A TikTok user was horrified after her custom-made bridal gown arrived and looked nothing like she expected.
Josephine Pepa, 25, from the United States, ordered her dream dress for her September wedding, which 500 guests were expected to attend. But when she showed up to the final fitting just 10 weeks out from the big day, she was shocked at the dress that had been designed for her.
Pepa believed the designer, who she didn't name, was reputable because they had previously made a gown for her good friend.
"She designed her dress, [and it was] stunning, amazing, perfection," Pepa said in a TikTok video. "So I was like, perfect."
Pepa showed the designer the inspiration for her wedding dress, which was a sweeping white gown with sheer long sleeves covered in pearls.
She paid US$7000 (NZ$10,913) for the custom-made dress, but what she received compared with what she wanted didn't meet her expectations. Pepa also admitted there were a few red flags when she went to her first fitting in December last year.
"The dress is like a skeleton," Pepa said in the video. "So I'm like, 'OK, it's obviously [not] what it's supposed to look like'."
But the designer assured her the actual dress wouldn't look like the gown she tried on.
Six months later, Pepa said the designer requested a final fitting - which would be only the second time she'd be trying on her wedding dress - be pushed back a month.
Pepa described the dress she put on in her final fitting in July as a "literal nightmare" and "horrific".
"I was sobbing," she said. "I'm like, 'Get this dress off of me'."
She said pearls had to be hot-glued onto the bodice because the bra cups were showing through the transparent material.
Pepa later sent the designer a text saying she didn't want to move forward with the dress.
"You and I both know that is a sad excuse of a wedding dress, with endless design flaws regardless if it matched what I initially ASKED you to recreate," she told the designer.
"Not only are they two completely different dresses but my dress alone is an embarrassment for both of us.
"You yelled saying that the dress I showed you I wanted was actually just used as 'inspiration'. When were you going to tell me it was an inspiration and couldn't actually be done?"
Two days later, Pepa was back at the drawing board to find a new wedding dress. Luckily, she found two dresses she loved - one for the wedding ceremony and the other for the reception.
In the end, her new dresses ended up costing her twice the amount of the custom-made gown, Insider reported, in part because of short-notice alterations.
Pepa ended up receiving a full refund for the custom dress and despite the late-hour stress close to her wedding day, she said "everything really does happen for a reason".
"I look at my wedding photos now and thank God I ended up getting the new dresses," she told Insider. "As dramatic as this sounds, I think I believe in divine intervention after this chaotic situation."
