Manolo for the Brides

I just can’t tell you how many times the topic of gender bending attendants has come up on the bridal forums I frequent. I’m not talking about odd Cousin Eddie who decided to become Edwina, however. That at least would be kind of interesting…there’s so much talk about curvy, voluptuous bridesmaids and perhaps not enough about flat, angular bridesmaids with unexpected bulges. I think I’ll save that discussion for a late date, however.

Whenever I encounter questions about groomsmaids and bridesmen, there are always a few individuals who think that putting a man where maids traditionally stand or inserting a maid among the men is the height of overt and icky unconformity. I’ll say right now that I don’t agree at all. I’m going to venture a guess and say that most of the people reading this do not live in gender segregated societies. In fact, many of those folks who are of a marriageable age grew up with friends of both the Tab A and Slot B varieties, and they may have also hung out with individuals who identified as neither or as something in between.

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Back in the day — by which I mean a period beginning shortly after WWII and ending sometime around the year 2000 when the United Nations General Assembly finally recognized the whole “blood diamond” thing — the recipe for getting engaged read, “Take one diamond valued at roughly two month’s salary plus one knee, and combine. Issue proposal thusly for maximum effect.” Screw you very much, De Beers.

I tend to forget about the whole business of diamonds for a couple of reasons. One, I don’t subscribe to cable or have an antenna, so my exposure to those nerve-gratingly annoying De Beers commercials is kept at a bare minimum. Two, most of my engaged and married peeps received something other than diamonds from their sweeties. And three, as much as I adore all that sparkles, I subscribe to the rather old fashioned notion that big bling looks best on ladies over the age of 50. Perhaps that should even be 60 or 70, considering that 40 is apparently the new 20, which would naturally make 50 the new 30 and so on.

So why am I suddenly concerned with mineralogical numerology? I read something yesterday in the online journal of a friend of a friend.

What is a diamond? It’s a pretty stone, but a really expensive one, and one that only means “I love you” because people think its absence means “I don’t”. With diamonds as the social norm in many countries, marriage is like a game of chicken - neither partner can broach the subject of not getting a diamond ring, because to do so would sound like less than total commitment.

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Whenever sleeves are the topic de jour, there’s always at least one person who suggests that vintage wedding gowns are the way to go. Buying vintage isn’t always easy, however. I’ve yet to find a gorgeous dress from yesteryear that fits my modern contours. Shopping outside of the world of vanity sizing, one discovers that size 12 was once more like a size 4 in terms of relative measurements.

The luckiest vintage obsessed brides-to-be are those with 24″-26″ waists and small everything else, being as those are the sorts of numbers you’ll run across often when exploring the selection of wedding gowns from the first half of the twentieth century. That’s not to say that the rest of us can’t take a nice long look at the vintage gowns that are up for sale on various web sites, which is precisely what I spent my entire morning doing.

Here are some of the gems I found:

From the description: “The designer of this exquisite [1910-ish] wedding gown combines straight-edged tape lace with the rounded shapes of princess lace in a highly textured statement. The torso and sleeves of the gown are completely fashioned from hand-assembled écru cotton lace. The matching cotton tulle skirt is hand appliquéd with scattered lace motifs. The gown is lined with an écru satin slip and closes in back with small hooks.”

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Picture this: Your wedding, as they say, is in the bag. You’ve got your dress… maybe the elegant Casablanca number that C* linked to in the comments of Saturday’s post. Your gals adore the bridesmaid dresses they helped you pick out and have long since placed their orders. Favors? They’re all taken care of. The ceremony site? Reserved. The reception venue? Ditto.

From an outsider’s perspective, nothing should be interfering with your pre-matrimonial bliss, and yet there’s a definite snag in the fabric of your happiness. Second thoughts have reared their ugly heads. More than a moment’s doubt, these thoughts have been messing with your mind, making you question your commitment to your impending, um, commitment. And I don’t mean second thoughts about the dress, the cake, the photog, or the rings.

I’m talking about cold feet to the nth degree — full on “Oh my god am I making the right decision about this man and this marriage” jitters.

It’s more common than you might think. Many if not most brides (and grooms) experience at least one OHCRAPOHCRAPOHCRAP moment wherein they wonder if the secret of permanent happiness truly does lie in the land of the single gal (or guy). Ramen-fueled nights spent posting on Match.com aside, there’s plenty to love about going solo. You can come and go as you please without having to answer to anyone. Your post-tax, post-bill, post-necessities income is yours and yours alone. And you can change your mind a million times without your indecision impacting anyone but you.

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When it comes to wedding favors, there’s one important thing to keep in mind: unless it’s a consumable, most of your guests will either leave them behind or junk them quickly. Over the years I’ve taken home more than my share of plastic doves, personalized wine glasses, tiny implements like flashlights that don’t actually work, and other assorted useless bits of flotsom and jetsam. Most of them got kept for a few puzzled months and then finally tossed in the trash…though I do still have a couple wineglasses with the names of couples I barely know sitting in my cupboard. They don’t get used, but I can’t quite bring myself to simply toss them and nobody wanted them at our last garage sale. No, I wasn’t surprised, but I gave it a shot.

Over and over again, it’s been made clear that if you want your favors to be a hit, then it’s best to give a popular kind of candy like chocolate. I’m all for chocolate, of course. I love it. It’s tasty, it’s sweet, and it’s nearly universally popular. But there are some other options you may wish to consider.

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Dear wedding gown designers,

Can we talk about something that’s been bothering me for years now? It’s a little thing called sleeves. Specifically, it’s about how nearly all of you refuse to design any.

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I just wanted to toss a sweet little story at you guys before jetting off for the weekend. Anna and Boris Kozlov were married in 1946, just before Boris had to report back to his military unit. A mere three days after they said their “I dos,” he was gone.

A short time later, Anna was branded an enemy of the state like her father before her and sent into internal exile in Siberia.

On his return, Boris was distraught. “She was always waiting for me when I came home, but this time there was no sign of her,” he said. “Nobody knew where they were, or what had happened to Anna. That’s how we lost any track of each other”.

Anna was eventually coerced into remarriage by her mother. Boris, thinking Anna lost forever, also remarried. They each, however, outlived their spouses.

More than half a century after they were separated, both Anna and Boris decided to return to their home village. He was visiting the grave of his parents…she had apparently returned to lay eyes on the home they occupied together for the three days of their marriage.

When Anna Kozlov caught sight of the elderly man clambering out of a car in her home village of Borovlyanka in Siberia, she stopped dead in her tracks, convinced her eyes were playing tricks.

There, in front of her, was Boris, the man she had fallen in love with and married 60 years earlier.

“[Boris] ran up to her and said: ‘My darling, I’ve been waiting for you for so long. My wife, my life…’

The couple has since remarried, though it took Boris a bit to convince Anna to don a bride’s garb for a third time.

“Since we found each other again, I swear we haven’t had a single quarrel. We’ve been parted for so long and who knows how much is left for us, so we just don’t want to lose time on arguing.”

Isn’t that just the coolest? I hope that both of them live a long, long time so they get to enjoy each other for many years to come.

I’m still engrossed in One Perfect Day. One uber interesting things that stood out in an already tremendously interesting book was the manner in which the bridal gown industry pushes its product. If you’re a bride-to-be or even a former bride, you may be familiar with the concept of the “aha” moment, also known as the “oh mommy” moment.

You know what I mean…a bride-to-be is trying on her thirtieth gown. She’s stepped up into the mirrored alcove and is turning to look at herself. As the saleswoman smooths down her skirt, the young woman before us draws her breath in sharply. She can’t believe what she’s seeing–the image before her is herself, yet not herself. Tears well up in her eyes, and her mother, who is watching the whole drama unfold, puts her hand up to her heart.

And so on and so forth. I didn’t have a magical aha moment. My relationship with clothing doesn’t work that way. Sure, I’ve teared up in a dressing room, but that was only because I’d managed to slide gracefully into a pair of skinny jeans that didn’t make me look like an overstuffed sausage. I mean, that is a sob-worthy experience, in my not so humble opinion.

The problem with the oh mommy moment, as outlined in One Perfect Day, is that it’s to some extent manufactured by the bridal salons. Why else would there be so many never worn wedding gowns on eBay and Craigslist and other similar sites? I can accept that there were some canceled engagements and potentially even some deaths, but the shear number of unworn gowns says to me that a lot of future brides are changing their minds.

I wonder if the gals selling the gowns below had an aha moment before realizing that the frocks they chose just weren’t what they were really looking for…

All in all, these gowns make me a little sad. I wonder why the brides changed their minds and whether they’ll recoup some of the associated costs. What do they feel as they post their classifieds? And did they find dresses they liked even more?

It’s interesting to think about, so I have to ask you: Did you buy a dress and then change your mind? What made you buy the first one, and why did you ultimately opt for another?

The couple above could very well be mugging for a horde of loved ones clicking away with their digitals, but they’re not. The happy pair you see before you chose the new elopement, i.e. they’ve ditched the family and friends but kept the trappings of the traditionalesque wedding.

Once upon a time–as far as I’ve been led to believe–elopements were a simple affair, done on the cheap. You might visit the local courthouse or a courthouse in a neighboring state. Heck, you might even run off to the courthouse in another country. Suits and suitcases were the order of the day. Nuptial niceties might included a nice hat, a bouquet hastily purchased, or a cupcake for two.

Now elopements can cost as much as a budget backyard wedding. One company, Protege Event Planning Inc., will help you elope in Colorado for a mere $2,895. For that kind of cash, brides and grooms get a bridal bouquet and matching boutonnière, a ceremonial floral arrangement, a sweetheart wedding cake and personalized cake cutter set, champagne and personalize toasting flutes, limo service, dinner, two nights in a honeymoon suite plus a breakfast buffet, total wedding coordination (whatever that means in the context of something like this), the services of an officiant, and a handful of wedding day snapshots.

Huh. If you gave me three thousand bucks to spend on an elopement I think I could do better than that. I really do–I’d love to see Protege’s price breakdown. How would you spend your $3,000 elopement budget?