What Size Wedding Dress To Order, How to Handle Body Changes

How do you know what size wedding dress to order? If you are a bride who is just beginning their wedding dress shopping journey, you might not be familiar with how the process works and how to choose your wedding dress size. Bridal fashion is very different from picking out a new outfit at a department store, where you likely know what size will fit your body. If you are ordering your wedding dress many months to a year in advance of your wedding day, how can you ensure the dress will fit when the time comes?

Before you order your wedding dress, you might be wondering how to handle any changes your body will go through in the year leading up to your wedding day. What logistics should brides consider when it comes to determining their wedding dress size, placing their dress order, and getting through the alterations process? As a general rule, brides should order their wedding dress about a year before the wedding, so how do they know what size gown to order? There could be weight loss or gain to deal with during the wedding planning process and the waiting period of your dress arriving to the bridal store. If you are wondering how to decide what size bridal gown to order, you are in the right place as we are giving the best tips to handle body changes and wedding dress size questions leading up to wedding day.

Video: How To Handle Body Changes Leading Up to Your Wedding Day

If you are a bride to be who is ready to wedding dress shop and is wondering how to know what size dress you should order, you are in the right place. We are sharing our expert advice in how to handle body changes leading up to wedding day and how to know what size wedding dress to order.

Forget Expectations

As expert bridal consultants in the Los Angeles area, we have seen and heard it all when it comes to body expectations leading up to a wedding day. There are so many thoughts and ideas of how a bride “should” look on wedding day, that it’s easy to get sidetracked about what is important and that is to find the wedding dress that makes you feel beautiful and confident in your body right now. We often hear from our brides shopping with us that they want to tone their arms before wedding day or drop a few pounds or whatever it may be as a goal they have set for themselves. It’s important to remember that you don’t always know how your body will react to the stress of planning a wedding. No one can predict if you will lose or gain weight and we have seen it all. Some brides gain weight under the stress and emotions that come with wedding planning. Some lose weight and some stay the same.

It really depends on where you are in your life and how you handle stress. Wedding planning can be very emotional. Maybe there is just too much going on and you don’t have the time to hit the gym like you thought you would or maybe you use gym time to eliminate some of the wedding planning stress. We have seen both ends of the spectrum because everyone’s situation is different. It's very difficult to predict where your life and body is going to be on wedding day, especially when you are shopping for your wedding dress a year in advance.

Stay Steady Through Alterations

At the end of the day, we want your wedding dress to fit you in the best way possible. From our experience, if you gain or lose a couple of pounds, it will not make that much of a difference in the way your wedding dress fits you. It’s if there are drastic changes happening that there can be issues with the size of your wedding dress. Maybe you just recently gave birth and know that you will be smaller come wedding day. Or you have a procedure planned before the wedding that’s going to alter your body’s measurements. It’s all an individual case by case basis, so be sure to communicate where you are at with your bridal stylist so they can give you the best advice on what size wedding dress to order.

While you may experience body changes in the 6-8 months that it takes for your wedding dress order to be fulfilled, it’s the alterations timeframe that we want your body to be stable. Typically, all of your alterations will be done in the 2 months before your wedding. When your wedding dress arrives in store, you’ll have your first dress fitting, about 2-3 months before the wedding. A second fitting will be about a month before the wedding and then your final fitting about two weeks before your wedding. If you lose or gain a ton of weight in between these fittings, then you are going to have to have your dress taken in again or possibly have a corset back put in if your dress can’t be taken out enough. It’s important to stay healthy overall, but try to remain the same size from your first fitting to wedding day so you don’t have to stress about additional alterations or expenses. Know that there are always solutions to be found, but wedding planning is already stressful enough, so don’t add to it if you don’t have to.

Healthy Mindset

Your mental health is going to be just as important as your physical health. Regular life is still going on while you are wedding planning, whether that be a job or school or kids and anything else you typically have to manage on a day to day basis and now you’ve added on wedding planning and all the logistics that brings. It can get a bit chaotic so be sure to take time to decompress as well. Don’t stress out too much about the things you can’t control. Wherever your body ends up, there are ways to make the dress work. Don't starve yourself, don't stress yourself out, don't not nourish your body just to be able to fit into a dress.

Make sure you are getting a good night’s sleep, staying hydrated and trying to be healthy overall. You don’t have to hit the gym every single day, but maybe try to squeeze in a few mental health walks for some fresh air. No matter where your physical body may be, keeping your mind healthy is going to give you good perspective and good energy and good feelings. We can always find something to nitpick about ourselves, but having a positive attitude and a good mindset can really dictate how you feel about yourself.

Ideally you’ll be feeling really beautiful and confident about yourself when you go wedding shopping, but we all know that is not always the case. We’d encourage you to still going wedding dress shopping, even if you aren’t feeling your best. And that might seem counter intuitive, but if you find a dress that you love when you aren’t feeling super confident, that’s how you know you’ve found the right dress. This dress made you feel beautiful and confident when you might have been feeling a bit low so when wedding day comes around, it’s only going to make you shine even more.

Muscle Mass

One final thing to keep in mind when considering what size wedding dress to order is if you gain muscle leading up to wedding day. If you are a bride who already works out a lot or uses exercise to manage stress, keep in mind that while you might be losing weight or toning up, if you are gaining muscle, you might also be gaining inches. So while your wedding dress may have fit you perfectly when you ordered it, if you have gained inches from working out in the time leading up to your wedding dress alterations timeline, the dress might be a bit tight on you now.

It’s always easier to take in a dress than it is to let out a dress. There is only so much fabric to work with and other options, like a lace up back, might have to be explored if the dress needs to be taken out more. On the other hand, you don’t want to order a size so large that you are swimming in the dress and there is an excess of fabric for your seamstress to be working with.

While there are lots of variables that lead up to your wedding and many different things going on, bridal stylists are used to seeing these things and know how to handle them. Be specific with your stylist on what your intentions are for your workout regimen and even how your body has handled stress in the past as far as gaining or losing weight so they can guide you to ordering the best size wedding dress.

More Helpful Wedding Dress Shopping Advice

We hope you have found this advice helpful when it comes to knowing how to handle body changes and wedding dress sizing questions. For even more helpful advice when it comes to shopping for your dream wedding dress and finding your bridal style, be sure to check out our past posts:

About Lovella

If you're shopping for your perfect wedding dress, come visit us at Lovella Bridal in Glendale, CA. We carry wedding dresses in all sizes and styles, including plus-size bridal gowns and a full selection of veils and accessories. Lovella Bridal is the premier, luxury bridal wedding dress shopping boutique located in Los Angeles, California. Lovella features couture, feminine, modern and chic bridal gowns in all sizes from the best wedding dress designers. Schedule an appointment to find the wedding dress of your dreams at Lovella Bridal. We can't wait to help you!

About Wedding Fashion Expert

Our wedding dress shopping tips and advice are from Nayri, Lovella's own, in-house wedding fashion expert. Nayri is truly the expert when it comes to bridal fashion and wedding style. As the Wedding Fashion Expert, Nayri is the top bridal fashion stylist and the best-selling author of the book "I'm Getting Married And I Have Nothing To Wear," the ultimate guide to helping brides find their wedding day style and their perfect wedding dress. You can subscribe to her YouTube channel or listen to her podcast for more helpful and practical advice on wedding dress shopping.

How To Handle Body Changes Leading Up to Your Wedding Day