The concept of special wedding garments is an ancient one, but attitudes and styles have certainly changed over the centuries. Traditional wedding dresses in China and other Asian countries, for example, were traditionally red (red is considered an auspicious color in many parts of Asia). In ancient Rome, wedding gowns were deep yellow, while ancient Athenian wedding gowns were violet or red.

The first recorded case of a white wedding dress in the West was when Princess Philippa of England was married to Eric of Pomerania in 1408. This was far from a trend at the time, however, and dresses of various colors and styles were used throughout Europe.

White wedding dresses began to gain traction in the West after Queen Victoria wore white in her marriage in 1840. Some brides chose to emulate her, and later on, people began to associate the color choice with purity and chastity.

Interestingly enough, old photographic processes probably had a role in reinforcing the choice for brides to dress in white. Before color photography, even the most beautifully colored dresses would be captured by photographers in a hundred shades of grey, while pure white dresses would come out more or less true to the day, standing out starkly against the black and grey spectrum of the rest of the photo.