Melbourne Bride Wedding Expo Jun 2010 and Brides of Melbourne Bridal Gown Sale

Bride Magazine organises the Melbourne Bride Wedding Expo once a year around the 3rd week of June. The event runs for two days at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. Having won a pair of tickets from a facebook competition, it was such a bonus to go in free last week on Sat the 19th of Jun. Cousin Kayla and Ammie joined us as well - just to see what a wedding expo was all about.

We actually attend their expo back in 2007 as well when I was still working for Victorian American Imports - a car conversion company which imports amercian vehicles and converts them to right-hand drive. It was just early browsing that time and more research of the hummers used as wedding transport. But this time we had a better reason for going! ;)

Here are some snaps from that day:

The rest of the photos can be found at
http://picasaweb.google.com/melchenyi/MelbourneBrideWeddingExpoJun2010#

We found that there were less retailers as compared to the Ultimate Bridal Event expo which we attended last month and some of them were those that we had already visited at the other event. They also had Fashion parades from Bridal Retailers in Melbourne, showcasing bridal gowns and men's suits.

There were however, have a few more retailers that were more specific to Melbourne and those that weren't too high end. One exquisite worth mentioning was the Sisko decorative chocolate displays. And I also liked it that the Photo Booth company were there for people to take some crazy shots! But if you're really looking for an expo with lots more retailers and cheaper by $5, Australia Bridal Service's Ultimate Bridal Event seems the better one.

Yesterday, Darling and I also popped by Melbourne's GPO in the morning for the Brides of Melbourne Bridal Gown Sale. I knew right before hand that this shop's pricing were more on the higher end, but I just wanted to check it out anyway.

Some snaps from the shop exterior:

I didn't really have a good impression of this bridal shop. Firstly, you were made to line up and take a ticket before they let you in. And then you were assigned an assistant which gave you only like 15 minutes to pick a few gowns to try on. Can you tell me how can someone made such an important decision in such a short time frame?! It was like they expected huge crowds to flock in and grab all their gowns on sale and so only gave you about half and hour there including trying and picking out your gown.

I would never make such an important decision and spend a few thousand dollars in an impulse. Even on sale, their gowns were at least $1000 and above. And so as you can guess, in normal periods, gown prices are about $2000 and above. And photo-taking wasn't allowed too. So how can you go home and ponder about whether the gown suits you? As much as I didn't really like this shop, I hate that I actually found a gown design that I like on their website. Let's hoping I have some luck with a similar design somewhere else. :p