Weddingbee Blog

… are two things that are becoming a pretty big deal in my wedding world: shoes and jewelry.

I never wear jewelry, ever. I own a few pairs of earrings, but to be honest I only bought them to match particular dresses for special occasions, and I never wore them again. Even wearing an engagement ring every day really took some getting used to at first. When Mr. Martini asked me what jewelry I was going to wear on our wedding day, my first thought was that I wasn’t going to wear anything other than my engagement ring. Maybe simple studs? I have no experience in jewelry; I wouldn’t even know where to begin looking!

When I went to RK Bridal in the NYC with two of my BMs to try on BM dresses, we got to check out the bridal jewelry displayed there. I begged them to help me choose a pair of earrings for me. I don’t even want to think about what would have happened had I been left alone to choose my own earrings. In the end my BMs liked these the best:

At first, I was worried that they were “too much”. But since my dress is so simple, it didn’t take long to be convinced that I needed a little more bling. I trusted them completely and ended up buying them right there on the spot. When I came home to try them on, I was pleased. They didn’t look super huge, they weren’t heavy, and they were really pretty. But for someone who has never spent more than 15 bucks on earrings, I am still shocked that I paid 60 dollars for these puppies, but I’m happy with them!

I mentioned before that I never cared much for shoes. I wear the same pair of shoes into the ground, and besides the one pair of brown boots I hardly wear, almost all my shoes are black. Also, I’ve never spent more than 100 dollars on a pair of shoes. Ever.

I wasn’t going to spend a lot of money on my wedding shoes, either. That is, until a friend started sending me links to really cute Kate Spade shoes… and I started brainwashing myself into thinking that maybe it’s okay to spend more than 100 dollars on shoes, if they were perfect enough. And then I started entertaining the idea of wearing purple shoes. I could never pull off purple shoes on a normal day, but why not for my wedding day? Once I made the decision to do it, I decided that purple peep toes would look cuter than purple strappy shoes. Since then, I was on a mission to find the perfect purple pair.

Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that there was a gazillion shades of purple in this world and none were close to the color I was looking for. I did, however, find the perfect dye-able shoes:

(source)

These beauties are the Stuart Weitzman “Bowden” shoes. I think peep toes are so flattering and I could totally picture these in the right shade of purple! I bookmarked the site and kept searching for other possibilities, but found myself constantly going back to these. I didn’t buy them right away however, because other than the fact that they were pretty darn expensive, they also only came in white. That meant that if I happened to change my mind about dyeing them, I wouldn’t be able to wear them because my wedding dress is ivory. And did I mention that the shoes were much more expensive than any shoes I’ve ever bought in my life? And I was going to DYE them and risk ruining them before I even got a chance to wear them? Was I insane?

Then I saw this little article about T.O. Dey, which was considered the best place to dye your shoes in 2005. When I read this tip on the last line of the article, “Late in the season, buy great shoes in an ugly color that are marked way down—then have them dyed black,” it opened my eyes to a whole new world. I would use T.O. Dey to dye my shoes purple, and then dye them black after the wedding. I would have adorable black peep toes I could wear over and over again!

We called to confirm that this was possible and they said it wouldn’t be a problem. And what makes all of this even better? When I checked back at Zappos to buy my shoes, I saw that they were actually on sale! They’re still a steep price for shoes, but knowing I will get very good use out of them way past our wedding day makes them that much more worth the cost. My decision was confirmed when I got my shoes in the mail - I absolutely adore them!

I’ll be sure to post what they look like after I get them dyed, which will be soon. I’m crossing my fingers that they will turn out nicely. If these came in ivory I would even have considered wearing them the way they are - they’re that cute!

Did you dye your wedding shoes?  Do you have any tips for other brides that are looking to dye their shoes?