Today's Bride-At-35 Beauty Blast!!

Part of being a bride is looking freaking awesome on your wedding day, and that doesn't change when you're north of 35.  We asked fabulous Charlotte-based stylist Caron (just Caron, because she has it like that), her thoughts. Caron has been in the beauty business for 22 years, working nationally as a stylist and as a national educator for a global beauty manufacturer.  She's recently opened Noir, a salon that specializes in beautiful hair color and eyebrow styling.  In January, Noir will be opening the Wedding Suite, a place exclusively for wedding parties to get beautified on the big day, either in the salon or at your wedding site (stylists will even travel to your destination wedding! We want to come too!! Okay, back to the point...).

Here's what Caron had to say about ageless beauty....

On Who's Taking the Plunge:

"I am seeing brides in 2 age groups; either very young or older than me. Lately, I am seeing more women in their  late-30s to 60's, some first timers and some getting remarried. The remarried ones are finding the courage to get married again after being bound to a bad marriage, but they are now bound by what's "appropriate", either because of what people are telling them, or because they don't see themsleves in magazines.  But I saw one bride whose grandson walked her down the aisle."

On Doing You:

"I had one client in her 40's with very fine hair, and she wanted to
grow it out so she could wear her hair up for her wedding because that's what people told her to do. This is a woman who (was choosing on her wedding day) to go barefoot, walking down the hallway of the home that she owned with her fiance', but when I asked her why she wanted to wear her hair up, she didn't know why. I told her to cut her hair and be herself, so on her wedding day she wore a short bob and a strapless gown and that is (supposed to be) a no-no at 46. She said that it was the best thing she could have done. It's because it wasn't a mask. It was her walking into the next part of her life.

Women grow their hair out for a year and cut it after their honeymoon. You can do what you want with your hair; showcase it; it is an asset; don't hide it. You don't have to work through a head of shellack on your wedding night."

On Doing It Yourself, but With Some Help....

"The biggest mistake that people make is doing their own make-up without a professional lesson; there are ways to do it without breaking your bank or your heart- you need your guidance."

On Embracing The Beauty That You Are RIGHT NOW:

"#1 advice- don't focus or be so hard on what you look like now as opposed to how you looked the first time (you got married) or what you would have looked if you got married when you were younger. Where you are now is more beautiful than where you were at 22 because in your maturity because you know who you are,  and that produces a beauty that no make-up or hairdressing is going to accomplish."

On True Radiance:
"A radiant bride is in 2 ways:  I know of a recent young bride; (when you are young) you can be happy because you are young and getting married; everything was in place. Everything went well. But the 46 year old bride I worked with was beautiful and was in her own hallway that she owned; her eyes were open. She wasn't blinded by the perfection. You can't top that day. (At that age) you see the possibilities and not the limitations. When you see a woman walk with grace and poise it's a different kind of amazing."

Why you should read this blog

So you're over 35 and you're getting married! Maybe this is your second time (or third - we don't judge). Or maybe, like us, this is your initial trip down the aisle fantastic, because you didn't find anybody awesome enough to marry before now. Anyway, congrats (or in the words of Leslie's husband's people, Mazel Tov!)

Like any bride, you might be hitting the wedding salons, grabbing every magazine with the word "bride" in it, or Googling ideas for dresses and hairstyles and funky trendy places to get your photos taken (is EVERY  hipster wedding at a carnival now?).

And if you've done that already, you may have noticed that you're apparently supposed to be the mother of the bride.

Because what else could explain the lack of women over the age of, we don't know, 25, in bridal gowns in the ads at your national chain bridal emporiums? Or their absence in bridal magazine ads or most features that aren't obviously meant to be a token inclusion so you won't get disgusted and not pay $6 for their rag. Or just the weird looks you get when you walk into a bridal store and ask to try something on and the clerk tries not to look surprised when you say, yeah, the appointment's for you.

Yeah, yeah, we know. Youth and beauty sells. And we get it. We fully expect beautiful, thin, young girls to populate those amazing, slinky, expensive gowns and to look awesome doing it. Here's the thing - if you NEVER see yourself reflected in a store, or an ad, or in cool awesome blogs, you start to think that maybe you're not supposed to be there. It's like "Take your old wrinkly butt over to Chico's bridal department...wait, they don't have one? Whoops."

Remember that awful Newsweek story from 1986 that said that women over 30 had only a 20 percent chance of getting married, and that for women over 40 that went down to 2 percent? First of all, screw that story. Apparently, it wasn't even true then, and it certainly isn't now. In 2006, Newsweek revealed that 40 year old women now have a 40 percent chance of getting married.  Now, that's better, but we have a feeling that in this day and age of people waiting later and later to walk down the aisle that number will continue to grow. Shoot, among a random sampling of people whose last name is Streeter (our maiden name) and were born in April of 1971, that stat goes up to 100%!

Bottom line, we're not the unicorn.  That's why we wanted to provide a place for brides over 35 (or even those under 35, if you feel like it) to post their photos, look for advice, encouragement and signs that say: You're not weird. You're just in love!