How to Buy a Wedding Dress

My cousin Helga’s daughter, Lilac, is getting married next year and it is a well-known fact that brides need to wear wedding dresses. To this end, Helga and Lilac came to NYC to shop and I joined them, not because I know anything at all about buying a wedding dress (I do not) but because I was so eager to learn. Plus I like champagne. But first we went to see Prada and Schiaparelli and wondered what sort of shoes we might wear on our heads, and then we slid into Ladurée for some life-affirming rose petal macaroons, knowing we would need all our strength for the adventure to follow.
Our first appointment of this marathon was at Pronovias, a Barcelona bridal fashion line. I had hitherto imagined that any fashion emanating from Spain would reference black mantillas and bolero jackets. I had much to learn. For instance, did you know that all the salesladies at all the bridal salons wear all black?
We went upstairs (the stairs were mirrored and circling – could be dangerous) and sat on sofas. Helga and I were very disappointed that no one offered us champagne. Where did we get the idea that this was de rigeur at high-end bridal shops? Neither of us knows the answer, but we know that we have clung to this notion for years, perhaps for as along as we have had marriageable daughters. Meanwhile, Lilac tried on dresses with the black-clad Alana, and then emerged from the dressing room, teetering on high heels, to parade for us. There was a lot of lace and a lot of crinoline. At Pronovias the dresses had names like Delta, Diciembre and Denver. Their shapes were variously described as mermaid, tulip, trumpet and cupcake. We discussed the merits of capped sleeves at length, and like rock & roll coffee pruning, this is a subject on which there can exist many opinions. Do you know the difference between French and American bustling? (Bustling is what is done with the train after the church ceremony, when the bride would like to dance and eat.) French bustling takes the train and hooks it up in the back, under the dress, while American bustling is done over the dress. Now you too know the difference.
On the way back uptown to our car we passed right by Lanvin, and it turns out that the bride-to-be to be is a devotée of Lanvin. As she herself said, “I could die for an exposed zipper.” So we went in and Lilac tried on 2 gorgeous dresses. This time the salesperson was a young man in a black suit whose enthusiasm for gorgeous gowns was delightful. I suspect him of being a ballroom dancer in his other life, because he often skated across the floor on his smooth paten leather shoes, and came dangerously close to kissing the hand of the mother of the bride. After that, were well and truly exhausted. How convenient that Ladurée is located very close by Lanvin, so that we were able to limp across the street and revive ourselves with doses of chocolate and praline macaroons.
The next day the first appointment was at Vera Wang. And yes, we were still clinging to our champagne expectations, like the shipwrecked Ishmael clinging to Queequeg’s coffin. Our consultant was another black clad anorectic lady. We had heard that Vera Wang had featured some black wedding dresses recently, and we were definitely hoping to see these. We did, and basically they looked just like the white wedding dresses, only in black. We learned the difference between Chantilly lace and Alençon lace. Vera too seems to use an alphabetical model for naming her dresses; Winter 2012 featured H: Hilary, Hayley and Hildegard. Maybe I missed the I’s, because next came J: Joan, Jane, Jasmine and Jellyroll.
The bride-to-be looked beautiful but kept complaining that the dresses were so heavy. Of course they were heavy; many of them required serious armature. Most of them boasted enough fabric for Christo to wrap a building with. They were architectural and gravity defying. But what did we care? We just watched her totter in Vera’s 5-inch heels, up and down the black carpeted, mirror-lined corridor.