Relationships
7 Wedding Dress Disasters That Will Make You Want To Elope Instead
Let me just start by saying that I think weddings are great. I'm the kind of person who gets weepy during the ceremony, even if I don't know the bride or groom. I love the whole production, and the fact that it all ends with cake doesn't hurt either. But planning a wedding sounds like a nightmare. It's expensive, complicated, there's often all kinds of a family drama, and there's always potential for wedding dress disasters around every corner. And I do mean every corner. From finding the dress, to buying it, to getting it to actually fit, to it surviving unscathed through the ceremony and reception... honestly, it seems like one giant obstacle course.
It can go wrong in so many different ways, but you don't have to take my word for it. Plenty of brides have shared their wedding dress stories on Reddit. When you hear of all the ways their wedding dress dreams went awry, well, it's enough to make you want to elope. So, if you're planning on walking down the aisle sometime soon, you may want to read their cautionary tales. That way, you can hopefully avoid a similar fate. (And wear comfortable shoes and get your dress hemmed so it doesn't drag on the floor. Just sayin'.)
01The Dress Vs. The TSA
I’m having a destination wedding and I had to travel internationally with my dress. I was advised not to put the dress in a box but rather to place it in a garment bag and pass it to the cabin crew when I board.
When I arrived at security at the airport, I handed over the garment bag for screening while I went through the detector to wait at the other end. By the time the officer brought the bag to me and opened it to check it manually, there was a big black stain on the dress (my dress is a traditional white wedding dress).
I was really distraught at this point. One of the supervisors tried to clean off the stain on the dress because she had previously worked in a wedding dress store. She said it was black powder and probably got stained from the conveyor belt or something. I was in transit for almost 48 hours after that so I could not follow up with them to know how they intend to make this right. I won’t be returning home until next month. Most of the stain has been cleaned off by my mum but in my eyes, I still see the black stain on the dress. I feel like my dress has been ruined and I no longer adore it like I used to. This has also made me quite depressed. There is also not enough time to get another dress before the wedding. I’m not really excited about my wedding anymore.
02The bride whose mother-in-;aw went full monster-in-law.
My soon to be MIL... came over yesterday, theoretically to see our new house, but instead offered the following criticism: I'm getting fat. Need to watch the calories so I can "fit into my dress."
This delightful conversation was interrupted by my fiance asking me to help him put a bed in the spare guest room together, so I left Future MIL to her own devices and Netflix while I helped. About 40 minutes into assembly, I went to go take a bathroom break and headed into the master bedroom...and what do I find but Future MIL struggling to yank my dress over her head BUT WAS FREAKING STUCK. I blurted out "what the hell?!" and she immediately started stammering "Oh my God! OH MY GOD! OH GOD!"
At that point my number one concern was her tearing the sheer backing of my dress so I rushed over to help her. It was all for not as she managed to scratch her way through the back of the dress and completely destroy the sheer material. She burst the side zipper of the dress and got a dirty footprint on the train.
I asked her, as soon as I got her out of the dress... what the HELL she was thinking. She responded that she was just trying to make sure the dress would fit me; because if the dress fit her, then it absolutely fit me too. If it didn't fit her, then I obviously had some work to do. Never mind that I just had my final fitting and it had fit like a glove.
She hasn't offered to pay for any of the repairs to the dress.
03The gown that tore... during the ceremony
I bought a dress for about $1,200 that I loved. I also really liked the seamstress.
The problem was, she told me she would sew in a bra for me (I have a big bust and felt a bit uncomfortable in the strapless dress) and said that it wouldn't significantly change the fitting if I had the bra on while trying on the dress, so when I got the final product I never actually tried on the dress until the day of the wedding.
When I did, the dress seemed too tight. We made it work but the clasp at the top popped off almost immediately.
Midway through the ceremony, just from taking a breath, half the back tore apart from the zipper. Pretty much 10 minutes into the reception the entire thing was torn away from the zipper and my entire back was open. We pinned it and I lived but it was a bit stressful. I also noted at the end of the night there was another huge tear where the skirt had pulled away from the bodice.
04Wedding dresses and sibling rivalry don't mix.
So, my sister and I got engaged within a few months of each other. We both grew up without a lot of money, so we really had to finance our weddings all on our own. My husband and I saved our pennies for three years so that we could have a true dream wedding. The one thing I wanted to be absolutely perfect was my dress. I've always had issues with my self-esteem, so I wanted to feel like a million bucks. All in all, my dress was over $3,500, and there was beading and some embroidery all over the bodice and hem, trailing up and down the skirt. It made me feel like a princess. I shared pictures with my family after buying it, and my sister really liked the style. I gave her the name of the boutique I tracked it down at, and she went looking. From what she told me, she found the dress, but not in her size (I'm a size smaller). They didn't carry her size, and ordering one wouldn't make it in time for her wedding. Letting out the current size was just unaffordable, so she gave up and looked for a new one.
For me, alterations were also really pricey, but my grandma offered to do them for me, free of charge... My cousin had me put my dress in her son's nursery while he was napping, that way nobody would touch it, and since the door was closed, none of her cats would get to it. My grandma was running late, so I just decided to wait it out downstairs for a bit. She got there about 45 minutes into the party, but we got caught up with conversation before we could go see the dress. My cousin's baby started to cry shortly after, and my sister offered to go get him.
Maybe 10-15 minutes later, my sister comes downstairs with the baby, saying that one of the cats got to my dress while the door was open and it's all torn up. I went upstairs, and sure enough, the bodice was torn right in half in the front, with the beads everywhere, embroidery wrecked, and the skirt ripped up. All I could do was cry. My grandma told me she wasn't able to fix it, and an estimate for repair was so out of our budget that if we went through with it, we'd either need to postpone six months, or ditch the photographer. I couldn't even get a new dress without selling it, and my sister offered to take it off my hands for 2/3 the original price, since it was so damaged. I gave it to her, bought a cheaper, more simplistic dress that I didn't love, and got married. My sister had part of the dress repaired, turning the rip in the front into a dip neckline, and covering the skirt with more material. It looked nice, and she got married.
At our family's Fourth of July party, my cousin called me over and told me she'd been going through recordings from her son's baby monitor to see how he kept getting out of his crib, and ended up watching a lot of them. She found a video, which she downloaded and showed to me, from the day my dress was ruined. My sister went into the room, gave the baby a pacifier, and hacked at my dress with a pair of scissors. Once she'd made some marks on it, she ripped it up with her hands, then grabbed my cousin's son and told me about it.
She ruined my wedding dress so she could have it. She did it on purpose.
05The wedding dress con.
I bought a wedding dress from a China-based store after watching YouTube reviews from small time YouTubers, who bought this same dress. Immediately after placing the order, I felt very stupid. They reassured me that I would receive the same dress in the picture. They didn't.
I received the dress a month later and I couldn't believe my eyes. I was completely expecting it to be a well elaborate prank from my friends (really, this comforting thought crossed my mind) for about 30 seconds. But it wasn't a prank. The dress resembles a Halloween costume. No appliqués, no trims, no pretty rhinestones, no embroidery, nothing — only cheap silver sequins all over. It is thick, stiff and it's ripped in several places, and the sequins are also falling off. The lace isn't cut properly and it looks nothing like the pictures they use to advertise it. It was completely misrepresented and it does not fit its purpose, unless the purpose is to wear it on Halloween.
On the seller's website, they explicitly say that the exact address they provided PayPal with for me to return the dress to, was actually not available for product return (!!!). The deadline for me to send the dress back came and went, and PayPal notified me they had now decided the dispute against me because I didn't send the dress back.
06Bridal shop snobbery.
Been feeling really discouraged about dress shopping lately. I’ve been to three bridal stores and as soon as I tell them my budget they smirk and go “Hmmm, not sure I can accommodate that.”
These were all consignment/secondhand dress stores where I really didn’t think a budget under $500 was unreasonable but once they know you’re not breaking the bank at their store I’ve found them so much less helpful and more judgey. One lady said “You know what, I have your perfect dress, but I’m not even going to tempt you by showing it to you”. Like ok??? I thought dress shopping was going to be fun :(
07Mama wedding dress drama.
I’m extremely upset right now. There was a one-day wedding dress sale in my city today that I attended with my mom.
I have been engaged eight months now and haven't really been able to imagine myself in a gown. So I was excited to, at least try some on, even if I didn't buy one. I am plus size, and unfortunately the sale was a disappointment, there was literally maybe three in my size range and they were not my style at all. Fine, I understood that was possible. I tried on a few but really didn't feel great about myself as they weren't flattering at all.
My mother literally said nothing the whole time and finally after a few she was basically like "Oh well. There's no more you can try, let me try on some for fun". Fine whatever I had a feeling she would do this, I wasn't thrilled by it but I thought she would try on a few and we could leave. We spent all this time looking through her size dresses and commenting on them. She tried on some dresses and was saying how nice she looked in them and taking pictures.
After a few, she tried one on that she fell in love with and she went ahead and bought it!!!!! She's not even in a relationship!
If anyone has earned a honeymoon... safe to say it’s these folks.
