Hi everyone,
I am in need of some advice regarding bridesmaids and dress colours but just to give fair warning I'm going to be the bride although technically I'm the groom, if this offends you or anything I'm then I'm sorry, please don't read any further.
Anyway, me and my girlfriend (fiancé!) are planning to get married next August or maybe October, we have been together for a long time and I have always been open with her about my dressing up and wear dresses pretty much all the time when I'm at home. For our entire relationship my girlfriend has always wanted us to get married but just in a small civil service and a big party afterwards. On the other hand I have never wanted to get married but have always wanted the experience of being a bride, long story short she wants to get married but not be a bride and I don't want to get married but want to be a bride.
We have recently decided that we should get married for various reasons (legal and getting lots of presents!) and we have begun thinking about what we want. The plan so far is a small service with just family and close friends, neither of us have extended family so it is going to be a small affair, then straight on to the reception/party with all our friends in attendance. We are looking at having the whole thing in one venue for ease.
As we were talking about our plans for the wedding my girlfriend asked me if I was going to wear one of my cocktail dresses or if was I going to get a 'real' wedding gown. I have to admit for some reason I hadn't even considered this whereas she had just assumed I would wear a dress for the occasion. As soon as she said that I knew that I couldn't not be the bride, I had dreamed about it pretty much my entire life!
We talked about this further and my girlfriend said she was going to wear a nice purple dress (her favourite colour) and that she's going to have her sister and her best friend as bridesmaids, I asked her what she wanted them to wear and she said 'I'll just tell them to wear something nice"!!!!
I on the other hand have gone a little bit bride crazy and have been scouring the internet for the perfect wedding and bridesmaid dresses. I have only been to one shop (Berketex) and will stick with them, I just popped in one day when they were quiet to ask if they would be willing to help me with dresses (I genuinely don't want to make anyone uncomfortable or upset, especially on such a lovely occasion as choosing a wedding dress) but the staff were so lovely and helpful I was bowled over with their response, I tried on three dresses while I was there and I only went in to see what the next steps I needed to take were!
I have a follow up consultation next week but I am fairly sure what dress I want (the Veda on the Berketex website or maybe the Elvina) as whenever I dress up I always dress vintage style. I am also going to have two bridesmaids too, my sister and my friend, and I am thinking that they would wear the Julieanna dress and we would all have vintage hairstyles and makeup.
That's the background to my question over so here's the actual question(s). First off as my fiancé is going to be wearing a purple dress I was thinking of having my bridesmaids (still can't help but smile when I say that, MY bridesmaids!) wear the Julieanna dress in lilac with purple accessories, shoes, hair accessories maybe replace the belt with a purple one, and I would wear purple heels, bracelet length gloves, hair flower and jewellery with purple accents to tie the whole look together with a bouquet of white with a scattering of purple and lilac flowers. I think this would look beautiful together but my concern is that the wedding photos would look like a wedding party and a couple of nicely dressed strangers that wandered past at the time.
Obviously, my fiancé is hugely supportive and I don't want to make her have the wedding in a way that she doesn't want but I would like it to look like we have but a little bit of thought into the whole thing. Her entire attitude is that she isn't interested at all in the wedding outfits, colours etc and that the actual ceremony and the reception are the important things. I honestly know that if I raised this with her she would have no problems with me deciding what her bridesmaids wear, however, I don't want to do this as it doesn't feel right to me as it would feel like they would all be my bridesmaids rather than her having her own.
I want to go to her with a couple of suggestions so that she will be involved in the process however I am not sure what suggestions I have! I thought that I could tell her that my bridesmaids would be wearing lilac and that hers could too and they could maybe find their own dresses but that might not work, I think it would then look like they were all my bridesmaids again and my fiancé was my maid of honour! I guess I want her to feel like her bridesmaids are hers alone so that she can have their support and let her enjoy the whole experience. Her sister and her friend however are looking forward to the whole bridesmaid thing and have already started asking me about my dress, bridesmaid dresses, colours, etc but I won't tell them as I want it to be a surprise but they clearly want to have the whole bridesmaid experience through me!
I was thinking that one possibility is that I find a complimentary colour to purple and lilac and give her a few suggestions as I think that she would actually enjoy the whole dressing up side of things once she got into it with the support of her bridesmaids. She is quite an anxious person and also a little impatient so the whole planning of 'insignificant' things fills her with dread but she does enjoy dressing up and playing with clothes, her unique sense of style is one of the things that attracted me to her, so I genuinely believe that she would get a lot out of the experience and if I gave her a bit of a start by giving her colour suggestions then she would jump in with both feet.
However, I have no idea of a complimentary colour as that is not one of my fashion skills at all! Can anyone give me any suggestions of a complimentary colour to lilac and purple? Is there anything I can do to encourage her to put her own mark on the whole proceedings and enjoy the process rather than just focus on making sure everything is booked and that there will be enough booze for everyone?
Apologies for the long post but I thought the background was needed to my questions and I appreciate you reading so far! Best wishes to you all and I hope you enjoy your day as much as I am planning to.
P.S. I am going to post this exact post on various wedding forums as I feel that I need as much advice on this as possible so if you see it elsewhere , sorry!