For Martina Gurgel, a Miami-based jewelry designer, shopping for her upcoming July wedding in Paris has become a part-time job.
It’s not the wedding dress that has become the attention-absorbing factor, but, rather, the outfits for the wedding’s ancillary events including a welcome lunch on a boat, the rehearsal dinner and other pre-wedding events. Among them: the engagement party, the engagement photo shoot, the bachelorette party and the bridal shower. In all, Gurgel has worn or plans to wear upward of 25 wedding-related outfits ranging from formal feminine attire to shiny and sexy designs. She has each outfit and corresponding event organized on a spreadsheet and said she spent between $15,000-$20,000 on looks for the wedding week alone, including honeymoon apparel.
“If I’m getting all this attention, and I’m already paying for a photographer, videographer and social media content creator, and all friends and family are going be there, then it’s worth having more outfits and different types of [social content] that you can put out to family and friends,” said Gurgel, who has a social media following of approximately 30,000 people on Instagram.
Extending the wedding fashion moment beyond the wedding dress is gaining broader traction beyond power-shoppers like Gurgel. As brides augment their wedding apparel to include a whole new wardrobe designating their bride status, the bridal industry and fashion brands are reaping the rewards. In the past two years, many established fashion brands have launched their first-ever bridal collections, including French brand Ba&sh, British brand Hai and shoe brand Loeffler Randall. Accessories brand Jennifer Behr also collaborated with luxury retailer Mytheresa on a bridal collection in 2023. Newer entrants into the bridal category include Belgian fashion brand Bernadette, in January; accessories brand Lele Sadoughi, in February; Abercrombie & Fitch, in March; and read-to-wear brand Jacquemus and fast-fashion brand Forever 21, in April.
By 2026, bridalwear is expected to be a $69.9 billion market, up from $55.5 billion in 2020, according to the Global Bridal Wear Industry Report from 2023. The U.S. specifically accounted for $26 billion of 2021 sales, representing more than 44% of the market. Yet, these numbers do not seem inclusive of ancillary wedding events, and there is a lack of data on expenditures related to wardrobes for these events.
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“As weddings become longer and more elaborate, our team realized we had brides coming to us for styles to wear for all of their events,” said Jennifer Behr, founder of the eponymous accessories brand. “We have made sure to include white options in all of our fabric silhouettes [now] and increased our range of earrings.”
Gabrielle Hurwitz, a New York City-based bridal stylist, attributes the boom in wedding wardrobes to social media. She said people increasingly view the ancillary wedding events as an opportunity to dress up, express themselves in different ways and exert more effort — in part, for Instagram. Additionally, because more contemporary and independent brands are now offering wedding wear, there are also more choices, which creates more opportunities for brides to shop.
Hurwitz’s clients are typically working professionals who either do not have the time to shop or love fashion and view it as the “ultimate expression of personal style,” she said. While most of her clients are high-net-worth individuals, she’s seen the tide change for wedding wardrobes, with people of various socioeconomic statuses and wedding styles partaking. In addition, she said, there are now more wedding stylists, compared to six years ago when she launched her business.
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“Curating a wedding wardrobe is aspirational in a lot of ways because when else can you really do that?” said Hurwitz. “You can play up all aspects of your style and your personality and not feel pigeonholed into one [style] box.”
Social media isn’t the only driver of wedding wardrobes, though it certainly supports the wedding industrial complex. The number of weddings has increased, as the millennial generation represents the largest wedding cohort in modern history, despite marriage rates steadily falling.
Furthermore, changing attitudes about traditional, subdued and formal weddings and ancillary events have allowed brides to seek different ways to express themselves throughout the nuptial journey. Certain events, like bachelorette parties, have notoriously become more expensive and elaborate than in previous years. According to the party-planning app Bach, the average cost of a bachelorette party was nearly $11,000 in 2023, $3,000 higher than three years prior. According to The Knot’s 2023 wedding trends report, Gen Zers are more likely than millennials to take engagement photos, serving as another opportunity for a new outfit. As stated in its Pinterest Predicts trend report for 2024, Pinterest is predicting a surge in wedding trends including “whimsical garden wedding,” vintage-style weddings and more colorful bridal attire for the bride, groom and wedding party.
“The bride’s orientation to what event dressing looks like has changed dramatically over the years,” said Desiree Thomas, CEO of Ba&sh North America. “Ba&sh wanted to give a fresh perspective on all the events leading up to the wedding. [The bride may also] incorporate some of these pieces into her everyday wardrobe.”
Ba&sh’s initial white capsule collection, launched in 2023, featured six styles and was designed with the North American market in mind. The newest collection, which debuted in March, features 10 looks ranging from a two-piece top and midi skirt to a lacy, long-sleeved V-neck mini dress. Ba&sh has 52 stores in North America, and sales are predominantly DTC, making up 90% of all sales. Its core customers are 27-45 years old.
Thomas said she expects bridal to be a huge driver for the brand, especially as Ba&sh releases more accessories, footwear and handbags in future collections. According to previous Glossy reporting, Ba&sh’s annual revenue reached nearly $350 million in 2022. A new flagship store in the New York City neighborhood SoHo will feature a private salon space for multiple guests to congregate, similar to a bride-to-be and her trousseau at a wedding dress atelier.
“At this point, it’s a missed opportunity not to have a few white pieces in every seasonal collection,” said Hurwitz.
