How to Measure Yourself at Home

As much as we would love to see all of our beautiful brides, we understand not everyone has the time to come our wedding dress shop in Great Harwood, Lancashire and try on our collection of non-traditional wedding dresses. That’s why we offer our wonderful alternative wedding outfits to you online! Buying online can be scary at the best of times, let alone for your wedding dress. That’s why we’ve bundled together all the information you need to measure yourself well at home.

If you’ve not had a peek at our dresses yet, check them out here!

First Steps

  First remove any bulky clothing. Ideally just wear your underwear and whichever is your day-to-day bra so your bust measurements will reflect your typical body shape.

Standing in front of a full-length mirror, hold the measuring tape snug against your body but not too tight and don’t forget to breathe normally!

1a: Front bodice – measure from your clavicle (where the two bones meet at your neck) to your waist down the centre front of your body (avoiding the bust).

1b: Waist to floor – measure from your natural waist to the floor. Keep your head up as looking down will make the length shorter.

2: Sleeve length – measuring the full length of your arm from the top edge of your shoulder to your wrist is useful for sleeve and cuff adjustments.

3: Shoulder – measure from the top edge of your shoulder to shoulder across the back as straight as you can.

4: Over bust – – this is the measurement around your body that is taken above your bust. Keep the measuring tape straight and measure just under your armpits.

5: Bust – this is the measurement around your body across the fullest part of your bust, often your nipples. Make sure you keep the measuring tape straight as you record the number so that it doesn’t dip at the back. Check this in a full-length mirror.

6: Under bust – measure where the elastic of your bra sits.

7: Waist – this is the measurement around your body at the narrowest part of your torso. If you are having difficulty finding your waist, stand tall and lean over to one side – the point where your body bends is your waist. Sometimes it can help to tie a piece of string or ribbon around your waist to find the right position.

8: High hip – measure around the top of your hip bone. Usually about 2-3” down from your waist and possibly not the fullest part.

9: Hip – your hip measurement is taken around your body at the fullest point of your hips/bottom. It’s probably lower down than you think and not around the top of your hip bone.

10: Armhole – measure the full circle from the top of your shoulder round under your arm

11: Upper arm – measure around your bicep or fullest part of your upper arm.

For more sizing information, check this out.

Things to Remember

   If you are between two sizes, please remember to always choose the bigger size. As you can imagine, it is much easier for us to take away fabric from wedding dresses, rather than to adding to it!

   If your top and bottom half are two different sizes (don’t worry, most of us are!), we can easily create a split size to make sure your wedding outfits fit you as snug as possible.

   We do offer a made-to-measure wedding dress service, however you must come into store for us to be able to measure you ourselves. Find out more about this here.

   If you still need help, feel free to contact us using the form below. We look forward to hearing from you!