How I Found My Wedding Dress Without Spending a Fortune or Losing My Mind

Eloping never sounded good until I was planning my wedding. There were too many pieces to put together: venue, vows, food, invitations, the bridesmaids, the bouquet, the dress, oh god, the dress.

Like much of the wedding, the dress had to be beautiful, nontraditional, and affordable. It wasn’t easy to find.

My first attempt was at a local bridal store. I looked at a few price tags, started to sweat a little, and left. We were on a budget. I was going to have to go online. Furthermore, if I wanted to save any real money, I was going to have to look at dresses, not wedding dresses.

I’d decided I wanted to look like a pin-up girl for my wedding, and the first website I fell in love with was Daddy-O’s. Page after page of beautiful models in glorious dresses, and sure enough, I found one I could see myself getting married in. It was cute. It was classy. It was casual, but with a wink and a nod to the formality of the occasion. It was perfect.

But it was too small.

I’m a plus-sized lady. Daddy-O’s carries women’s sizes up to 2X for many items, but not for my would-be wedding dress. I was going to have to look somewhere else.

The next website that I scoured for dresses, believe it or not, was Amazon.com. Amazon’s user-friendly features allowed me to include factors like color and price in my search and customer reviews helped me figure out whether a bargain was really as good as it seemed. While I found a lot of lovely outfits and great deals, I didn’t find my wedding dress.

Venturing back into the world of pin-up inspired fashion, I looked at pinupgirlclothing.com. Again, beautiful dresses, but not in my size. I was back at square one.

I was starting to think that I was going to have to make some serious compromises when I discovered Starlets and Harlots. It was like a dream come true. Not only did they have the widest selection of retro, rockabilly and pin-up inspired outfits I’d ever found in one shop, they had them in sizes up to 3X! And they were cheap. I rarely spend $80 on a dress, but spending $80 on my wedding dress felt like robbing a bank.

At the end of the day, I would’ve married my husband wearing a hospital gown, but by starting early, thinking outside the box, and remaining flexible, I able to find an affordable dress that allowed me to feel comfortable and beautiful on my wedding day. I would wish as much for any bride.


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