by Vanessa Cobb

Created on: February 09, 2009

It's your day and, for many brides, a lifetime's dream come true. The fairy tale hero never counts the cost, but sadly, real world pleasures of the 21st century come with a price tag.

A budget wedding can feel like a crashing disappointment and an unreasonable compromise, yet with some canny spending decisions, you can create a spectacular experience for everyone, without re-mortgaging Granny's flat to pay for it.

In this article we'll take a look at the centrepiece of many brides' perfect-day plans: the wedding dress itself. You want to save money but you still want to glide down the aisle like a princess. Does that mean running up a masterpiece from a pair of net curtains on Aunt Vera's sewing machine, or are there other ways to find a low cost gown that won't give the game away?

Here are our top three tips for finding your dream dress for a fraction of the usual price.

At number three, it's the Ebay auction.

In the last ten minutes I've noticed plenty of gowns selling privately, several for well under 200, in a range of sizes and styles. In some cases, dresses are being made to measure and shipped from the emerging economies of China and the Pacific basin, sometimes via traders in Europe, and prices for these can be startlingly low.

One offer that caught my eye was for a dress with a "buy now" price of less than 10. It seemed far too good to be true. Admittedly the shipping added another 75 to the price. However, checking the vendor's feedback it was evident that, sure enough, several of these stunning gowns have been made and received to great satisfaction by customers in the UK. But I'd be a little suspicious and wonder whether the 10 fee was simply a down-payment on a subsequent order.

Online auctions offer a mixed bag of risk and reward and there are plenty of horror stories about deals that went badly wrong. Even reading the fine print carefully can't always protect you against a rip-off.

For the best chance of bagging a bargain on Ebay, contact the seller to confirm all the details, discuss actual measurements and fabrics, and ask for a photograph of the dress being worn. Above all, always pay by Paypal. A Paypal transaction is protected on Ebay from fraudulent activity on behalf of the seller, so the risk to you is reduced dramatically by doing so.

Even then, remember that for all your precautions, an Ebay purchase may not result in the perfect gown for you. We've all seen fabulous outfits displayed in catalogues or hanging in shop windows, but once

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>