Wedding Dresses? My Experience and a Look at the Latest Fashions

I don’t often cover Bridal for EverBeautiful.com even though I spent many years covering it for various magazines. But, I recently accompanied my daughters when they shopped for their wedding dresses – yup, two daughters; two wedding dresses within two years! – and the process was anything but fun. It was, initially at least, daunting, overwhelming and stressful as we slogged from appointment to appointment, waited on uncomfortable banquets as we watched the clock tick the minutes off our one-hour allotment and walked out of too many shops without having said yes to the dress. My advice to ease the stress of wedding dress shopping? Do your homework. Comb through bridal magazines and websites for names of designers and styles that you think will appeal to you; get recommendations for bridal shops from satisfied friends who had happy experiences, wear the proper undergarments, including shape wear if that makes you feel more comfortable, when shopping and then chill and try to enjoy the experience. Read on for a taste of what designers showed for Spring 2017.

Deep, plunging V-necks, off the shoulder necklines, oversized bows and lace, lace, lace were some of the trends seen at Bridal Fashion Week in NYC earlier this month. While 2017 brides will, of course, have the option of traditional looks, many designers focused on low cut necklines, sheer fabrics and body conscious silhouettes for Spring 2017. Also look for three dimensional ornamentation including florals and bows. Separates, including lingerie-look body suits paired with skirts or pants are another trend. The looks are romantic, fantastical, sometimes sexy but always beautiful which is how every bride wants to look on her special day.

On a personal note, my daughter, Emily Riess married Adam Fudala on September 18 at Union Trust in Philadelphia. It was a magical evening, perfect, equaled only by the marriage of my daughter, Victoria Riess to Nathan Zapolsky whose wedding was at the Ballroom at the Ben in Philadelphia on March 29, 2015. We don’t like to mess with success so we used the exact same vendors for both weddings, having had such a wonderful experience at Tori’s. From Finley Caterings’ gorgeous venues with incredible staffs and delicious and plentiful food that our guests are still raving about to music by the band CTO Tribeca that had everyone on their feet for the entire evening to the beautiful centerpieces from Carl Alan Florist, both weddings were the stuff of dreams, my girls’ dreams and mine. And, since I’m giving shoutouts, I must mention Ashley Gerrity Photography who not only captured the evenings’ moments incredibly beautifully and treated our guests to a slideshow of the photos before the evening had ended (how many can say that their photographers did that?), Ashley and company are so easy to work with, so professional and so much fun, this incredibly camera shy mother of the bride, actually enjoyed having her picture taken. I must also thank Proud to Plan, wedding planners, organizers, people-who-do-everything! for helping to make the evening even more incredible than we could have imagined. Proud to Plan made us feel like royalty and allowed my daughters and I to enjoy every minute of their special days without concern about anything going awry. And, nothing did! Finally, since this is a post about bridal fashions, both of my daughters bought their dresses from Adrienne’s Bridal on Orchard Street in NYC. Owner Maryann Greco gave each of my daughters the gift of her time, patience, fashion sense and of her expert tailoring as well. We had been to several bridal shops – yes, the kind you see on TV where you are given a one-hour appointment, made to hurry up and wait and then rushed out the door whether or not you said yes to the dress. Our experience at Adrienne’s could not have been warmer, friendlier, more personal or better in any way. My daughters and I are “on the wedding circuit” now and I hear from friends of mine and theirs that planning their weddings is fraught with anxiety, compromises, arguments and tension. I am grateful to all of our vendors for making my daughters’ weddings among the happiest days of their lives and relatively anxiety-free. (There will always be anxiety, but it did not come from any of our vendors.)