The History of Wearing WHITE
- 6 days ago
- 2 min read
Why do brides wear white?
Queen Victoria standardised wearing white in 1840 when she married Prince Albert.
She wore white English silk satin with handcrafted Honiton lace. The lace showcased the declining handmade textile industry.
Opinions state that isolated royal brides before QV wore white prior to 1840, In 1558 Mary Queen of Scots wore a white wedding gown to her marriage with Francis the Dauphin of France.
Queen Victoria's high profile wedding cemented it as a lasting cultural standard. Its noted that guests were also requested not to wear white, signifying it as the brides colour.
Historically brides wore their finest clothes for their wedding day, rich colours like red and blue were common. The trend to wear white was primarily adopted by the high class society at first as white fabric was expensive and impractical for daily wear. It became a trend to display their affluence. This is partly why wedding gowns are still only worn once.
In this time period white dresses were reserved for women who were being presented at court, we can still see this trend today with modern day debutantes and popular media adaptations such as Bridgerton.
The white dress became a symbol of purity and new beginnings, which for the Victorian time period was significant for a successful marriage however, has no religious significance. The global adoption of wearing white came from Western culture and colonisation.
Whilst the western world has standardised white, we can still see brides around the world weaing different colours. In India and China red is the expected colour. In India brides typically wear a red lehenga or saree, its said to represent prosperity and love.
In China the bride wears a Qipaos or Gualas. Culturally the red represnsets good luck and happiness as well as warding off evil spirits.
We've seen a shift in recent years that ivory, champagnes, blush and even black are being worn as bridal colours now with ivory over taking white as the most popular bridal colour as it compliments more complexions. Ballerina pink is the newest trend to take the bridal world by storm with it expected to become popular for 2028.
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