Happy Fashion Friday!!
I’m mixing things up a bit this week for Fashion Friday, my friends. Rather than always having you see my ideas and opinions on the fashion front, I thought it might be fun to incorporate some of YOUR IDEAS as well!
**If you think you’ve got a great idea for a Fashion Friday guest post, shoot me an email at sweettoothcourtney[@]gmail[.]com!**
Our first Fashion Friday guest post comes from none other than my fellow fashionista, Shanna. She’s here to tell show us all some great tips for finding inexpensive, wedding-season dresses, and let me tell you…she has some adorable ones to share!
Take it away, Shanna! 
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Hi Fabulous Sweet Tooth, Sweet Life Readers!
My name is Shanna and I blog over at Shanna, like Banana. And in case you are wondering, I don’t have an abnormal love of bananas, but rather this is my surefire way to get people to say my name correctly. So now that that’s out of the way, nice to meet you ;)
I’m honored that Courtney asked me to post for Fashion Friday. She’s mastered the art of cupcake baking (putting Martha to shame), while still looking faboosh in everything she wears. And did you know that Courtney’s was one of the first blogs that I started reading???
Okay, back to the very serious matter at hand: Fashion. Based on my Shoes-Day Tuesday posts, you’d think I’d post about shoes, but nope, I’m taking a different approach. Originally I had planned to post about how to “Dress without Stress,” but then a more appropriate idea dawned on me:
“Where to go for inexpensive, sassy wedding-season dresses!“
Since turning 28 (a few years ago now — MEEP!), I’ve had multiple weddings to attend each year. And for the hubby and me, that often means mucho dinero is spent on the plane tickets to get to our destination. Since the best part of a wedding is dressing up (err, besides supporting the ones you love 
), I’ve become quite adept at finding super cute, trendy dresses on the cheap. Let’s go shopping shall we?
www.Overstock.com: It’s not just for furniture or random crap! Overstock actually carries quite a bit of amazing stuff, including watches, shoes, and jewelry. They also carry a slew of namebrand dresses from Jessica Simpson to Michael Kors. Oh and shipping is only $2.95 — can’t beat that!
Purchased from: Overstock.com
Brand: Kensie
Price: ~$75 (retail >$150)
Occasion: Bestie’s bachelorette party in Vegas
H&M: I love that stores like H&M and Forever 21 aren’t just for youngins’ because both carry a bevy of the latest styles at a fraction of the cost. Places like this are great if you want to try something super trendy, but are concerned it may not be in style next season.
Purchased from: H&M, San Francisco
Brand: H&M
Price: ~$50
Occasion: Friend’s wedding in Santa Monica, CA (also wore for my hubby’s work Christmas party)
www.LuLus.com: I owe finding this gem to Miss Courtney herself! Last summer she was soliciting inputs on some great online dress finds, and mentioned LuLu’s. I was hooked at first click ;) I’ve shopped here twice for dresses and both times went out of my comfort zone by choosing one-shoulder ideas. One word to the wise: these dresses run short! And I’m only a little over 5’4″.
Purchased from: Lulus.com
Brand: Lulu’s Deft Precision in Navy
Price: $60
Occasion: Friend’s wedding in Washington DC
Purchased from: Lulus.com
Brand: Lulu’s Bat Your Lashes, in blush
Price: $32
Occasion: Friend’s wedding in Kauai
Friend’s Closets: Never underestimate the power of doing some good ol’ closet shopping! Lucky for me, I have a few friends with pricier tastes that wear the same dress size as me. In my experience, I love to see clothes have another chance out on the town, particularly dresses. My friends were more than happy to open up their closets to me and I came out with two beauties that I didn’t have to break the bank for. Talk about a win-win situation ;)
Borrowed from: Ilyssa’s closet
Brand: BCBG
Price: ~$300, but free for me!
Occasion: Wedding Professionals Gala
Borrowed from: Mojan’s closet
Brand: BCBG
Price: >$170, but free for me!
Occasion: Friend’s wedding in Illinois
Other places I highly recommend for fun, flirty frocks are: Victoria’s Secret (Clearance / Sale items), Arden B, and Target (now carrying Zac Posen and Rodarte)
Now it’s your turn to share your closet secrets:
- Where do you buy your dresses? If you have a great go-to website or store, please share!
- Fashion Do or Don’t? Wearing white to a wedding (when you’re not the bride!). I say it’s more of a Don’t than a Do, unless of course you’ve cleared it with the Bride. As for wearing black, totally fine, especially for late afternoon / evening weddings.
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Thanks so much, Shanna, for a great Fashion Friday post!!
Shanna, you look gorgeous in every single one of these pictures!! :) xo
RentTheRunway.com! You rent designer dresses for $50-200+ depending on the designer. You can order 2 sizes to make sure it fits, it comes perfectly dry cleaned in a garment bag with a postage paid envelope to send it back in the day after your event. They have accessories, as well. It’s perfect for me who always wants a new dress for every event, and hates wearing the same thing twice ;)
Oh my – that sounds right up my alley!
Yay! Looks good Courtney — thanks for having my guest blog ;)
I’ll have to check back to see what other fabulous ideas your readers come up with :)
I love all the cute clothes! Take me shopping with you – I am a shopoholic :)
I’d be happy to! Do you live in Cali Ally? (ooo notice that rhymed?)
Loving all of these dress picks! :) And now, I have found a new blog to read!
Yay Shari! Chicago rocks btw!
Bridesmaid dresses double great as dresses for weddings as a guest! A lot of bridal shops have cute, fun and flirty little dress options now for bridesmaids and a lot of the time you can get them pretty inexpensively, they are ordered to size, and you can usually choose color & fabric and can always add options yourself to make it stand out. Just make sure you know where the bride had her girls get their dresses and what color they are so you don’t look like you’re part of the bridal party! ;)
So true! I tried picking out bridesmaids dresses that my girls could wear ago or just slightly alter.
Such great tips, Shanna! All these pretty dresses makes me want to go and dress up, haha!
I love Shanna’s style and wish I can do a closet swap with her :)
I’m all for bargain shopping too and I try very hard not to purchase something that is full price.
I love shopping at Nordstrom Rack and all the online stores mentioned above.
Recently, most of my clothes (except work clothes) have been purchased thru sample sales. If you haven’t gone to a sample sale, you should at least try to do it once. I found $80-$100 dresses for $8. BUT you have to be a smart shopper to get the right stuff because most of the good stuff are gone an hour after you walk in the store.
I did a post of my fave dresses….majority of them were from Arden B’s sample sale.
Here’s the link -> http://healthycoconut.wordpress.com/2011/02/01/lets-talk-dresses/
I’ll swap anytime Lea! Can I borrow the gren/white striped one? ;)
Shanna, you’re a life saver. I have a friends wedding in May, nothing to wear, and very little money! :)
Since I’m going to multiple weddings this summer, this post was very timely. I love all your dresses, especially that navy one!
I like Nordstrom Rack and sites like ruelala and gilt groupe. With the website though, you have to be on the ball though because their sizes run out super quick.
Love all of these! You look great in all of them! I recently discovered mjrsales.com. It’s basically an outlet for Victoria’s Secret online and the discounts are seriously deep. I got 3 (more casual) summer dresses on clearance for $35 with shipping! They have a ton of styles, so I’m sure you could find something wedding-worthy there! :D
What! That’s awesome! Totally going to check it out!
That sounds like my kinda place! :)
Great post Shanna! I love your style, so hot and chic ;) That dress you wore in Kauai is so simple but it looks so gorgeous on you. I love buying dresses from Macy’s, they have such a pretty selection
you look so classy! thanks for the informative post!
Thanks for introducing me to Lulus.com!!! I just ordered a dress from there, I can’t wait to get it! Have you ever been to Modcloth.com?
Ahh I’ll be 28 in a few years! I hope I’ll look as good as you! :)
Great post, Shanna! I need to go shopping with you! I’ve also found great dresses at the outlet mall, and in particular, at the BCBG outlet. Dresses that are normally hundreds of dollars are ridiculously marked down to <$100. Thanks for all the info!
omgoodness! totally coveting the lulu’s belted sheath w/ the dolman sleeves in “blush” I adore the color and the easy-breezy style! and $32, are you kidding me?!?
Shanna take me shopping! (Pretty Please?) ::)
omgoodness! totally coveting the lulu’s belted sheath w/ the dolman sleeves in “blush” I adore the color and the easy-breezy style! and $32, are you kidding me?!?
Totally going to check it out! I hope I’ll look as good as you! So true!
Looking great in all of those photos. I love the simplicity of that black dress. Thumbs up!
Well i like all the posts here on your blog. It all looks awesome there.
Awesome blog by an awesome lady.
Hats off…
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