Affordable wedding dresses are, to the fashion-forward-yet-frugal-bride, a godsend. Anyone who’s getting married or is recently-wed will know that, when planning your nuptials, you tend to split things into tiers depending on your priorities.

Tier one is your non-negotiables (i.e. the things you want to spend the most amount of money on) – think: your venue, photographer, band/entertainment. Tier two is reserved for the slightly less important things, and tier three is the nice-to-have stuff for whatever funds are left over.

Depending on the type of bride you are, your wedding dress could fall into any one of those categories, but if it’s something you’d rather not splurge on, rest assured there are styles under £1000 that look just as elegant as the ones that are 10x that.

Recent celebrity weddings (Charli xcx and George Daniel, Selena Gomez and Benny Blanco, etc. etc.) have also pushed the demand for second/evening wedding dresses tenfold, and unless you’re extremely fortunate enough to be able to afford two gowns – or are designing your own, for that matter – then a more affordable wedding dress is likely where you’re looking.

Planning your big day is no mean feat at the best of times: expensive, stressful and time-consuming. Your growing list of things-to-do will include finding the perfect venue, photographer, multi-way bridesmaid dresses to keep your pals happy and entertainment for everyone else, so when you start to tot up the cost of all of the above, a designer wedding dress may start to feel a little too extravagant for something you’ll only wear once. Totally justified.

Enter: affordable wedding dresses that look expensive. Yep, high street wedding dresses exist thanks to brands like Meshki, Ghost, Reformation and ASOS taking inspiration from designer bridalwear (by Halfpenny London, Vivienne Westwood, Vera Wang et. al.) in their affordable wedding dress collections.

Everyone’s favourite Coast has tonnes of wedding gowns that are perfectly suited to the traditional bride with beaded embellishments and tulle underskirts, while Omnes wedding dresses capture modern romanticism (and score in the sustainability games) for modest prices. Elsewhere, designer retailers Net-A-Porter and Mytheresa carry some excellent bridal brands that fall in the more affordable price bracket too. See below…

After more wedding content? Shop square neck wedding dresses, short wedding dresses and ASOS wedding dresses.

Ahead, the best high street wedding dresses that’ll blow their minds (and not your budget).