The Wedding Dress

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White Gown?

White certainly was worn at some weddings - to the Romans it was symbolic of joy. However it was far from the only colour.

In earlier times a wide range of colours could be worn for the wedding. About the only really taboo colours for vintage gowns were black, the colour of mourning, and red - associated with harlots and loose women. A particular favourite was blue which at the time was the usual symbol of purity.

Green has a mixed repuation. For those of Irish descent it was a popular colour. For others it was sometimes considered to indicate too much rolling in the damp grass.

The modern custom of being married in white was - like so much else - established by Queen Victoria. The Queen was extremely popular and whatever she did everyone else wanted to emulate. So when in 1840 she married in white that instantly became the in thing.

One of the "advantages" of white was that it is such a difficult colour to keep clean. Buying an expensive white dress that could only be worn once was a sign of wealth and status. In earlier times the wedding dress was carefully chosen to allow it to be used for many years to come.

In those days it used to be thought unlucky for the bride to make her own dress! Hard now to picture any bride to be giving up the opportunity to shop for the wedding dress.

Seeing The Dress

For this reason some people still try on the new dress in sections instead of all at once. Even when dressing for the big day some people prefer to leave off one small item such as a glove until arriving at the ceremony.

A variation of this is to leave the final stitch of the bridal gown undone until the last possible moment. This is obviously more difficult to do when you buy a designer weddibg gown from a store rather than sewing it yourself!