7 Ideas to Repurpose Your Wedding Dress

Thankfully, there are wedding dress upcycling solutions for anyone: creative, crafty, practical, or altruistic.

You can either have fun, help someone in need, earn extra cash, or combine multiple ideas.

It doesn’t matter how long ago your wedding was or what’s the design of your dress. Any bridal gown has numerous applications better than lying in your closet for decades.

Most importantly, all these ideas give your old wedding dress a new life and help to escape the guilt of contributing to worldwide waste.

1. Make It Casual

Upcycling is among the hottest trends of recent years, and that’s no surprise. It’s an environmentally friendly and creative way to replace something old and useless with something entirely new and valuable.

Wedding dress upcycling can take many forms, though repurposing them into a casual fashion piece is the most practical option.

Wasting a dozen yards of fabric and hundreds of dollars on something you’d only wear once is reckless, to say the least.

If you’re concerned about sustainability, transform your wedding dress into a casual summer dress you’ll wear daily.

Alternatively, you may repurpose your wedding gown into a jacket, skirt, or shirt – depending on the fabric type and amount.

Minimalistic, opaque cotton and polyester fabrics are especially great for this purpose, as they are more versatile than semi-transparent chiffon or tulle. Embellishments and appliques can also complicate the process.

It’s not like richly embellished wedding dresses aren’t suitable for sewing casual clothes.

But you should be careful to avoid looking like a runaway bride. Consider removing all decorations from your dress if you’re making a casual apparel piece.

If removing decorations and lace is impossible, you may make a christening gown or a kid’s party dress – perhaps, even multiple. Then, give it to your niece, friend’s daughter, or simply sell it.

The first and the scariest step in upcycling your wedding dress is cutting it up. If you decide to do it yourself, remember to treat your dress with respect.

You will need very sharp scissors, a large flat surface, and a clear idea of what you’re planning to do. Avoid cutting your dress into small pieces, as you may not be able to sew anything from them.

This wedding dress repurposing idea will be especially appreciated by crafty brides with sewing experience.

However, if you’d like to transform your bridal gown into something new but lack the skills, you may find someone to do it for you.

Today, numerous services online specialize in bringing new life to old wedding dresses-many designers offer to make a new clothing piece by your order at a reasonable price.

2. Craft Interior Accessories

Some wedding dresses are unsuitable for sewing new clothing pieces. Even if you’ve already made two christening gowns and a beach skirt from your wedding gown, you likely have some materials left.

Throwing away a bag of plastic beads or artificial feathers is a bit careless, considering how useful it can be.

And if you aren’t particularly creative, you may sell it or give it to someone you know passionate about arts and crafts.

One of the most original wedding dress repurposing ideas is to craft interior items using lace, beads, and other decorative elements. For example, you can make a photo album, photo frame, or cushion.

Such interior elements make a perfect gift for someone else’s wedding, christening, or birthday, depending on the design. Of course, you may also use your custom-made photo album or frame for your own wedding pictures.

3. Make Jewelry or Other Accessories

Beads and embellishments from your wedding dress can be used to craft not only interior elements but also stunning keepsake jewelry. The simplest jewelry pieces to do are large pendants and brooches.

However, if you have some experience in crafting jewelry or don’t mind learning something new, you can even make elegant rings or earrings. The type of jewelry you can make also depends on the bead type used for your dress.

DIY jewelry from a wedding dress can serve as a gift, worn casually, or preserved as a deeply symbolic family heirloom. Your daughter or granddaughter can later wear such a necklace or ring for her wedding.

Alternatively, you can transform your old wedding dress into a handy tote bag. If the lace isn’t overly intricate, your dress can make a perfect shopping or beach bag for the summer months.

Lace and appliques from your dress can also be used to decorate shoes, hats, and gloves. You can then wear them for formal occasions such as someone else’s wedding or sell them in one of the online marketplaces.

4. Host a Wedding Dress Party

Hosting a wedding dress party is, perhaps, one of the most fun ways to repurpose a wedding dress. Although the idea may seem odd at first, I reckon that most of your friends will be excited about such a party theme.

A wedding dress party gives your married friends the opportunity to wear their old gowns again and remember their very special day.

And your unmarried friends can consider it a free wedding day trial and a chance to become a princess for a day.

If you’ve watched old seasons of Friends, you likely remember the episode where Rachel, Phoebe, and Monica were hanging out at home wearing their wedding gowns. Many series fans then laughed at the absurd, though some borrowed the idea.

In fact, if you search for the “wedding dress party” hashtag on Instagram or Twitter, you’ll find hundreds of pictures showcasing happy women dressed in the dresses of their dreams.

A wedding dress party is a great opportunity for a fun group photoshoot. However, some of your single or divorced friends should bear in mind that posting a picture in a wedding dress may cause a blast on their social media.

If your friends don’t have a wedding dress, there’s no need to spend over a thousand dollars to buy one. Today, you can easily rent a wedding dress for a day.

5. Use It for a Photoshoot

Many women prefer to preserve their wedding dress as a memory, but that doesn’t mean it should lie in the closet without any use. You can awake the memories of that special day by recreating it in an anniversary photoshoot.

An anniversary photoshoot is a fun way to remind each other how happy you were on your wedding day. Plus, your husband has likely already forgotten how astonishingly beautiful your dress was, and he deserves to see it again.

A couple’s photoshoot is a great first, fifth, tenth, or twentieth wedding anniversary idea. However, most of us don’t remain the same size throughout the years, so don’t postpone it until you two get old.

If the idea of a couple’s photoshoot doesn’t seem too exciting for you, you may use your dress for a creative fashion photoshoot.

Turn your wedding gown into an art piece: spray it with paint like Shalom Harlow’s 1999 McQueen dress, or make a runaway bride-themed shoot.

6. Sell It

Instead of getting all crafty and creative, you can indirectly repurpose your wedding dress by converting it into cash.

Numerous marketplaces online specialize in wedding dress resale, allowing women to compensate part of their wedding expenses.

On average, wedding dress resale value is about 50% of the initial price, which isn’t bad. And if your dress carries a recognizable name such as Vera Wang, it can easily sell for over 70% of the initial value.

If your wedding was a good while ago and the dress is already considered vintage, you may sell it at an even higher price than the initial, especially considering inflation.

Of course, this doesn’t apply to any vintage dress, but mainly to those made by famous designers or featuring a very typical for that era style.

7. Donate It

Donating your gown to charity is among the best wedding dress repurposing ideas. It helps you to quickly free some space in the closet and gives an opportunity to make someone happy.

Not every charity will accept wedding gowns, though, so your best bet is finding one that focuses on this type of garment.

Furthermore, not every organization uses the donated dresses the same way.

For instance, Adorned in Grace resells donated wedding dresses and uses the funds to fight sex trafficking and help its victims. Forever Angels of Virginia transforms bridal gowns into burial dresses for infants.

Brides Against Breast Cancer sells donated dresses at a low price for those in need and uses all funds to support anti-breast cancer organizations.

Some donated dresses are used for their initial purpose. So, Brides Across America gives bridal gowns to military and first responder brides who can’t afford to buy a dress of their own.

Alternatively, you may donate your dress directly to the local goodwill, salvation army, or someone you know who may be in need.