Wedding Dress Shopping During a Pandemic

Spoiler, I’m not going to be sharing my dress just yet, but trust me it’s worth the wait.

I have always been the girl with the Pinterest wedding board, watching every episode of Say Yes to the Dress and a whole vision of what everything would look like in my head. Then when we got engaged I went straight to my Pinterest board to start planning and realized I hated 80% of it (I can confidently say there will be no turquoise dresses in my wedding). The same thing happened when we went wedding dress shopping. I had a vision in my head of exactly what I wanted, and I absolutely hated it and ended up with something I never would have thought of before trying it on.

I went shopping at Lovely Bride in Rochester. They had such a great setup and made shopping during this crazy time completely comfortable. Here are some things to prepare for/expect for wedding dress shopping during this pandemic from my experience:

Bring Water (Lots of it)

I made the mistake of not eating anything besides an apple that morning before we went and having very little water before hand. Trying on wedding dresses is more of a workout than you’d think! Especially with the social distancing rules in place, you are getting in and out of heavy dresses on your own for a few hours. Make sure you bring water and eat something beforehand!

Make a Wishlist, But Don’t Be Afraid to Deviate

When booking an appointment with Lovely Bride they had me put together a wishlist of dresses that I wanted to try on. I liked this for two reasons. First, I had looked at these dresses over and over so it was great to be able to try on the dresses I’d been obsessing over. Second, if I hadn’t tried on the dresses I’d been envisioning, I always would have wondered how they looked. Trying them on made me realize that they were completely the wrong style for me.

Pick a Small Shopping Group

With social distancing orders being what they are, prepare to bring one or two other people with you when you go shopping. If there are people you wish could be there, start a group chat to send dress options as you go or FaceTime loved ones while you try on your dresses. It can definitely be tough not to bring everyone you imagined, but you can definitely make it work! And honestly, sometimes the less opinions you have influencing you in that moment, the better!