The following is a post by Sydney, aka Mrs. Samurai. She’s one of the most frugal people I know, which is one of the reasons why we get along so great. She’d rather go to Target than Prada. Whoo hoo!

Did you just receive a black tie wedding invitation and are in a bit of a panic over the dress code? I was in the same boat!

Here’s my own story about how I figured out how to dress to the 9s for a black tie wedding for cheap. It’s totally possible to look the part without spending a fortune.

A Black Tie Wedding Invitation Arrives

Sam and I were thrilled when our friend finally popped the question to his girlfriend of five years and she said yes.

Tidbits on their possible wedding date and plans started to trickle in over the months that followed. Due to the devastating wildfires throughout the Sonoma Valley area, their plans of a wine country wedding were dashed. But lucky for us they picked San Francisco instead.

Our friends hired a fancy NYC wedding planner pretty quickly. They anticipated having a 200-person guest list and wanted to go big. They could easily afford it, so more power to them.

Many months went by though, the bachelor party came and went (on the early side), and there was still no sign of a save the date card or a wedding invitation. Did the wedding planner drop the ball?

Anyway, two months before the supposed wedding date, the invitation finally arrived.

A Fancy Black Tie Wedding Awaits

Completely customized in the most ornate papers with 3D inks, carefully handpicked historic stamps, and a wax seal on the envelope to boot, the excitement of opening the invitation was well worth the wait.

Impressive quality, especially considering my husband and I used a free evite for our wedding invitations many years ago.

We carefully admired our friends’ invitation together when my eyes suddenly fell on the words “Attire: Black Tie.” Gulp. Black Tie?! Uh oh, what does that mean? I nervously exclaimed.

My husband lightheartedly said, Oh I’m sure it’s no big deal. We can just wear whatever. I’m just going to wear my old black suit and tie. After all, what else could “black tie” mean?

Knowing how our friends have a taste for the finer things in life and are frequently invited to attend banquets and fancy fundraisers, I raised an eyebrow and said, Mmmm you better check with him first.

What Do You Wear To A Black Tie Wedding?

Sure enough, the more I researched black tie weddings, the clearer it became that our friends meant business with their dress code.

A suit and tie were not gonna cut it for my hubby. He asked, and his friend said no. Black tie attire meant tuxedo for the men! And I was going to need to find a fancy dress to match.

When browsing their wedding website, I noticed that “floor length evening gowns” were specified for ladies.

• Ladies, whenever in doubt, it’s best to go with a floor length dress versus tea length or shorter if the invitation doesn’t specify. You can’t go wrong with an evening gown. Solid colors work well, especially jewel tones.

Fancy clothes aren’t my thing. Neither are fancy shoes or handbags. I get much more excited about comfy leggings and sweatshirts. Disappointed that none of the cocktail dresses I had in my closet would work, I hit the internet to start searching for black tie dresses.

First I checked out Rent The Runway at my hubby’s suggestion (I swear he knows more about fashion than me; I’m fashionably clueless). There were some nice dresses, but seeing some rental price tags for $100-$150+, the frugality in me wanted to find a dress for that price that I could keep instead.

Plus, I was very skeptical about finding a floor length black tie dress that would fit me – I’m on the shortest end of petites.

• If you are average height or tall, however, Rent The Runway is a great option to find a fancy black tie dress. You’ll have a ton more options to choose from than petite women and are more likely to find a gown that fits on the first try.

Custom Made Black Tie Dresses

With so many more important things going on in my life, the last thing I wanted was to deal with the stress of renting a dress that didn’t fit and getting in a bind of finding something at the last minute.

However, I knew that if I bought a new dress, I’d likely have to get it tailored to my height. So I started searching for affordable custom made dresses online out of curiosity for what I’d find.

To my surprise I found a great website that had all sorts of gorgeous dresses that could be customized in any color and ordered to fit based on my own measurements. I must have spent over five hours browsing around, mesmerized by the endless options.

I got so close to pulling the trigger on a gorgeous tulle dress when my gut instinct told me it all seemed too good to be true. So I decided to search for reviews on this particular website and quickly discovered a ton of bad reviews. Yikes! Not worth the risk, so I scratched that plan.

• Be very wary of websites that make customized dresses, especially those made overseas. Sure you might get a custom made dress in the mail, but it will highly likely take much longer to arrive than expected, will not be the quality you hoped, probably won’t fit quite right even if you gave them your measurements, and worst of all will not be fully or even partially refundable.

Bridesmaid Dresses Can Work Surprisingly Well

Next, I started searching places like Nordstrom’s for black tie dresses. Nothing got me excited and I was starting to get frustrated. I didn’t want to spend $200, or anywhere close to $1,000+ for a designer name dress I would realistically probably only wear once every 5-10 years.

After wasting even more time on the internet, I started to realize a lot of the dresses that showed up in black tie searches were just plain old, simple bridesmaid dresses.

That got me thinking. I went to my closet and poked around until I found a black bridesmaid dress from a cheap bridal store that I wore to a friend’s wedding back in 2012. I had to suck in to get the zipper all the way up, but it held and by golly it was floor length.

Black felt kinda boring to wear to a wedding, but at least it was classic. And the perfect color to match my husband’s black tie tuxedo. ;) Best of all, the dress was already tailored and wouldn’t cost me anything.

New shoes? Screw that. I still had the fake patent leather black heels I wore with it collecting dust in the back of my closet. Dress – check. Shoes – check. Now I was starting to get excited again. My to-do list was down to a clutch purse and some bling.

I saw a beautiful silver clutch purse at the mall for $50, but just didn’t want to spend that much for a purse I wouldn’t frequently use. So I turned to Amazon, my godsend for everything I buy that isn’t clothes. I found a silver clutch that was big enough to fit my iPhone 7S Plus for less than $12. Score!

Last on my list was some bling. Fake bling of course. But it had to look authentic since I wanted a statement piece, and I knew many of the wedding guests would be wearing the real deal.

I did a quick search online at Charming Charlie and found this gorgeous statement necklace for only $26.

If fake bling isn’t your thing, but you don’t want to pay luxury brand prices, you can find affordable diamond solitaire necklaces for under $500, bold sterling silver necklaces for under $300 and lots more on sites like Blue Nile.

My Total Cost For A Black Tie Wedding: Only $38!

I was thrilled to be able to spend less than $40 bucks from head to toe. Best of all, I got at least four compliments on my necklace and two on my dress at the wedding!

And when my heels unexpectedly sunk into the muddy grass three times that evening (I wasn’t expecting we’d be outside!) I didn’t shed any tears over my shoes getting dirty.

• Hair accessory $0 (received as a gift 15 years ago)
• Earrings $0 (received as a gift 10 years ago)
• Statement necklace $26
• Floor length dress (used bridesmaid dress, $90 back in 2012)
• Clutch purse $12
• Black (fake) patent leather heels $0 (paid about $30 back in 2012)

So there you have it. It’s totally possible to attend a black tie wedding without spending a fortune and still look like a million bucks. If you got a black tie wedding invitation in the mail, dig around in your closet before shelling out for new things. You might be surprised what you’d find that you can reuse.

For those of you guys out there that were patient enough to read through this, thanks for sticking around! Your best bet for a black tie wedding is to simply rent a tux. It’s pretty straight forward. Just give yourself enough time to get fitted and reserve your tux before the wedding date approaches.

My hubby spent about $150 for his tuxedo rental including shoes and all of those PITA shiny clip-on buttons. He looked better than James Bond himself!

If you like wedding topics, here are some other fun articles you’ll enjoy.

Who Should Pay For The Wedding? A Logical Guide To Lavish Spending

Wedding Spending Rules To Follow If You Don’t Want To End Up Broke And Alone

The New Rule For Engagement Ring Buying

Readers, have you ever attended a black tie wedding? Was it your own, a friend’s or a relatives? How much did you spend on your outfit? What’s the most you’re willing to spend to dress up for a fancy shin dig?

The post How To Dress Well On The Cheap For A Black Tie Wedding appeared first on Financial Samurai.

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