How to travel with your wedding dress
Whether you’re getting married in a faraway, exotic locale or at the local beach, you want your wedding dress to look fresh and beautiful for the most unforgettable day of your life.
Travelling with your dress by car can be tricky enough as it is. But it is travelling overseas or interstate where a big wedding dress can be a bit of a hassle.
Packing the dress for a romantic destination wedding is easy once you know how. Here are a few tips to ensure easy travel for you and your wedding dress
If you are travelling to a destination wedding, one option for packing the wedding dress is to ask the bridal salon where you purchased it to pack it for you for safe travel.
Be sure they have a box big enough so that your dress isn’t pressed into a thousand wrinkles. In many cases, wedding gowns are shipped to salons in very small boxes, and they may not have one large enough to accommodate you. If you’re packing the dress yourself, find a carton about the same length as one-third the length of your gown. Line it with tissue paper to protect the dress and put your gown in, skirt section first. Make sure the bodice will be face up when you finish. Spread it out as evenly as possible to avoid wrinkling. Add a layer of tissue paper, and then fold the dress back over it. Add another layer of tissue paper and fold until the bodice is facing you. Stuff the sleeves and bodice with more tissue paper.
When you are finished the dress should stay in one place and not move an inch! For travel to your wedding by car, the garment bag provided by the shop will be sufficient for packing the gown. Shops and salons usually insert tissue paper to keep your gown fresh and prevent most wrinkling, so packing the dress for a short trip only requires a quick touch up when you arrive. If you don’t have a garment bag to pack the wedding dress, stuff it with tissue paper yourself and put it between two fitted sheets. Pin the sheets together to protect the dress. Hang your gown from the back seat hook and drape the skirt over the seat.
When packing the dress for travel by plane, most airlines insist that the gown goes with checked baggage nowadays. For this, you will need either a very large box so the dress will have room to travel without being too wrinkled or an extra-large suitcase. If using a suitcase, make sure the inside is ultra-clean or lay sheets inside to protect your dress. There are also specialists in wedding gown cleaning and preserving who will also pack your wedding dress for travel. There is probably a professional near you who is experienced and will also have large-sized boxes for packing the dress.
Check with your wedding planner or hotel about steaming options before you travel with your gown. There may be a professional pressing service you can use once you reach your destination. Perhaps you will need to take a portable hand steamer with you. Many wrinkles relax by hanging your gown in the bathroom (well away from the shower). Turn on the hot water and let the room fill up with steam. Packing your wedding dress for travel so that it arrives fresh, clean and unwrinkled is just one of the many details which will make your special day run smoothly.
