What Will She Wear? The Enduring Romance of the Wedding Dress

Traditionally, wedding dresses are lovingly kept, precious mementoes of a special day, many often ending up in museum collections. At the Fashion Museum we have wedding dresses from the 18th century right up to the present day, and this special exhibition, hastily curated after the announcement of the engagement of HRH Prince William to Miss Catherine Middleton in November 2010, opened on Valentines Day 2011, in time for the Royal wedding in April that year.

The exhibition featured 30 traditional white wedding dresses from the museum collection, ranging from a silk blonde lace dress from the 1830s with feature ‘gigot’ sleeves to a short white lace dress designed by Alexander McQueen, worn in 2010, and borrowed especially for the exhibition. A feature of this exhibition were the white bridal ‘flowers’, all made by the ‘Friday Ladies’ Fashion Museum volunteer team using snowy white paper tissues, white plastic bin liners and other up-cycled materials, all then carefully styled into exuberant bridal head-dresses in a special installation feature by fashion stylist Iain R Webb.