Standing up for a wedding is an incredible honor, but it can also cost a lot of money-and if your bridesmaids aren't exactly well to do, as the bride you really need to do whatever you can to help control those expenses.
Particularly since many women get married-and thus their friends are asked to be bridesmaids-when they are in their early 20's, still in college or recently graduated from high school, and often employed with either part-time or entry-level jobs, finances are a huge concern. Many of the designer bridesmaids dresses on the market today can easily run $200 and up. That's just not easy money for a young bridesmaid to come by.
But you don't have to spend that much to get high quality, gorgeous bridesmaid dresses that will make all of your girls beautiful on your special day. You just need to know where to shop!
Don't get me wrong. It's okay to peruse all the designer fashion catalogs and imagine your entourage of bridesmaids in the beautiful gowns you see on the pages of the bridal magazines. But when it comes to actually purchasing the bridesmaids dresses, work with your bridesmaids to select dresses that will both flatter all their figures and fit into all of their budgets. Look online to select styles all of the girls will love or select a different style for each girl-a style that looks best with her body type-and simply purchase all of the dresses in the same color or shades of color.
The maid or matron of honor-and all of the bridesmaids-put a lot of time, energy, thought, and money into honoring the bride with their presence and their presents. As the bride, you can honor your bridesmaids by selecting dresses for the girls that won't break the bank or make them look less than absolutely gorgeous on your special day.
One of the best ways to get beautiful bridesmaid dresses on a budget is to shop online. It's also really convenient since you can narrow your selections down to a handful of your favorites and then share the urls with your bridesmaids via an email to get their opinions and assess their likes and dislikes before actually ordering anything.
Shopping online also provides you with a much wider selection of styles and colors so that you are more likely to find a dress that will make every bridesmaid look her best. You can choose the perfect colors to compliment each bridesmaid's hair color and skin tones and styles and sizes designed to flatter different figure types. You can even find petite and plus size selections you might not find in a local bridal boutique.
To be perfectly honest, I've actually been to weddings where I wondered if the bride deliberately selected bridesmaid dresses that would make her girls look bad so she would look better and be the star of the ball. In the end, though, it just created a rather sad picture of the entire wedding party.
If you really love your friends, sisters, and soon to be sisters-in-law enough to ask them to stand up in your wedding, honor them with your dress selection and outfit your entire bridal party with beautiful gowns that will make them look like princesses for your coronation as the queen. You should all look like royalty on your wedding day!
