Prom Dress Shopping Brings Excitement and Stress

Great Crossing High School will host its first prom in its three years of being open on April 23rd, 2022, and students have been highly anticipating this moment. With prom quickly approaching, junior and senior girls at Great Crossing are scrambling to find the perfect dress. When trying to find a style that is flattering, in a color one loves to wear that fits into a budget, the search for the ideal prom dress can be stressful. 

Students have been going to places like Miss Priss and Dillard’s to compare dress styles. Every prom season comes with its own trends.  This year, students are leaning more towards bright colors.   Senior Kaelyn Faul said “People are getting a bunch of sequins and bright colors. There’s a lot of pink and orange.”  

Sequined dresses have been a hit and a miss with students. For senior Riley Baldridge, the trend is great. Baldridge said, “I plan on getting a dress that is a bright color with some sparkle! “I have been to David’s Bridal, and I found a dress I really loved! It was a hot pink a-line dress,” she said. 

For Faul, the sequins have been a total miss. “I don’t like sequins. They’re itchy, uncomfortable, and heavy. I wanted something that fits my personality. [My dress] is form-fitting and it’s almost like a mermaid style dress, but it goes to like mid shin before it flows. It’s wine red and has no sparkles,” Faul said. 

Some students chose a style that has been popular throughout several decades.  Junior Madeline Roark said “I went to Miss Priss to get my dress. I picked out more of a ball gown-looking dress, which is what I prefer on myself.” 

While dress shopping has its perks, it can also be a strenuous process. There are lots of issues that students run into when dress shopping.  For some students, it is just finding the dress that’s perfect, but not simple. Faul said, “Trying to find a dress in my size in a decent style without looking big and poofy was the hardest thing.” 

For others, sizing is the most exhausting part. Baldridge said, “[The hardest part] was finding one that was the perfect fit. I find it difficult to find a dress that’s on-trend that is also a bigger size. I think the sizing of prom dresses lately has not been accurate, and it’s made it very difficult to shop.”

 Roark also had this problem and said, “The biggest difficulty, for me, was finding the dress that fit perfectly. I didn’t want to have to get it hemmed or altered.” 

Once students are past the pressure of dress shopping, they can focus on the most important part of prom: having a great night with friends.