Congratulations! You’ve found your one true love, and he has proposed to you. Now, the next step is to find what seems to be the one thing many aspiring brides-to-be put importance on, THE WHITE DRESS.
Inside every little girl’s mind is the perfect dress we drew and designed in childhood, long before we even found or considered our groom. Even now, when you close your eyes and imagine your wedding, your gown stands out the most.
Throughout history, especially with royalty, people rarely remember what the groom wore, but what the bride’s dress was seemed to easily find its way into front-page headlines. Why has this dress become a symbol, and why do people find it essential to a wedding? Read on to learn about the dress’s history and the crazy expensive wedding gown list we’ve come up with.
The Significance Of The Wedding Dress In History
The wedding dress started as a tradition during the early 1400s, when Princess Philippa, an English royal, married the Scandinavian king Eric. She wore the earliest recorded white tunic made from squirrel fur and ermine. However, this only accounts for Europe, as Asia had worn white for their brides long before. In other words, white was a standard color for weddings centuries before, and there is a reason for picking such a color.
In ancient Greece, women wore yellow and other shades close to it to symbolize being the torch and the light in their husbands’ homes. In Athens, brides wore red and violet, cinched at the waist with a girdle that the groom would loosen later in the ceremony to symbolize the loss of virginity.
In Asia, white symbolizes the purity and virginity of the bride. Compared to today’s society, the one from centuries ago put pressure on a woman’s virginity, and only her husband can take this virginity and claim it for himself (although this does not apply to the groom).
In Europe, white wedding gowns started when royalty began to use them during their ceremonies. Mary, Queen of Scots, wore white to her union with the king of France in 1558, setting the trend after Princess Philippa. She could pull this off even when, at that time, white was a mourning color for France. In this regard, white was not a symbol of purity or chastity but rather the communication of wealth, as white was costly and more challenging to maintain.
Today, brides are no longer obligated to wear white or limited to any color or style. The wedding gown is now a symbol of beauty that brides like to indulge in and appear aesthetically pleasing to their chosen groom. Whether it be a passed-down vintage gown or a custom-made and modern-cut gown, the wedding dress today symbolizes the end of singlehood and the start of marriage and motherhood.
10 Crazy Expensive Wedding Gowns
1. The Diamond Wedding Dress
This record-breaking dress is the brainchild of Renee Strauss and Martin Katz, made from more diamonds than you’ll ever see in your lifetime, each weighing 150 carats.
Renee Strauss is popularly known in Beverly Hills for her 5-star bridal salon and her inclusion in a TLC show called Brides of Beverly hills. Her salon and client list have seen people such as Kathy Ireland, Paul Abdul, and Shannen Doherty. Her gowns and creations have been used in many Hollywood hits, like Coyote Ugly and He’s Just Not That Into You.
Her partner in crime, Martin Katz, is also stationed in Beverly Hills, where you can find his Jewelry store. Katz is well known as a designer and jeweler and has made the famous million-dollar silver and diamond bracelet. His popular works have all been worn by stars such as Angelina Jolie, Claire Daines, and Carrie Mulligan.
The special feature of this wedding gown is its multi-faceted diamonds that shine wherever and whenever the bride turns and moves. Only in this way will you truly know that each sparkling stone in the dress is real, tried-and-true diamonds, other than seeing its price tag, which is a hefty $12 million. So far, this gown is still up for sale today, and no skin has touched its finest silk and heavy diamond ornaments. The creators are in no rush to sell it out as well.
2. The White Gold Dress
White gold can be worn as a wedding ring, but have you ever considered using it as a trinket on a wedding dress? In 2006, a gown surfaced in the fashion industry dubbed the White Gold Dress. 87-year-old Japanese designer Yuki Katsura thought the white gold diamond would be a perfect addition to the dress, on top of the zari-embroidered silk satin, an 8.8-carat diamond emblem, and 1000 pearls already sewn into it.
Yuki Katsura has been designing wedding dresses for most of her life. She’s one of the most well-known designers in this field but never fails to design outside of the matrimonial gowns she makes. At first, she catered to a very small percentage. Only around 3% of couples during her opening year wore the Western style. Despite that, Katsura dedicated herself to catering to the minority, which turned the tides in her favor as the style was adopted in Japan over the years.
3. The Peacock Wedding Dress
Vera Wang is one of the most well-known designers in the industry, famous for balancing traditional elements in contemporary pieces. Her most famous work might embody this belief in her work: The peacock dress.
As you would assume, the peacock dress is a bridal gown with a skirt made entirely of feathers. For some years, Wang has been under fire for such a controversial piece, alarming animal rights activists, until she explained the peacock feathers were all taken as they were shed. Still, you can probably guess how many peacocks it took and how many years she waited to complete the piece, given they shed every year after the mating season.
This piece is tagged to be $1.5 million. One of the cheaper ones on the scale for sure, but in terms of style and distinctiveness, Vera Wang’s Peacock Wedding dress is the perfect item if you want to add a little oomph to your day (and given you have an extra $1.5 million lying around).
4. Danasha Luxury Gown
One of the simplest in terms of design, the Danasha Luxury gown, is made by designers Jad Ghadour and Danasha Luxury as a sort of antithesis to the idea of crazy expensive gowns in the market. They want to prove that a luxury gown costing millions of dollars doesn’t have to look gimmicky or overbearing in its diamonds, pearls, and rows and rows of tulle. Thus, this silk gown, looking like liquid mercury, was made primarily with that thought. It costs $1.5 million as of today.
5. Kate Middleton’s Wedding Dress
Royalty can go all-out on their bride’s wedding day, and Kate’s is no exception. It’s an unadorned gown, and paying homage to the long sleeves that royalty wears, Kate’s own is presented in delicate lace. Despite looking very clean and simply cut, her gown costs almost $400,000. That doesn’t include Queen Elizabeth’s gift to her, a tiara holding about a thousand diamonds.
6. Mauro Adami’s Wedding Dress
This platinum gown is made by the beloved Italian designer Mauro Adami, who made the Rolling Stone member Keith Richards’ platinum jacket. Set on the same shade as that jacket, this wedding gown is made from 40 meters of the best silk fabric and embroidered with platinum threads in various complicated floral designs.
7. Eastern Platinum Wedding Dress
Perhaps one of the most stunning pieces on the list, the Eastern platinum wedding dress is made from the finest bolt of red silk, and its ornate metallic gold design is nothing to snob at either. There is an aesthetic juxtaposition between this eastern platinum gown and the earlier mentioned Mauro Adami gown, but their designs, cut, style, and origins could not be more different. This wedding dress is priced at a quarter of a million dollars today.
8. Carat Gems Wedding Gown
Probably one of the oldest creations, the Carat Gems wedding gown is still worthy of being listed as one of the crazy expensive dresses available today. It is made from 9,999 carats of gems, no more, no less. Therefore, this gown isn’t just a gown; it can also be every piece of jewelry you were supposed to wear on that particular day.
9. Bach Ngoc Xiem Y Wedding Dress
A costly dress coming from Vietnam, this item is embellished with over 100 rubies and 222 diamonds. Its body is made of layers and layers of white silk satin, making every girl willing and able to afford the dress feel like Cinderella. Its total cost as of today is $117,000.
10. Imperial Pearl Syndicate Gown
In addition to the pearl dress, Miss Connolly wears four strands of pearls valued at $250,000, a purse valued at $40,000, a bracelet at $40,000, earrings at $15,000, a pin at $10,000, a ring at $10,000, and a single solitaire pearl valued at $35,000. Those two pistols say she isn’t going anywhere with all that stuff. — Image by © Bettmann/CORBIS
In the 1950s, this wedding gown worn by photographer Mary Joe Connolly was priced at $100,000. Now, it costs up to half a million dollars. This dress might be one of the most beneficial items, as the designers funded the money from selling it for a cancer program. It weighs up to a staggering 27 pounds.
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