We’ve finally seen The Dress.
It needs no introduction. But just in case… Dua Lipa’s Chanel wedding gown required 1,155 hours of needlework by Lesage, with 480,000 Atelier Montex beads and 25,000 Lemarié feathers – to say nothing of the hand-embroidered six-metre veil detailed with light-as-air organza appliqués. The feat of couture craftsmanship was not the only custom confection the popstar modelled during her Sicily wedding to Callum Turner, which saw the likes of Charli XCX, Mark Ronson and Julia Fox also witness the unveiling of a Bottega Veneta leather party dress and a bohemian Chloé brunch look, all of which was preceded by Dua’s Schiaparelli civil ceremony suit in London, of course.
Charli, naturally, knows that a high-profile wedding requires a positively bratty amount of bridalwear. Her own multi-part union to George Daniel saw the certified party girl wear a classic Vivienne Westwood mini to officially say “I do”, a post-town hall YSL dress, then a whole wedding wardrobe for the Sicily leg, of which the cherry on top was a whisper of a sheer Danielle Frankel number.
Cast your mind back to Hailey Bieber’s 2019 wedding to Justin Bieber, and you’ll remember the model commissioned Virgil Abloh to make her a wedding gown and a cathedral-length veil emblazoned with the words “Till Death Do Us Part”, to complement her Westwood rehearsal dinner minidress, halter-neck Ralph & Russo reception dress, and Vera Wang after-party slip. Two years later, Paris Hilton took the multi-bridal look crown, with her feast of Oscar de la Renta, Galia Lahav, Pamella Roland, Marchesa, Oscar de la Renta and Alice + Olivia.
That’s before taking into account the couples who fuse their cultures into one mega multi-faith celebration, like the “religious mash-up” of Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas in Mumbai in 2019, which required an assortment of looks for the entire bridal party. “We [took] beautiful traditions that we both grew up with and we [personalised] them in a way that makes sense for us,” said Chopra at the time, adding: “People will need vacations after this wedding.” The bride’s fashion stamina married with the back-to-back schedule, as she turned out couture-level lehengas (Sabyasachi Mukherjee had a big part to play) and gowns (ditto Ralph Lauren) for the Hindu and Christian ceremonies and celebrations alike.
The brimming bridal trousseau is not exclusive to the celebverse. After the pandemic shrunk weddings down to government-sanctioned guest lists and social-distanced venues, multi-part nuptials are back and bigger than ever, with brides embracing the potential to show off different sides of their personal style via a clutch of aisle-ready, dancefloor-worthy and registration office-appropriate looks certain to generate likes on main grids. Here, the essential fashion components of a celebrity-level wedding, with a small disclaimer that you do not need access to the petite mains of Paris to make an impact.
The town hall wedding look
The barometer of a chic town hall wedding outfit will forever be the YSL two-piece worn by Bianca Perez-Mora Macias to marry Mick Jagger in Saint-Tropez in 1971, after a whirlwind nine-month romance that stemmed from a chance encounter at a rock concert. Lipa’s recent Schiaparelli ode to the Nicaraguan socialite’s skirt suit was unabashedly direct, complete with a wide-brimmed Stephen Jones hat lined in gold foil, so that the bride would be cast in a golden glow on her big day. Despite this deliciously diva-leaning flourish, the town hall wedding look writ large is defined by its demure nature. Take Amal Alamuddin, who married George Clooney in wonderfully pared-back Stella McCartney separates that, had they been in another colour, would have worked for her job as a powerhouse barrister in court. Emily Ratajkowski, meanwhile, eschewed a traditional cream palette for a mustard Zara pantsuit with a Jagger-adjacent hat in the same hue, while Charli XCX modelled the most conservative version of a bridal dress one could have predicted for the “365” singer: the ever-popular Vivienne Westwood Nova Cora style.
