Getting married in New York is expensive! Especially when you need to buy two wedding gowns, instead of just one:

An owner of Designer Loft, a bridal shop in Manhattan's garment district, Paulette Cleghorn, said in recent years she's seen an influx of women "with an enlightened sense of fashion" picking out two wedding dresses.

"They want to look a little more parent-appropriate for the ceremony, and they feel more comfortable showing off their bodies at the reception," she said. "A dress covered in thousands of Swarovski crystals may not be appropriate for the ceremony, but in a candlelit reception hall makes for the most exquisite bride ever."

Well, there's the ethnic contingent: "It's common for American women of Asian, Indian, and Arab descent to opt to wear a Western-style white gown, and a colorful Eastern-style design on their wedding day," we helpfully learn. Okay, them aside! Who else?

At her September 2005 wedding at the Palace Hotel on Madison Avenue, New Yorker Lourdes Cohen, now 25, wore two Monique Lhuillier dresses.

When she took her vows, she wore a short-sleeve, full-length white lace gown with a gold sash. Later, for the reception and afterparty, also held at the Palace, she changed into a high-collar, lowback white minidress. "It was still white, it was still lace, and I still was obviously the bride, but I was able to dance the night away," Mrs. Cohen, a non-practicing lawyer, said.

Dressed to Wed, Dressed to Party [NYS]

[Image via]