Monday, July 30, 2012

Armadale Wedding Gallery

The bridal gown hunt and research process has diverged into 2 angles.
1) Search for cheapest cheap-ass (but nice) gown for the ROM / garden wedding

2) Find the ONE dress to rule them all for the main event - Doesn't every bride hope for something unique? And by unique in Malaysia, it means, like hell I'm going to get it here if I can help it. And definitely not at SS2. My mother thinks Melaka falls under the definition of "unique" but I must beg to differ.

I'll leave the ONE dress hunt for another post and talk about the cheap-ass (but nice) gown search.

How to find (and successfully buy) cheap-ass gowns

1) Keep trawling bridal house Facebook sites - I think Malaysia Brides Forum does a pretty good job at it, and I have so far been to the Wedding Boutique close-down sale (i think they're still clearing their gowns) and Armadale Wedding's clearance sale.

2) Buy simple - See, the thing about looking for cheap-ass gowns is to keep it simple. It can be real tough when gowns on clearance racks typically consist of beaded horrors and sequinned nightmares you wouldn't be caught dead in, ie you'd rather DIE, but if you just a) focus and b) look for simple and ageless, you should be able to luck out one day. So just keep your expectations low when going for the sale and you might just get surprised.

And please for goodness' sake, if the clearance gown is 400 bucks, don't hemm and haww like it is bloody 40 thousand like I saw one picky nitwit bride behave at Armadale over the weekend.  

Armadale is located near Jalan Semantan. Turn left from Jalan Semantan before the Shell (if you're coming from Jalan Duta), then immediately hang right between the Shell and ECM Libra building. Go down Persiaran Damansara Endah, and take the first left uphill and go right to the end where Armadale is located in the last house on your right.

While the selection isn't as massive as the SS2 houses, it felt much less like a factory they were out to empty your pockets cut-throat, and I immediately relaxed (you have no idea how defensive you can become when you are a constantly assaulted bride to be during bridal fairs or step into bridal houses).


There are 2-3 gown changing areas, and about 6-7 racks of dresses on the ground floor. The two racks you see in the above picture are gowns for brides who choose their photography packages from Armadale (yes, as mentioned, not an extensive selection, but they looked quite tasteful to me). The outdoor area is where they take some pre-wedding shots, I believe.  

If I'm not mistaken, most of the clearance gowns are going from RM400-500. I narrowed down to 4 gowns after 20 minutes and they were all quoted to me at a price of RM500. After I paid RM500 and left with my gown, they called me back and said they made a mistake and had overcharged me by RM100, which they will transfer back to my bank account. Well, I never!!!!

Below 3 were one of the more classic and simple (ie unfussy, un-massively beaded and un-horribly sequinned and un-shinily laced) gowns I whittled down to. The first 2 are by designer Carven Ong (for RM500 a gown wtf in a good way shit are you joking dot dot dot ya Tuhan its cheap). And the bottom gown has a wonderful classy beading detail. The duchess satin skirt has quite a strong crinoline that it stands on its own like a giant wedding cake.



And lastly, the one I bought.

I tell you, with the veritable ambush of beads, sequins, flower appliques, lace trains, ribbons, detachable sashes, and various other addendums available to horror spice up a gown nowadays, I can understand how hard it is to stick to simple. And keep reminding yourself, less is more less is more less is more less is more. Especially so when you're going for a non-designer factory line type bridal house gown. Just leave the addendums and intricate gown dan-lain-lains to the Vera Wangs, Jenny Packhams and Pronovias' of the world, lor.

I have seen so many random brides on Facebook (not my kawan-kawan of course) whom I think have completely lost their minds. Lastly before anyone thinks I'm getting to be a bit too snotty to handle, let me post a completely fail picture of my dress trying here.

Don't understand where the "fail" part comes from? Well, it's the back portion. The v-split on the back ain't due to any ingenious styling on the designer's part. Its about how far the zip can be pulled up. :D

Flashback to the visit to the Wedding Boutique where the saleslady said to me while huffing and puffing and tugging the laces of a particularly tight gown around my ribs, "You actually look very slim, but actually right, you are not."

Needless to say, I didn't buy a gown that day.

1 comments:

lana said...

muahaha, love the v split. I swear I thought it was an awesome dress feature

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