Manolo for the Brides

Aren’t these just too pretty? LaVieja Tun Tun’s bridal necklaces, hair clips, hair pins, and other bridal accessories are feminine, romantic, and perfect perhaps for the bride who wants a striking piece of jewelry to complement her classic, Hollywood, or vintage wedding day look.

Hand formed soft fabric roses are paired with glass pearls, Czech beads, semi-precious stones, and brass links to make all manner of bridal jewelry (that is also nice for the bridesmaid or even the non-bride). Apparently, LaVieja Tun Tun will happily custom make a necklace or other piece using your wedding colors, but I’m having a hard time confirming that. I’m envisioning the brighter counterparts of the accessories above on brides who want to add a little more color and flair in their bridal ensemble.

What do you think? LaVieja Tun Tun’s designs are quite chunky and can dominate. Too much? Just enough?

Once upon a time, every bride knew more or less what she would wear on her head at her wedding. Young first-time brides wore veils, older or previously married women wore hats. If you got married in a judge’s chambers or at City Hall, you wore a small hat, no matter what your age or previous marital status. Period. The only questions lay in the length of the veil or trim on the hat.

The good news is that all that went out the window nearly fifty years ago. The even better news is that there are huge numbers of options now, from cathedral length veils for third-time brides to glorious hats for formal first-time brides to bare heads to wreaths to…well, nearly anything you can imagine putting on your head.

One popular option right now is the fascinator. Once upon a time that word meant a wooly knitted or crocheted scarf that covered the head, but that was when Queen Victoria was still around. Nowadays a fascinator is a decorative bit of whimsey worn in the hair. It can be elegant like this:

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How freakin’ cute are these retro deer wedding cake toppers from Dear Girlface? Oh em gee, if The Beard and I hadn’t topped our cake with statues of our kittehs, these are what I would have wanted. And I usually hate wedding cake toppers!

Made lovingly by hand, as it says in the description, these adorable deer are crafted from high quality felt, ribbons, fabric flowers, and vintage buttons. Each deer is unique, but if what’s on offer doesn’t ring your bell, you can have yours custom made with your choices of colors, genders, and details like eye patches!

At six inches tall, no one will overlook your totally sweet choice of wedding cake topper. I usually scoff at wedding products that boast heirloom potential, but I could definitely see these standing the test of time — especially if they can be removed from the base and displayed individually (or played with!).

Okay, can someone please tell me why anyone, brides or otherwise, would want to wear clear shoes? Seems to me that the end result would be a gruesome view of slightly squished feet… possibly even very moist and sweaty feet. I wore jellies as a kid in the 80s, so I know what happens to feet in shoes that don’t breath!

Here we have two examples of shoes, both being marketed toward the bride. The first pair of clear bridal shoes differentiates itself with a silver toe, while the second appears to have been bedazzled to within an inch of its life. In case it wasn’t clear, I hate both.

What say you?

Still looking for your “something blue”? Plenty of brides hide something blue under their skirts in the form of a blue bridal garter or blue satin shoes. Then there are brides who add a touch of blue to their wedding gowns with the addition of a sash or even wear an entirely blue wedding dress! Maybe, however, none of these options sounds right to you. May I suggest a bridal necklace that features a big splash of sparkling blue? For just under $50, a frequently closer to $30, a bride can get something blue that is bright, fun, and totally rewearable. Here are four of my faves:

From afar, this blue pendant necklace from An Optimistic Cynic looks rather like blue opal because of the different colors, but come closer and you see that it’s actually painted flowers. Matching beads on a uniquely-shaped chain complete the look. ($25)

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It’s not at all uncommon for brides and grooms to usurp interesting or pretty traditions from other cultures when planning their wedding ceremonies. And why not? When you’ve been to enough weddings that all began and ended with the same rites and rituals, the drive to differentiate yourself can be strong. USian and Canadian brides and grooms who aren’t of Native descent also have family who once upon a time called somewhere else home, and they may find the traditions of their heritage fascinating and beautiful.

Most recently I came across the wedding horseshoe, which according to different web sites is common in the UK, not at all common in the UK, frequently carried by brides, now almost never carried by brides, made of wood, made of lace, or most definitely a real horseshoe that must have been worn by an actual horse. That’s the Internet for you! Ah, well… it’s still a lovely idea. And I do think that all that good luck that can be found in an upturned horseshoe will probably still be accessible to the bride in the form of a charm or a wedding cake topper or bridal bouquet embellishment. No need to sprain your wrist or run the risk of knocking out your ring bearer!

But for the purists, here’s the skinny on wedding horseshoes.
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How sweet is this silver wedding dress hanger from Lila Frances? If it was terribly expensive as so many things associated with weddings are, I might turn up my nose at it for being silly, but at $20, it’s a cute little keepsake that you’ll see every day when you’re rummaging in your closet.

While I’ll admit that a personalized wedding dress hanger isn’t the most practical sort of pre-wedding gift for the bride-to-be (or from the bride-to-be to herself), these hangers do look quite nice in those iconic ‘wedding dress waiting for the bride’ photos.

One word of caution: Don’t leave a heavy wedding gown hanging from it for any length of time, lest it warp the lettering.

What do you think of when you think of Queen Victoria? I’m betting you don’t think of recycling, or of frugality. The truth is, though, that she hated waste, wasn’t huge on pomp and circumstance where it could be helped, and was tremendously sentimental. These three facts combined to make sure she reused her wedding lace for the rest of her life.
This is what the scene looked like on February 10, 1840, when young Queen Victoria married her cousin Prince Albert at the Chapel Royal, St. James.

Compared to other royal brides of the period, Victoria dressed simply. She kept the jewels to a minimum and had her wedding clothes made of English products, including her lace. In fact, it’s widely believed that she ordered the Honiton lace ensemble of wide skirt flounce, narrow sleeve flounces, veil, and a fichu before she even proposed to Albert. Whether or not that’s true, she certainly did have the lace made in the village of Beer under the direction of one Miss Jane Bidney. It took some two hundred lacemakers to create the set. When the lace was completed, she ordered the patterns destroyed so that it could not be replicated.

But that’s not the end of the story.
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