**Part 1 of 2**
I got engaged recently (yay!). After the dust settled, all the calls to family members and friends were made, and my partner and I started planning in earnest, I began dress shopping (not so yay).
The wedding dress industry is a multi-billion dollar industry catering to those looking for something to wear on their wedding day. In the United States, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a new dress for under $1,500, with most dresses netting out at over $2,000 before the additional costs of alterations. You would think that an industry this big - with a higher price point compared to the average dress, and the customers increased attention to detail - would provide an in-store experience that accommodates to a wide variety of shapes, sizes and silhouettes. You would be wrong.
As someone who has moved between a size 12 to 18 for most of my teen and adult life, I was ready to be frustrated. I was ready to have to call ahead to every bridal store to confirm that they had sample sizes above an 8 available for me. They all confirmed, via email or phone, that they had “a variety of styles in my size to try on”. Nine times out of ten, the “variety of styles” turned out to be four or five poufy, A-line gowns, which just happened to be the only dresses in the store that would fit over my hips. No sheath or minimalist dresses, just poufy A-lines.
After a few visits like this, I went back to the drawing board. I started searching for “plus-size designers” in the markets I was looking in and after a few hours of searching, I found a few! They had the style of dresses I wanted! They went up to a size 28-30! They had plus-size models on the front page of their website and in their photography! I looked through their dresses, found a few I liked, and emailed their customer support to see if their NYC location had appointments and had the dresses in stock to try on close to my size. You know what comes next…
Read Part 2: https://lnkd.in/etUf3EaX
#sizeinclusivity #weddingdress #sizewashing #clothingdesign