A stylist grapples with her best friend's wedding dress selection, torn between offering honest feedback and respecting her friend's decision. The article explores the emotional complexities of weddings and how they can amplify personal anxieties.
Dear Eva, My best friend is getting married, and it brings me genuine joy to see her moving into this new chapter, happy and secure.
But – and I know it’s her wedding, her body, her decision – I’m struggling with her choice of dress, which, as a stylist, might be the most hideous thing I’ve ever seen. While our friends are doing the right thing and saying, “Oh, that’s nice,” the truth is: it’s tasteless, and not at all reflective of how beautiful she is.
I haven’t said anything outright – I suspect she’s wary of my opinion because of my job – but on the few occasions I’ve gently floated different silhouettes or brands, I’ve been shut down. I’m not sure how to suggest alternatives without revealing my reservations and somehow undermining her vision.
The good news is that she hasn’t actually bought it yet, and the wedding is still some way off… though that only heightens the sense that I’m watching a comet hurtle towards earth, and that I might be the only person able to stop it. Do I just accept that it’s none of my business? Or shall I assemble a Cobra meeting?
There’s something about the prospect of a wedding that makes even those touching only its furthest edges go completely bananas, don’t you think? As if a deranged inkblot is inching away from the couple, staining every bridesmaid, cousin, mother, ex. The stain is Rorshach test-y too, the wedding shifting so it appears as different things to different guests at different times.
One guest sees, maybe, a statement about fear, one a sign they’re aging too fast, another sees a comment on their own relationship, or, in the choice of party venue, the revival of a long nursed slight about vodka. It’s something to do with the grandeur of the occasion, the purity of intention, the various stacked pressures and questions it makes us ask about our own lives, but it is our job I think, as decent people, to unstick our anxieties from somebody else’s hopefully very nice day.
Which is why, though I understand that you are approaching what you see as the problem of your best friend’s wedding gown in good faith and with kindness, ‘as a stylist’ it does not and will not land. I say this babe with the absolute and utmost respect: you need to politely piss off. Step away from the dress.
The first thing I learned through writing an agony aunt column is how important it is to only give advice when asked. The second was, this is hard! We are full of thoughts! Opinions leak out of the sides of our mouths and other broken seams!
It’s made even harder by the experience of living in a culture where advice is a currency, and we’re encouraged to believe there is one correct way to be, one single serum that will smooth all wrinkles, one single age to have a baby. Yet offering uninvited opinions to a friend, especially at a time of stress, whether on their haircut, husband, dinner or dress, is rarely welcome.
You know this – she’s already ‘shut you down’ when you ‘floated’ your thoughts, and still you refuse to listen, or accept that rather than the outfit being ‘tasteless’ she simply has different taste to you, that there is no objectively ‘hideous’ dress, that the right thing for her to wear is something she feels good in, rather than whatever silhouettes or brands you’d choose for her.
Release some of this creative energy on your next job – style the living shit out of a paying client, let your opinions loose beside a rail of glitter and tailoring, and, when the client takes your advice, enjoy the glory as they swish away happy, the unbeatable high that comes with having been right. Please though, get this out of your system before the wedding.
Otherwise your disapproval will, if not quite ruin the day, then certainly leave a bitter taste. I know you think you can hide it, that your face can keep a secret, but trust me, your best friend can see what you think from the other side of a room, so you must swallow the judgement as soon as possible, concentrate on her lovely face, the exquisite cake, ok?
One of the reasons weddings trigger so many anxieties in their guests is that it’s traditionally the first marker of adulthood – growing up involves accepting that many many things are none of your business. This is one of them.
Wedding Dress Friendship Style Advice Emotional Pressure Social Etiquette
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