House of Brides: Knockoffs or real?

House of Brides is based out of Chicago so it's much more legit than say a Chinese website....however the site obviously has so many bad reviews for a reason and I would not overlook that simply to save a few dollars, as it may end up costing you a lot more in the end. If you are able to go to one of their stores in person, I would opt for going that route. If you want to chance it with the site, then at the least make sure you use Paypal so that if things come out screwed up, you can have an easier time disputing and getting your money back. Good luck!

House of brides is legit, but I wouldn't trust them. If you are going to get a dress online see if www.bestbridalprices.com has it first. They are a much much better site.

Thanks ladies

I'm here in Chicago and House of Brides is across the street from the David's Bridal I went to. Never really thought of going to them. But I'll be that way today so I think I'll stop by to see how their dresses look. If you tell me what dress you are looking at I'll take a picture of it if they have one in stock. Let me know...If fact email me at ***************@*****.*** because I'm horrible at coming back to threads to see the responds.

Well, I haven't tried it on yet, so I don't know if I want it as bad as I think I do but if this isn't the most beautiful thing I 've ever seen I'm looking at http://www.alfredangelo.com/collections/styles/1153w

With the difference in price, it might be worth it to drive up to Chicago, and buy the dress in the store...

I definitely belive HOB is legit and you can get the designer dresses there. Me personally though, did not have the best experience there, but everyone is different. And, I hope Takara can take a pciture of the dress, or try and sneak one.. Because they are very strict about taking pictures of the dresses...I ended up going to David's for both my wedding and BM's dresses. Prices were better and the customer service/experience was a lot better for me!

@ "Megan"

Just so you know, you need to create a vendor profile, you can't create a fake bride account to use to comment on the forums. ~ thanks

I live close to a HOB store. I purchased my dress from them. It was high quality and gorgeous!

Eeeeehhhhh.... Fake bride profile does NOT make a good impression... idk... maybe I'll look elsewhere.

I'm pretty sure that I read on the AA website a while ago that House of Brides was no longer authorized to sell their lines, so just for that reason I wouldn't do business with them. And I mean they made a fake account to comment on your post... yeah, no!

I ordered bridesmaid dresses from them as well and while the dresses were legit and beautiful they took over 6 months to get here even though told us said 8-12 weeks max Thank goodness we ordered waayy in advance so it didnt cause an issue. Not great customer service when they were late either. Give them a fake date about 4 months before your actual wedding so you dont have issues!

Wow, their reviews are atrocious. If they're that bad in person, I imagine they'd be much less helpful online.

I ordered from Dressilyme.com (China) my dress is so beautiful and customized to my specs (had train left off, added corset back instead of zipper and more beading) all for under $200. Received dress in 4 weeks which was 2 weeks earlier than they promised. I am very pleased.

Lorena is it a good quality? I would love to be able to choose different options like that as I am picky. There isnt a whole lot of places out here, a few overly expensive boutiques and davids bridal is all we have, of course not tryin the dress on freaks me out too.

Yes, the dress is great quality. Taffeta w/fully boned corset built in. Lovely crystals., pleating is synetrical and pick ups are held w/clear iridescent beads. Just lovely. Arrived in a tiny box so it was a bit wrinkled, but otherwise perfect. I posted pics in the forum thread Dressilyme. They were very responsive to my many inquiries which calmed my nerves a lot also be sure to have someone else measure you carefully using their messurement guide. I hope this helps you.

Professionalism seems to be a bit issue with HOB, I think I will probably look elsewhere.

Lorena, I have ordered a LOT of stuff from chinese wholesalers in the past, I'm a bit of an ebay addict and when I was dancing I bought almost all of my professional quality outfits from Chinese manufacturers, and I've always had very good luck with them. I've bought some wedding stuff from similar sources, and I've run into a little bit of trouble, some flowers being the wrong color and of course shipping in the smallest possible box so that stuff gets all smushed, but in my experience these types of sellers are EXTREMELY concerned about maintaining high feedback ratings and typically respond to complaints very quickly and I've always had my issues resolved. I do have one site that I use fairly frequently which will hold your money in escrow until you confirm that you received the product as described, so I think I might try buying a dress from them, (with PLENTY of time to spare), then

Return it if it's not up to the quality I expect. That way I don't have to worry about someone shady running off with my money. For the prices that they're charging, it's a gamble that might just be worth it

Success to you Mika. They also have a profile on Facebook with pics submitted by actual brides in their dresses.

DO NOT USE HOUSE OF BRIDES.

My bridesmaids dresses are ~3 weeks late, I have ~5 weeks until my wedding.

I highly doubt they will be here on time even though we ordered 4 months ago.