What to Do With Old Wedding Dresses: 9 Recycling Ideas To Take It From Sentimental to Sustainable
Your wedding day was undoubtedly one of the most memorable days of your life.
But at some point, once the celebrations and honeymoon are over (of course), you’ll inevitably wonder what to do with your old wedding dress.
There’s no reason why you can’t keep the memories of your special day alive in a meaningful and creative way—instead of gathering dust in the back of your otherwise minimalist wardrobe.
That’s why we’re tackling what happens beyond the Big Day a la wedding dress recycling ideas, so you can turn any retired wedding dress into a sustainable wedding dress.
Ideas On What To Do With Your Old Wedding Dress
1. Where To Sell Old Wedding Dresses
Are used wedding dresses worth anything?
Absolutely! There is a huge market featuring old wedding dresses for sale.
Selling your wedding dress might seem like a daunting thing to do, but what better way to make sure it continues to be loved than to let it make another blushing bride feel beautiful?
And if you’re feeling the post-wedding pinch, it’s the perfect way to make some cash back while helping someone else avoid a little of the financial pressure of wedding planning.
As you can do with any old clothes and old shoes in good condition, check out local consignment options first because it avoids the dreaded carbon footprint of shipping. You’ll get paid if and when the store sells your dress.
If there’s nothing near you, there are plenty of websites to help you sell your used wedding dress:
- Stillwhite is one of the largest online wedding dress marketplaces. You can filter searches by brand, size, and budget.
- PreOwnedWeddingDresses offers a helpful wedding dress value calculator if you’re concerned that sentiment might cloud your thinking.
- Nearly Newlywed is another marketplace to look for designer bridal gowns at a fraction of the price. Unlike some other options, dresses are free to list.
Other generic platforms to sell clothes online—like eBay and Poshmark—deal in wedding dresses, too, though you might not get as much value for them.
2. Loan Out Your Wedding Dress
Sometimes, the best answer for how to repurpose a wedding dress may be to keep it in use with its original purpose by letting it live another (wedding) day.
Budget-conscious brides are starting to realize they only need a wedding gown for their one big day and are choosing to go with clothing and dress rental online services and spend the money they save elsewhere.
In the US, SomethingBorrowedBridals lets you easily offer up old wedding dresses for rent with no more effort than getting it to the shop. Every time your dress is rented out you get paid a percentage.
If you live in the UK, list your dress for rent using the By Rotation app, which can also be used for any fashion apparel.
3. Where to Donate Old Wedding Dresses
If money isn’t a concern for you, an excellent wedding dress recycling option is to donate or gift your dress so it becomes someone’s “something old”.
Knowing your wedding dress will be well-loved over again and helping out a bride on her big day is a true win, win.
Plus, it will be nice for them to wear a dress that already has some sentimental value attached to it before adding sentiment of their own.
The Salvation Army, Goodwill, and other local thrift stores will gladly accept wedding gown donations, as well as these specific charities:
- NICU Helping Hands Angel Gown Program provides comfort for grieving families who have recently lost a newborn. Donated dresses are transformed into baby gowns for final photos and burial services by volunteer seamstresses.
- Brides Across America is a non-profit organization committed to loving one another by donating wedding dresses to military, first responders, and front-line healthcare brides—26,000+ so far!
- Adorned in Grace helps in the fight against human sex trafficking with a mission of creating awareness, prevention, and restoration for survivors. Donate your wedding dress if it’s less than five years old.
- Brides Against Breast Cancer is a 501(c) nonprofit that resells donated wedding dresses and donates a percentage of the sale goes towards breast cancer research.
- Brides for a Cause takes wedding dress donations, resells them, and use the proceeds to raise money for different causes.
- Operation Prom and Cinderella’s Closet take wedding dresses to help dress low-income students for their prom.
Donate your wedding dress to local theaters and performing arts programs to add to their costume repertoire.
Maybe you’ll get to see it onstage in an upcoming production of The Wedding Singer!
4. Ways To Repurpose Wedding Dresses
It’s perfectly understandable that you don’t want to part with this core memory from your happy wedding day.
Fortunately, recycling wedding gowns doesn’t necessarily mean letting them go.
Consider working with a seamstress or tailor to create a new item of upcycled clothing. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t wear your restyled dress all over the place after its initial debut.
You could dye it a new color and transform it into a beautiful gown or cocktail dress fit for any number of special occasions.
However, not all fabrics and embellishments dye well. Lace, for example, is permeable and won’t soak up color. Silk, on the other hand, usually takes dye very well. If you’re not sure what to do, look for a professional.
Another popular way of recycling wedding dresses after the wedding is to commission a custom christening gown or flower girl dress. There’s likely to be extra fabric, so keep the leftover fabric for future family additions.
5. Ways To Upcycle Wedding Dresses
What can you make with an old wedding dress?
Anything and everything!
Choosing the upcycle wedding dress route is not limited to creating other garments.
If you have the time and experience, turn your dress into a piece of decor or accessories to appreciate daily.
Here’s some of our favorite wedding dress repurpose ideas:
- Reuse wedding dresses as sustainable home decor by transforming them into tablecloths, table runners, curtains, or homemade napkins to remind you of your special day each time you use them.
- Create a photo album or wedding card keepsake by embellishing it with material from your wedding gown. Choose some of your favorite parts from the dress, cut them out, and use them to cover a photo album.
- Turn your dress into sustainable Christmas decorations. A circular skirt will be easy to convert into the bottom part of a no-sew Christmas tree skirt.
- If you like flowers but aren’t the best at remembering to water them, turning your wedding dress into fancy everlasting florals could be the answer. Take buttons from the dress, earrings you wore at the wedding, or another sentimental item of jewelry and attach it to the center of the flower for an extra special touch.
- Make a throw pillow to put your dress on permanent display on your eco-friendly sofa. Choose a beaded back or jeweled neckline for the front, and save the plainer fabric for the reverse to replace old pillows that have seen better days.
- Create a patchwork quilt using your gown and other memorable elements from your wedding, like material from the shirt or tie your husband wore or handkerchiefs used by your parents or grandparents. Offer to recycle bridesmaid dresses from your wedding party, too, or have wedding photos printed onto fabric to add to the quilt.
- Create a DIY shadow box with a detailed section of dress along with other mementos such as an eco-friendly wedding invitations.
If you don’t have the DIY expertise (or confidence to take scissors to your beloved gown), here are some companies that repurpose wedding dresses for you:
- Jem Design takes dresses made of tulle, satin, or wedding dress lace and transforms them into beautiful handbags and clutches.
- Sockcreations started out upcycling old socks and now also turns your wedding or fancy cocktail dress into keepsakes, such as teddy bears.
6. Frame Your Old Wedding Gown
If a shadow box doesn’t do your dream dress justice, frame the entire thing to keep it in pristine condition.
You can do so yourself or get some help from the professionals at Outrageous Framing and The Beautiful Frame Company.
Hang it on the wall as a stunning art piece, a sentimental reminder of your special day, and an inspiring old wedding dress idea.
It’s perfect for those looking for what to do with vintage wedding dresses that are rare or have extra sentimental value attached—like those that were handed down from your mom or grandma.
7. Compost Your Natural Wedding Dress
If you’ve not yet tied the knot, consider fabric end-of-life before you ever say “yes” to the dress.
Erin Smith has come up with a “Growable Gown”, a green wedding fashion item created from panels of snow-white fungus. Once the panels are grown, they can be baked and molded into a form-fitting gown.
However, if mushrooms don’t fit your dream matrimonial ceremony, choose any biodegradable wedding dress made using natural materials, like organic cotton, hemp, or linen.
Just avoid synthetic fabrics.
When your wedding is over, shred the dress and toss it in your compost. Eventually, it can help grow your ecological garden—as your marriage grows right alongside it.
8. Save Your Old Wedding Gown For Your Anniversary
This is one of the more fun wedding dress recycle ideas and something you can do every year, fitting allowed.
If your husband still has his wedding suit, have him put that on too, and relive your wedding bliss every year—or in ten when you plan to renew your vows.
Make sure you store it properly, as this will ensure it stays in good condition for many years to come.
9. Preserve Your Old Wedding Dress
Haven’t quite decided what to do with your old wedding dress after the wedding yet?
Sentimentality makes big decisions like this harder, so take your time deciding, but be sure to keep your wedding dress in tip-top condition in storage until you figure it out.
After all, your memories aren’t going to be quite the same if you pull out a gown that’s musty, dusty, and full of moth holes.
First, store it away clean, either after professional cleaning or self-cleaning, in which case be sure to read the label for any special instructions. Spot test the cleaning agent to ensure it doesn’t react negatively with the fabric, and only use a soft-bristled brush.
Once cleaned, handle the dress wearing white cotton gloves to avoid any oils on your skin soaking into the fabric. In the storage box, only use acid-free tissue paper and keep the box out of the light and away from moisture.
Alternatively, professional preservation services are often the best way to ensure it can be passed down to someone else or repurposed for yourself.
With The Knot, your gown will be dry-cleaned using GreenEarth Cleaning methods, repaired, steamed, pressed, and professionally folded. It will be packaged in acid-free packaging materials and comes with a lifetime warranty against yellowing.
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Why Recycle Wedding Dresses?
Unfortunately, there’s a lot of stigma and market-driven expectations in the wedding gown industry.
All those glossy bridal magazines encouraging brides to have a bridal gown that’s hers alone and never worn before don’t do the planet any favors.
Fashion is one of the largest polluters in the world, and its wasteful practices have even wrapped their disposable, cheap arms around our timeless wedding gowns.
Recycling wedding gowns—or choosing to purchase a recycled or second hand one in the first place—in no way diminishes their purpose or sentimental value.
There are so many things to do with your old wedding dress that mean it doesn’t have to gather dust or loin the 17 million tons of US textile waste.
Choosing to donate, sell, upcycle, or any one of the other uses for old wedding dresses is a way to ensure the magic of your specific day lives on in some way.
Final Thoughts On What To Do With An Old Wedding Dress
Your wedding dress was probably a large investment, and it made you feel magical on your big day—but is it necessary to keep it now?
It might make sense financially to sell it to someone else. It might not seem the most sensible thing to do to leave it hanging at the back of your closet.
Now that you know about the many options for what to do with old wedding gowns, you might not feel so bad about saying goodbye to your wedding dress.
If your own wedding dress is long gone, but you know someone with a wedding day coming up—or going through a major sustainable spring cleaning kick—share this post with them and give them some sustainable old wedding dress ideas.
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The dress donation sites are useless. All specify age five years or less.