In its quest to win over adults, Disney has managed to engender some bad publicity. “It’s douchey shit like this that makes me hate being a woman,” railed a commenter on Gawker. And in a brides.com message board, one woman expressed more concern about the label than the design. “What if the tag said Disney on it?” she wondered. Quelle horreur! So what’s an aspiring princess to do?
Yolanda Cellucci, the owner of Yolanda’s Waltham bridal salon, didn’t hesitate to stock the Disney gowns, and her 40-year-old outlet has exclusive distribution rights to the line in Massachusetts. Demand was immediate. Cellucci says she figured that, eventually, Disney would marry its success with weddings — around 2000 are hosted annually at its US resorts and on the Disney cruise lines — to attire. “The dresses were the only thing that was missing,” she says.
“Some people feel that the Disney name turns them off,” admits Cellucci. “But people love them. There are people who love the fantasy world of being a princess, of being Cinderella for a day. I had a young girl come in who said she’s been looking at Snow White for so long, and that was exactly what she wanted to look like. She knew the dress.
“I’ve heard girls say, ‘Oh, I don’t know if I wanted to be connected to a Disney dress.’ Then there’s the client who wants that. She’s striving for that storybook Cinderella with the coach, the handsome guy, the whole thing. . . . It’s about Prince Charming. I mean, it’s pretty hard, in today’s world, to say there’s a Prince Charming out there, when you look around.”
Not tacky . . . honest
And now for the strangest thing about the Disney bridal gowns: they aren’t the least bit cheesy or tacky. Not even a little. They aren’t overt, costume-y rip-offs of the animated dresses, they aren’t poufy monstrosities, and they don’t cost a princess’s fortune. They’re beautiful, polished, conventionally sweet, and pick up on extremely popular bridal trends. If you hated Disney, but didn’t know the dresses were in any way connected with the company, you’d probably covet one of them. You might even prefer it to a pricey Vera Wang or whatever you could snag at the Filene’s Basement wedding-dress sale. Thanks to Kelly, the dresses cleverly play on enduring themes and silhouettes and, true to Disney’s mainstream-appeal philosophy, they probably would look good on just about anyone.
Ranging from $1100 to $3500, Kirstie Kelly’s Disney dresses aren’t inexpensive, but, according to Cellucci, they do fall into the average brides’ budget. What’s more, each of them practically shouts, “OMG, I’m a princess!” But not, like, in a shrieky, Platinum Weddings kind of way. These gowns will age well in your photo album. Your friends are bound to compliment the one you choose. It would take a great deal of effort not to feel regal in any one of Kelly’s designs.
The first-season Disney’s Princess Jasmine dress costs under $2500 and features an empire waist (one of the trendier bridal cuts) and several layers of charmingly draped chiffon. It doesn’t have a bead or overt embellishment anywhere on it. It’s also the line’s best-selling frock. “The phones do not stop ringing for that dress,” says Cleghorn. “It looks good on a size two and on a size 24. It’s a wonderful, magic dress.”
