After getting engaged in January (with wedding planned for October), I knew I'd need to start looking for wedding dresses. I've never really been the type of gal to pore over bridal magazines looking for "the" dress because if it looks good on a magazine model, you can generally guarantee it won't look good on me! I'm 5'9 and hourglass-curvy, with what my FH refers to as "birthin' hips", and typically wear a size 16 or so. My biggest issue is that due to the way I carry weight, losing 50 pounds would only make me lose a single pant size, so "getting into shape" to fit into a dress won't do me much good. I'm also not very girly - don't dress up a lot, minimal makeup, etc - so I'm not trying to find anything fancy. Just your standard, run-of-the-mill wedding dress, with a little lace and beading, in an A-line or ballgown shape.
As a result, I went into wedding dress shopping with modest budget and the following requirements:
1) Does it look good on me?
2) Does it make my waist come out of hiding?
3) Is it white?
You would think this would have made shopping easier. I had been somewhat looking forward to finding a dress, but it has been a disaster from the very beginning. I've found very few dresses that manage to make me look good at all, let alone something flattering. After trying on what seemed like a million dresses, I finally managed to find a dress at David's Bridal. Once I was ready to order, I was informed that they had literally just discontinued the plus-sizes in that dress and no store in the country had it, but that they would order me a straight size (and too small, I might add) and alter the you-know-what out of it. I would have paid as much for alterations as the dress would have cost, and it would have looked nothing like the dress I tried on! Needless to say...that was a bust.
After that disappointment I went to a very well-known local retailer, and after nearly exhausting their stock, finally managed to find what I thought was "the" dress. It was the one I had liked the best and probably looked the best on me. Their pricing was definitely on the high side (plus Chicago taxes!) so I contacted the manufacturer to find out if any other local places carried the dress. Once they managed to pin down exactly what dress I was looking for, I was told that I wouldn't have been able to order the dress anyway because it was discontinued.
Getting insanely worried I went to yet another shop, tried on a lot of dresses, and managed to find THE dress, a gorgeous Maggie Sottero. It was perfect, it looked amazing on me, it fit every desire I had for a dress, and miracle of miracles, it was well under what I had expected to pay. So we got all the paperwork done, put down the deposit, and I breathed a sigh of relief. You can guess what's coming next, can't you?
It was discontinued.
So I've found three different dresses, at three different shops, and all three were discontinued. I'm ready to give up on finding a wedding dress at all, both due to time (wedding in 5 months) and the fact that there are maybe 2 gowns in a 30 mile radius I haven't had on my body yet. Am I being too picky? Am I just unlucky, or is this a fairly common occurance? Have any of you had this happen, and what did you do? Anyone have some wedding-dress magic they can pass along? Too many questions?