Also, if you've found your dream dress and it's *way* out of your budget, post a message on a wedding board (theknot, wedding channel, etc.) offering to buy it. A lot of brides are more than willing to sell their brand gowns after their wedding (5 hours of wear) for pretty decent prices.
Hey, Thanks you Skylah and Ebree for posting the link for bridecouture. I get a much better sense of what the dress is like then I do on theknot and similar places. Plus it could come in real handy for when I finally move over to this board!
My state has a third of the population of L.A., so designer bridal boutiques are bit thin on the ground.
ETA: I was most surprised at how appealing i found the vera wang dresses. On her site she only has pics of them on catwalk models and their bodies make the dresses look ugly and unflattering. There's no way to get a sense of what they might look like on someone more curvy.
My apologies to those women with model body-types that I just horribly offended.
Ooh, those links are great! I''m on a self-proclaimed budget, just because I''d rather spend more money on the honeymoon and on our future house we should be getting soon. And even though I''d love a $20k fairy tale wedding, I just can''t let myself spend that much on something that will only last one day.