The Dress Dilemna

Something just crossed my mind - what is it that is so darn special about a wedding dress that demands 50 trillion alterations? It's (when you come right down to it) a white or ivory or whatever colored evening/formal gown. In other words - a really dressy dress. I know that most women can stroll into their neighborhood Saks and pick up a dress off the rack that FITS - no major bust/waist/hip/length alterations needed. Why is it then, the second you step into a bridal salon, you are almost EXPECTED to have five or six fittings?? Come on - I can understand that for a custom made dress, but when you are working off of a basic pattern? Is there something right fishy here or is it just me missing something? If everyone in my high school class who wanted to go could find something off the rack to wear (and we varied widely in sizes) why the devil can't bridal manaufacturers do the same thing?? I think they PURPOSELY make the dress shaped 'wrong'. It doesn't cost the designer anything extra as they can custom make ONE for their model - and the dress shops get a HEALTHY boost in their income because women come back to them for alterations. Just think - the worse fitting the original gown is - the more alterations you need. If one designer made rather wonky dresses, giving the bridal shop more alteration money, maybe the bridal shop will buy more of his or her dresses - perpetuating a cycle that only the designer and the bridal shop benefit from.

*shakes head* I really don't know what I'm going to do as far as my dress goes. I don't want to even try ONE on right now because I expect to be a nice bit smaller before the wedding - and what may look good on me now, my not look good on me then, and vice versa. Besides - I don't want to deal with bridal shops AT all. Everytime I walk into one I hear this huge sucking sound. And I might be a WEE bit oversensetive - but I swear the level of customer service has been down right nasty in every bridal shop I have entered. I've gone to about 4 now (2 David's *shudder* and 2 little boutiqey ones) and neither of them gave me a warm and fuzzy - oh I want to give this business 400.00 for one dress for one day kind of feeling. And I don't have the smallest engagement ring - so any observant clerk would have guessed that I was REALLY there shopping. Maybe it's because I either came alone or with Corey - they figured that unless I had an older woman or two or three friends in tow I wasn't serious.
Eh.
I was flipping through Harper's Bazaar a few nights ago - and realized that I really dug some of the gowns they had in there. While the magazine itself is irratating as all get out (who ARE all those people - and are they the dirty rich that aren't famous? Maybe I don't like it cuz it makes me jealous. I wanna be RICH!!! and what's up with the sexy starvation look??) I for some possesed reason used my soon to expire airmiles on a free subscription. At this point, I'm starting to appreciate more though because it is giving me more ideas as to what I could wear. If a style/color is good enough for the Oscars - I'm thinking it will be fancy enough for a wedding, eh?

I bet they only need one or two fittings too.

jasmyn.