(no subject)
I idly look at wedding dresses in my spare time (and not-so-spare time). Although my wedding is at least a year and half away, I want to know what's out there, what designers are in what price points so I know what not to look at and what to focus on.
One thing I "realized" is that although I don't want to spend a whole lot on a dress, I can buy a dress from a designer I love pre-owned. Most of the dresses I love are in my price range (absolute limit $1500; trying to stay under $1000) but Jim Hjelm makes dreamy dresses that are way out of it (in the $3,000-$4,000 range). However, there are women selling them online for 33-50% of the price. Which means one of two things: 1) I can buy the dress preowned, which I am not averse to; most women wear their wedding dress once or twice and a good cleaning takes care of any worries. Moreover, a lot of these women have added bustles and gotten needed alterations, which means I won't have to pay $200 for a bustling or something if I like it, or 2) I can theoretically buy a brand-new Jim Hjelm wedding dress and resell it and recoup around 50% of my costs. Most of the women selling it for 33% of their originally paid price added alterations or something that really make it 50% of the total price. Assuming I buy a dress for $3,000 and add alterations for around $400, I can probably sell that dress for $1,700 (or even $2,000) online and I've effectively paid $1400-1700 for the dress. However, I think that's a slightly riskier proposition than buying the dress used.
The best part, though, was when I clicked on PreownedWeddingDresses.com's "What's the Best Dress for Your Shape?" They give you four options: Apple, Pear, Hourglass, and Rectangle. OR there's an option to enter your measurements and find out what your shape is. I earlier measured myself roughly (I say rough because I used the wrong kind of measuring tape) - 34" bust, 27" waist, 38" hips - and so I put that in the thing, expecting to get an hourglass.
Apparently, I'm pear-shaped - which, honestly, when I think about it, is 'right' given their description of a pear-shape - thinner on top with more curves/fullness on the bottom half - that is definitely, definitely my body shape. I got wide hips and thick thighs, y'all. LOL.
But what was more amusing was their suggestions for dresses. First they advised to draw attention to your top half (breasts) with certain style necklines like one-shoulder, strapless, and v-neck, all of which I like (the one-shoulder and v-neck in particular are sexy, because I'm loving dresses with straps nowadays).
But the second part was "reduce attention to your bottom half with ballgown or A-line silhouettes. Skip sheaths, which are two clingy for your shape, and mermaid and trumpet, which put attention on the wrong half of your body."
LOL! I LIKE my big ol butt, hips, and thighs! I just thought it was funny that the estimator immediately thought women would be trying to minimize the biggest part of their bodies. I've tried on some wedding dresses and actually, I don't like ballgowns and most A-line shapes, precisely because they minimize my hips and butt, lol. They make me look like a 12-year-old playing dress up instead of a shapely woman. I love mermaid and trumpet styles because they emphasize my hips and sheath styles! I visited a couple of other websites and they all say the same thing for street clothes - wear tighter-fitting tops to emphasize your breasts, and don't wear tight-fitting bottoms like pencil skirts. They all assume I want to hide my damn hips!
I also was curious to see how much bigger my hips could be than my bust to classify as an hourglass shape, so I played with it. Apparently there's only a 2" clearance on the bigger size of your bust to be hourglass-shaped given the same wait size. A girl with a 34" bust, 27" waist is hourglass-shaped if her hips are 34-36". Any smaller and you're rectangular; any bigger and you're pear-shaped.
As a side note, I had a friend in college who did a study on Black men and women's preferences for women's body shape, compared to white men and women's. She had a variety of cards (between 7-10) that illustrated different kinds of body shapes, and had each participant select the shape they preferred and the shape they thought the opposite sex preferred. First, she found that Black women are overall happier with their shapes and body image than white women. She also found that racial preferences differed - Black men preferred women with thicker bottom halves, whereas white men preferred women with big breasts and slim hips. White women were pretty accurate in predicting white men's preferences, but Black women assumed that Black men wanted an hourglass shaped woman instead of the pear-shape.
One thing I "realized" is that although I don't want to spend a whole lot on a dress, I can buy a dress from a designer I love pre-owned. Most of the dresses I love are in my price range (absolute limit $1500; trying to stay under $1000) but Jim Hjelm makes dreamy dresses that are way out of it (in the $3,000-$4,000 range). However, there are women selling them online for 33-50% of the price. Which means one of two things: 1) I can buy the dress preowned, which I am not averse to; most women wear their wedding dress once or twice and a good cleaning takes care of any worries. Moreover, a lot of these women have added bustles and gotten needed alterations, which means I won't have to pay $200 for a bustling or something if I like it, or 2) I can theoretically buy a brand-new Jim Hjelm wedding dress and resell it and recoup around 50% of my costs. Most of the women selling it for 33% of their originally paid price added alterations or something that really make it 50% of the total price. Assuming I buy a dress for $3,000 and add alterations for around $400, I can probably sell that dress for $1,700 (or even $2,000) online and I've effectively paid $1400-1700 for the dress. However, I think that's a slightly riskier proposition than buying the dress used.
The best part, though, was when I clicked on PreownedWeddingDresses.com's "What's the Best Dress for Your Shape?" They give you four options: Apple, Pear, Hourglass, and Rectangle. OR there's an option to enter your measurements and find out what your shape is. I earlier measured myself roughly (I say rough because I used the wrong kind of measuring tape) - 34" bust, 27" waist, 38" hips - and so I put that in the thing, expecting to get an hourglass.
Apparently, I'm pear-shaped - which, honestly, when I think about it, is 'right' given their description of a pear-shape - thinner on top with more curves/fullness on the bottom half - that is definitely, definitely my body shape. I got wide hips and thick thighs, y'all. LOL.
But what was more amusing was their suggestions for dresses. First they advised to draw attention to your top half (breasts) with certain style necklines like one-shoulder, strapless, and v-neck, all of which I like (the one-shoulder and v-neck in particular are sexy, because I'm loving dresses with straps nowadays).
But the second part was "reduce attention to your bottom half with ballgown or A-line silhouettes. Skip sheaths, which are two clingy for your shape, and mermaid and trumpet, which put attention on the wrong half of your body."
LOL! I LIKE my big ol butt, hips, and thighs! I just thought it was funny that the estimator immediately thought women would be trying to minimize the biggest part of their bodies. I've tried on some wedding dresses and actually, I don't like ballgowns and most A-line shapes, precisely because they minimize my hips and butt, lol. They make me look like a 12-year-old playing dress up instead of a shapely woman. I love mermaid and trumpet styles because they emphasize my hips and sheath styles! I visited a couple of other websites and they all say the same thing for street clothes - wear tighter-fitting tops to emphasize your breasts, and don't wear tight-fitting bottoms like pencil skirts. They all assume I want to hide my damn hips!
I also was curious to see how much bigger my hips could be than my bust to classify as an hourglass shape, so I played with it. Apparently there's only a 2" clearance on the bigger size of your bust to be hourglass-shaped given the same wait size. A girl with a 34" bust, 27" waist is hourglass-shaped if her hips are 34-36". Any smaller and you're rectangular; any bigger and you're pear-shaped.
As a side note, I had a friend in college who did a study on Black men and women's preferences for women's body shape, compared to white men and women's. She had a variety of cards (between 7-10) that illustrated different kinds of body shapes, and had each participant select the shape they preferred and the shape they thought the opposite sex preferred. First, she found that Black women are overall happier with their shapes and body image than white women. She also found that racial preferences differed - Black men preferred women with thicker bottom halves, whereas white men preferred women with big breasts and slim hips. White women were pretty accurate in predicting white men's preferences, but Black women assumed that Black men wanted an hourglass shaped woman instead of the pear-shape.