Any experiences with helenebridal?

Sirinial

I'm one of those people who have known since childhood what I want my dress to look like.  You know the dress at the end of Sleeping Beauty?  The one that changed colors?  Yeah, that one.

I have hunted through every designer collection I could get my hands on, and it seems that this year, nobody is doing basque waist with cap sleeves and no gathers.  Then I go to http://helenebridal.com, and what should I find but *3* dresses that are all gorgeous interpretations of my dream dress, any of which I would be thrilled to wear.  Plus, all three are under $400!

But everyone I've talked to and everything I've read say that I ABSOLUTELY MUST try the dress on before I buy it.  So, the following questions:

Have any of you bought/are any of you planning to buy your dress online?  What company did you use?  If you have already gone through it, what was the experience like?  Did the dress arrive in good condition and on time?

Thanks, guys!

vitacarminis

Hey chica ... sorry that no one replied to you, but I think I can help you out!

I actually bought my wedding dress online.  But I was super lucky.  I have a pretty standard size body and I'm pretty skinny so most things look nice on me.  I found the dress I wanted from a specific designer, found a bridal shop in LA that was selling a size 8 of that dress on EBay, and then emailed the seller, made sure that my measurements would fit, had my brother who is in LA go to the store and take pictures and make sure that it is in good shape.  When I got the dress, it was in perfect condition and it fit almost perfectly too.  We had to hem it and adjust the fit around the bust, but that was it.

My dress was actually from and made by a designer (Pronovias) and I think that, along with my communication with the seller, and my brother's trip to the store to check it out and take pictures, I was pretty confident that I'd have a good outcome.

Now my bridesmaids dresses are another story.  I ended up buying them through Helene Bridal.  Three of the girls have tried their dresses on so far, and none of them have fit.  We even did custom sizing so this should not have been an issue.

I thought I did some Google searching on Helene Bridal before I placed the order and didn't find anything too bad, but when I did the search after receiving the dresses, I found quite a few bad reviews.

I emailed Helene Bridal on the 4th and haven't heard back.  I filed a dispute with PayPal and am now gathering photographic evidence of the poor make, and bad sizing of the dresses: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vitacarminis/sets/72157624901229114/detail/

I read in review of HB that you won't get ANYTHING back from them unless you do this and you might not even then.  I am hoping to pursue this through PayPal and my credit card if necessary to get a refund.

So I would definitely not recommend buying your dress through anything other than a business that deal in real dresses (not knock-offs).  Make sure you can actually talk to a real person before putting money down.  Be confident that the dresses will fit the way you want.

Hope things have worked out!