Wedding dress

A wedding dress or bridal gown is the dress worn by the bride during a wedding ceremony. The color, style and ceremonial importance of the gown can depend on the religion and culture of the wedding participants. Wedding dresses hold a significant place in fashion, symbolizing personal expression, and cultural traditions and societal values. In Western culture, the wedding dress is most commonly white, a fashion made popular by Queen Victoria when she married in 1840. In Eastern cultures, brides often choose red to symbolize auspiciousness. These wedding dresses often represent a blend of heritage and contemporary trends, making them a pivotal aspect of bridal fashion and a reflection of evolving style in society.

Fashion

Wedding dress fashion has evolved significantly, shaped by shifts in aesthetic preferences, technological advancements, and broader cultural trends. Historically, bridal attire featured elaborate designs with structured silhouettes and intricate detailing, reflecting the prevailing styles of their time. In more recent decades, minimalist and modern designs have gained popularity, emphasizing simplicity and personal expression. Wedding dresses continue to adapt to contemporary fashion trends while retaining elements of tradition, offering a wide range of styles that allow brides to express their individuality.

21st century

In the early 21st century, many wedding dresses were sleeveless and strapless. Other brides preferred styles with sleeves, higher necklines, and covered backs.

The latest wedding dress designs, as of 2024, feature drop-waist silhouettes, convertible gowns, intricate crystal embellishments, tulle, and gowns that display vintage charm.

History

In Western cultures, white wedding gowns have symbolized purity and grace since the 19th century, whereas Eastern cultures often feature elaborate, colorful garments imbued with symbolic meanings unique to each region.

Western culture

Weddings performed during and immediately following the Middle Ages were often more than a personal union between two individuals. They frequently symbolized a union between families, businesses, or even nations. These ceremonies were driven more by political considerations than romantic love, particularly among the nobility and the higher social classes. Brides were expected to dress in a way that reflected the status of their families, representing more than just themselves during the ceremony. Brides from wealthy families often wore rich colors and exclusive fabrics, wearing bold colors and layers of furs, velvet, and silk. The attire of the bride was a testament to the wealth and social standing of her family. Brides from lower social strata wore their best church dress on their wedding day. The amount and the price of material a wedding dress contained was a direct reflection of the bride's social standing and indicated the extent of the family's wealth to wedding guests. More recently, due to the exorbitant price of a dress second hand shops often carry wedding dresses. At which point, a tailor can make the necessary alterations for the bride.

Color

The first documented instance of a royal bride wearing a white wedding dress was that of Philippa of England. She wore a tunic with a cloak in white silk bordered with squirrel and ermine in 1406, when she married Eric of Pomerania. Similarly, Mary, Queen of Scots, wore a white wedding dress in 1559 when she married her first husband, Francis, the Dauphin of France, because it was her favorite color, although white was then the color of mourning for French queens.

This was not a widespread trend, however: prior to the Victorian era, a bride was married in any color, black being popular in Finland.

White became a popular option in 1840, after the marriage of Queen Victoria to Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, when Victoria wore a white gown trimmed with Honiton lace. Illustrations of the wedding were widely published, and many brides opted for white in accordance with the Queen's choice. Although white was later assumed to symbolize virginity, it was originally blue that represented purity, piety, and fidelity, and was associated with the Virgin Mary.

Despite the rise in popularity of white wedding dresses, brides continued to follow contemporary fashion trends. In the early 1900s, clothing included a lot of decorations, such as lace or frills. This was also adopted in wedding dresses, where decorative frills and lace were common. For example, in the 1920s, they were typically short in the front with a longer train in the back and were worn with cloche-style wedding veils. This tendency to follow current fashions continued until the late 1960s, when it became popular to revert to long, full-skirted designs reminiscent of the Victorian era.

Since the mid-20th century, white has been the dominant color for Western wedding dresses, though "wedding white" includes shades such as eggshell, ecru, and ivory. However, white is not the universal color of wedding dresses.

In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the color white is used as a symbol of purity, innocence, and cleanliness, particularly in religious ceremonies, including weddings. For weddings in the temple, white clothing is also worn by all participants during the ceremony, both men and women, to symbolize unity and equality before God. The brides are instructed to wear white dresses that are modest in design and fabric and free of elaborate decoration.

Eastern culture

Traditionally, a Kurdish first-time bride would wear a red dress for her wedding to symbolize the postcoital bleeding she will experience when she loses her virginity while a Kurdish bride who used to be married before would wear pink. Many Kurds associate red wedding dresses with impoverished Kurdish rural society and it is no longer commonly worn.

Gallery

Historical Western European wedding dresses

Detail from The Marriage by Nicolo da Bologna, 1350s.
Helena Fourment, second wife of Peter Paul Rubens, painted by Rubens in her wedding dress, 1630.
Sophia Magdalena of Denmark's wedding dress, 1766. The Royal Armoury in Sweden.
The Wedding of Napoleon and Marie Louise by Georges Rouget, France, 1810.

Wedding dresses from different areas of the world

Traditional Finnish farmer wedding dress in Jomala, Åland
Traditional Kazakh wedding dress
Traditional Armenian wedding dress
18th-century wedding dress from Kymi, Greece (Collection of PFF, Nauplio)
Bride in a wedding dress, Podhale, the Tatra Mountains
Yemenite Jewish bride in Israel, 1950s
Wedding of Tewfik Pasha and Emina Ilhamy, Cairo, Egypt, January 1873
Chinese couple wearing traditional wedding hanfu

South Asian dresses

Indian Hindu bride in red Sari
Sikh bride wearing purple lehenga and dastaar for Anand Karaj
Traditional Bengali bride in formal matrimonial Sari
Indian Christian bride in white Sari
Nepali bride of Kathmandu, 1941
Bengali Hindu bride during Sindur Daan
Marathi wedding
Sri Lankan wedding

Southeast Asian dresses

Khmer (Cambodian) couple dressed in traditional wedding outfits
Vietnamese couple in traditional dress
Couple dress in traditional Thai outfits
Couple dressed in traditional Burmese outfits
Bali Hindu wedding dress
Reenactment of the royal wedding ceremony of King Gojong and Queen Myeongseong

Modern Western-style dresses

A bride in 1968, wearing a dress reflecting the styles of the time
Patricia Nixon Cox with her father Richard Nixon, 1971
Taiwanese couple dressed Western-style for keepsake photos in the park, 1989
American bride marrying a Scotsman wearing a kilt, 1996
New Orleans bride wearing a strapless, sleeveless gown, 2006
Same-gender marriage. Saint Petersburg, Russia, 2014.