A bride has been backed online for editing her niece’s wedding dress in her collection of wedding photos.
The woman, 30, took to Reddit to share that she decided to edit the images of her niece as the 16-year-old girl had worn white to the ceremony—going against the tradition upheld by many of only the bride and, occasionally, the bridesmaids wearing white to a wedding.
The woman, posting under the handle u/DesignedBasic, described her niece’s dress as being white, lacy and knee-length.
Lavinia Stewart-Brown, the founder and director of bespoke wedding planning firm Lavinia Stewart-Brown Events told Newsweek that while there aren’t official rules against wearing white to weddings, it is frowned upon.
“It is often noted that white is saved for the bride, should she be following tradition,” Stewart-Brown said.
“As a wedding planner, I always think it’s important a bride can stand out on her day. However, more people are opting for less traditional dress codes. My overall advice is to steer away from white unless the couple has said differently,” she said.
The Redditor recalled the day’s events in her post: “[My niece] even wore lace elbow-length gloves! Honestly, it looked just like a wedding dress. I didn’t say anything to her or her parents in the moment, and I tried my best to ignore it. When I got the first drafts back from our photographer, I couldn’t stand when I saw her in her white dress standing next to me”.
“My husband saw how upset I was and suggested that we pay extra to get my niece’s dress photoshopped to a light blue. Last week, we got the final photos back and they looked great! I could hardly even tell that my niece was originally wearing white, and she still looked really nice,” she wrote.
The woman then revealed that her editing choice was met with backlash from her niece’s mother after she saw them on social media.
“My sister-in-law messaged me and was angry that I had photoshopped my niece without checking with her first. She accused me of thinking my niece was ugly and of body shaming her,” the woman detailed in the viral post.
The new bride went on to reaffirm to readers that she had not requested for her niece to be photoshopped for any reason other than for her dress color to look more like a guest’s dress than a wedding dress. Worried that she’d offended her niece and the rest of her family, the woman sought out the opinion of internet users on the awkward matter.
What Do the Comments Say?
Since it was shared on the social media platform on May 28, the Reddit post has been upvoted by 96 percent of the Redditors who engaged with it and it has received more than 2,600 comments. The majority of commenters have expressed understanding of the bride not wanting others to wear white on her big day.
“If she didn’t want the dress to be photoshopped, she shouldn’t have let her daughter attend a wedding in a lacy white dress! The nerve of that woman,” one user wrote.
“The sister-in-law is ticked. She’s probably the one who helped pick the dress and gloves and encouraged this. The niece may not know, doubtful at her age in 2023 but the sister-in-law did,” another user added.