The wasteful white wedding dress and the brand that has a solution

A top from For Good Luck, the NYC-based brand repurposing vintage evening wear since 2018.

As a young teen sitting with my friends over our packed lunches, when the conversation inevitably turned to thoughts of our future – job, marriage, family –, there’d often be someone who made the joke: “I don’t want a marriage, I want a wedding.” Understandable. A wedding is an opportunity to live out a fairytale for a day. To be a real-life princess in the gown of your dreams. But the cost of a grand, ethereal gown with a tremendous train to be worn just once isn’t just financial, but environmental too. Maybe your daughter will wear it for her wedding. Maybe you’ll donate it. Maybe it’ll sit in your attic for decades, a relic. What’s for certain, it won’t get anywhere near the amount of wear your other dresses do. Thus, adding to our problem of textile waste. All because a wedding dress is so distinguishable, so single-minded in its purpose that it can’t be worn for any other occasion. 

Queen Victoria's wedding dress

Wedding dresses weren’t always so instantly recognisable. Before the 19^th century, Western women had traditionally married in blue, pink, or their favourite colour. This meant a wedding dress could be re-worn many times after the ‘big day’. Working class women often opted for the even more practical black. But this changed in 1840 when young Queen Victoria captured the hearts of 19^th century brides with her choice of a white satin and lace dress. Subverting expectations, she strayed from the jewel-encrusted silver or gold robes that would usually be worn for a royal wedding. This wedding was unique not only due to Victoria’s sartorial choices, but because it was motivated by romance rather than diplomatic manoeuvring, as had been the norm with royal marriages. So, Queen Vic became the romantic heroine of her day and many women wanted to follow suit. At first, the impracticality of a white dress meant that it was only accessible to the rich. But thanks to advances in technology and synthetic materials that helped to blur visible class divisions, by the 1920s only a white wedding dress would do.  

Sharon Tate's wedding dress

Lulu's wedding dress

This snowy takeover of bridal wear also brought with it connotations of virginity and virtue, replacing blue, which had previously signified purity. This does not mean that all 20^th century wedding dresses were conservative, though, with the colour remaining the same but the length and style being dictated by contemporary fashions. Sharon Tate wore a puff-sleeved minidress for her wedding in 1968. Scottish singer Lulu wore a fur-lined coat in 1969. Bianca Jagger wore an elegant skirt suit in 1971. And in 2006, Pamela Anderson wore a white bikini.

Bianca Jagger's wedding

Pamela Anderson in her white wedding bikini

Fast forward to 2020 and it is clear that against the backdrop of unprecedented pollution and climate change, a single-use, extravagant dress is no longer so romantic. But – apart from choosing our own wedding dress wisely – what can we really do about it? Enter Olivia Horan, founder of For Good Luck, the NYC-based brand which transforms vintage evening wear (prom dresses and wedding gowns, garments typically worn once) into elegant tops which can be worn anywhere from the club to church. Horan’s focus is on the bodice: by chopping off the skirt the garment becomes instantly more wearable, and in dyeing it colourful hues she not only adds fun, but also tackles the construct of bridal purity. Billowy sleeves, elaborate embroidery, flattering corsetry, delicate silk, romantic lace: these are the aspects of the wedding dress that she wants to retain whilst creating a versatile top that pairs beautifully even with jeans. If chopping up a perfectly good dress makes you wince, Horan explains: “When I first started [deconstructing wedding gowns] everyone was kind of taken aback and would say to me, ‘How could you do that?’ and I would respond, ‘How could you just let it sit in your closet for 50 years?!’”

Olivia Horan in one of her tops

Aside from the obvious environmental benefits of repurposing old clothes, young founder Olivia Horan also hopes that the memories embedded in the used fabrics could transfer a touch of magic and romance into the new owner’s life. The transformed tops are products of love and beacons of a more conscious, sustainable future. Horan is careful about the term ‘sustainable’ though: “…sustainability right now is such a buzz word. I think sustainability’s message shouldn’t just be a branding point but it should already be integrated into the practice of the design, and into fashion especially. To be a sustainable business in fashion you have to really break down consumer habits in buying clothes – I mean, it is important how the clothes are made, but I think breaking down the habits of how we buy things and how we wear our clothes is important. I have yet to come out to say that I am a sustainable brand because I understand that there is a lot that comes along with that.” 

As always, there is still much to be done to reform fashion’s wasteful nature, but Olivia’s brand sets a good example of the circular model that the industry at large should move towards. Plus, the journey from pre-loved vintage wedding dress to dreamy going-out top was too poetic for me not to write about. Worn in different decades, these garments link the different women who have felt beautiful in them, whether that’s on their wedding day or getting ready for a first date.

Words by Anastasia Vartanian