to have been invited to the most special day of her life.
After the excitement dropped, the wardrobe stress started.
I have NOTHING to wear, SOS! This is always my answer to every upcoming event,
but this particular occasion asked for even more fashion attention than usual. A wedding coming up soon and in need of some wardrobe advice?
Keep on reading!
What NOT to wear to a wedding
All things White
This is kind of a given as even I, a wedding virgin, remembers that wearing white
to a wedding is social and fashion suicide. The reason you can never ever wear white to a wedding, is because you don’t want to draw away attention from the bride. It’s her day to shine and usually the bride wears
white or a similar, light color. So beige, ivory, off-white and eggshell are also off the table. Even when the bride doesn’t wear white, it’s still not an option, as guests might mistake you for the bride. It doesn’t matter how cute that white summer dress or embroidered top is,
(I saw some perfect white outfits in stores) it’s a definite no go.
Don’t become bridal roadkill.
All black Everything
Now I actually didn’t know it’s a little bit frowned upon to wear all black. It’s not forbidden
like wearing all white, but in many cultures black is worn in mourning.
So it’s probably better
to wear something more colorful to express happiness, a wedding is a celebration
after all. Since my go to color is always black, I went out and bought myself an all black formal dress! Whoops. The lady at the check out counter gave me an odd look, when I told her I was shopping for a wedding outfit.
“This looks like a funeral or office dress” she said.
“But if you add some colorful shoes, bag and accessories, it might work”.
“This looks like a funeral or office dress” she said.
Great! I had just purchased a funeral dress for a wedding, score. Thing is, I don’t own any
colorful shoes or colorful accessories. Black is my favorite color, for any occasion. You can’t go wrong with wearing black, it makes you look skinnier, sophisticated and ready to party, in my belief. Now I did look for colorful, flowery, cute dresses,
I just couldn’t find any nice ones that suited me. Wearing an all black outfit to
a wedding is kind of a grey area. It’s not totally against the rules, but if you love dark colors as much as I do, it’s probably better to go with a dark shade of blue, like navy or midnight blue. Just to be safe. I did however spot some black dresses
at the wedding,
so I wasn’t the only one in a funeral dress.
A hole in One
Obviously you shouldn’t wear clothing with holes in them. I can check
this fashion faux pas of my list as well, besides wearing all black. I actually wanted to wear a
cute, stylish, party dress which I bought in NYC a few years ago. (11 years ago). I had only wore it once, to a musical on
Broadway. Perfect to wear to a wedding. Since I hadn’t worn it since 2008,
my observing bf noticed some major stains all
over the front. You should know, this was 2 hours before the wedding.
After some stressful stain removal wiping, I was ready to go… if the zipper in the back had worked. My bf never pulled, tugged and yanked so
hard on a piece of clothing before. He almost broke the damn thing, but just the last piece of zip would not close. Maybe I gained a few pounds in 11 years, just maybe.
So the back up,
funeral dress was on the table again.
I noticed a pretty big hole in the seam of my new dress. SOS!
Zipped up and ready to go again, I noticed a pretty big hole
in the seam of my new dress. SOS!
There was no time to stitch it, so I just had to attend my friend’s wedding with
a f*cking hole in my all black outfit. Awesome.
What I learned so far? Always try on important ensembles at least a week before the actual event, so you can always buy a (2nd) back up plan.
It’s also a good idea to bring a sewing kit to a wedding, which I didn’t do, but
a woman I met in the ladies room apparently did.
She was so sweet to stitch
my dress, so I could throw off my (black) vest, which covered up the hole. Why are women in ladies rooms always so nice to each other?
That’s another topic I’ll save for another blogpost. I did however pack up an extra pair of tights,
which I was very proud of, being somewhat disorganized from time to time.
But of course those didn’t rip that night,
they do rip every other night though.
Photo by pina messina on Unsplash
It’s a wedding, not prom night
A prom dress or ball gown might seem like a good idea,
because it’s festive and pretty.
But you don’t want to wear anything that outshines the bride, or look like a bride (or bridesmaid) for that matter. It’s the bride’s special day and you should look nice and beautiful, but don’t take it too far.
Also no tiara, no red dress, nothing too sexy or sparkly or too much
make-up. You can save that for Halloween or a theme party.
So you don’t want to be better looking than the bride, but certainly don’t do the
complete opposite and attend a wedding in a pair of jeans and t-shirt. This may sound logical, but you never know, some people just really love jeans.
Photo by Tamara Bellis on Unsplash
Stick to the Dress code
It’s common that the soon to be married couple have written a dress code
in the invitation. This could vary from black tie, to cocktail or semi casual.
Always respect the dress code, as the couple
wants to make sure everyone looks
nice and appropriate. Of course there are exceptions to all of the wedding outfit
don’ts listed above. The dress code could be: all white, all black, or another color. It could even be: everyone in distressed clothing, but that would be unlikely.
So unless it’s distinctly written in the invitation, don’t wear any of the items or colors I mentioned before.
That’s all for now. Luckily I got away with wearing a ripped, all black
dress to the wedding and it was a beautiful
ceremony and wonderful party.
But I suggest you don’t try this at home and learn from my wedding bloopers. 😉
Sidenote: I was wearing high heels, but when it was time to dance, I kicked them off and threw on my Nikes. That’s allowed at weddings 😀
Stay fashionable!
Love,
Lina
