Everybody wants to look like the most gorgeous, radiant version of themselves on their wedding day – of course they do! And while your bridal hair and make-up team will be absolutely key to that, there are other tweaks you can make in the run-up to the wedding to ensure you look and feel amazing on the big day.
Whether you’re not sure when to start getting facials or you want to know the lowdown on your bridal beauty trials, we’ve got it covered in our Ultimate Bridal Beauty Timeline.
THE ULTIMATE BRIDAL BEAUTY TIMELINE
1 Year+ Before The Wedding: Consider Nutrition
There are certain things you can’t start too early, such as making sure you’re eating a nutritious diet that contributes to the health of your hair, skin and nails.
Eating poorly can result in lacklustre locks and dull skin – and will impact your physical and mental wellbeing too – so if you’re not already doing so, give some serious consideration to improving your eating habits.
“The skin reflects the gut. Good skin means good gut, and vice versa,” explains Gregorio Torchia, scientific director and clinical nutritionist at Nutripanda in Edinburgh.
Nutripanda create personalised dietary plans for people based on lifestyle, diet, body analysis composition and a whole host of other factors. One of the best things you can do for your health is visit a nutritionist for a bespoke consultation – but if that’s not in your budget, Gregorio has some tips on food to include in your diet that will boost the health of your skin and nails.
“Monounsaturated fatty acids can be very beneficial for your skin, an example of this being oleic acid. This can be found in extra virgin olive oil – and if you take a tablespoon or two of raw, high-quality extra virgin olive oil every day, you will soon see an improvement in your skin.”
Gregorio is also a fan of polyunsaturated fatty acids, known as PUFAs, and cites flaxseed, salmon, anchovies, mackerel and walnuts as excellent sources.
Foods high in polyphenols are worthwhile including in your diet too. “Polyphenols remove free radicals and oxidation in your body, so your skin will improve as a result,” says Gregorio. “Look for fruits and vegetables that are brightly coloured as well as dark blue and violet coloured foods, such as blueberries.”
As for your hair? “Avoid having any deficiency in B vitamins by making sure you have plenty in your diet, in particular vitamin B12,” says Gregorio.
Remember that while they can sometimes be helpful, supplements are no substitute for getting your essential vitamins and minerals from whole foods. As an example, Gregorio mentions a study done on Vitamin C which showed that people’s levels of the vitamin didn’t change at all when they took a supplement, but improved markedly when they simply ate oranges.
“Foods contain a whole variety of compounds, some of which we don’t even know about yet, which all work together synergistically to help us absorb them properly,” he explains.
1 Year+ Before The Wedding: Skincare time!
According to Frances Turner Traill, clinical director and nurse injector/prescriber at FTT Clinics, you should start thinking about your skin routine as soon as you get engaged (if you haven’t already got it sorted!). So make it a priority on your bridal beauty timeline.
“Skincare is a journey and it’s something we should be doing all the time. Your skin is the first thing you see and your canvas, so the earlier you get a good routine established, the better,” she says. “The worst is when someone comes in six weeks before the wedding; there’s only so much that can be done in that time.”
When brides-to-be visit FTT Clinics – there’s one in Hamilton and one in Inverness – they get a custom consultation to establish which treatments are right for them. A popular treatment with brides is the FTT Bespoke Facial Treatment, which contains 20+ individual treatments based on your requirements.
“We do a skin scan assessment to work out what your skin needs, and then we draw up a skin clinic treatment plan. So it might incorporate a peel, or microneedling, or IPL – whatever we want to improve,” explains Frances.
“Another thing brides love is our WOW Fusion facial, where we infuse the skin with a cocktail of peptides using a glass vial and titanium needles. Sometimes we will even include a little bit of Botox in that too. This is the kind of treatment that really gives you what we call ‘glass skin’ and it’s a great treatment to have if you’ve already got good skin, or as a finishing treatment following a series of the bespoke facials.”
Frances says if you really want to see a noticeable improvement in your skin, you should have one facial a month (more if you have medical skin concerns such as acne) and budget around £150 for each one.
If that’s not a spend you can stretch to, focus on fixing your own skincare routine that you do at home. You could go for a skincare consultation to get yourself on the right track and find out which products work well for your skin, then take it from there.
“With some guidance we can measure things like pigment, melanin, pore size and how much sebum the skin is producing, and from there we can make product recommendations,” says Frances. “The skin cycle is 4-6 weeks so you need a good few months to establish a routine. Stop going to Boots and getting deals on skincare that isn’t right for you. Buy once, and buy well!”
9-12 Months Before The Wedding: Book Hair and Make-Up
Top hairstylists and make-up artists book up quickly, so the earlier you can book, the better. But obviously you need to have your venue and date secured before you do this!
Don’t rush into a decision when booking your beauty squad: make sure you do your research. At AMM, we have a portfolio of our work online and you can follow us on social to see some of the beautiful brides we’ve styled. We are always happy to answer any of your questions, so just contact us if you fancy a chat. We’d love to hear from you and help you achieve your hair and make-up goals!
6 Months Before The Wedding: Hone Your Beauty Style
The next step in your bridal beauty timeline is to start thinking more seriously about the style of hair and make-up you’d like. By this point, you should have decided on your wedding dress – and this will influence your wedding beauty look. Start creating a Pinterest board of looks you like, so that you can show your beauty team when you go for your hair and make-up trials.
Make sure you’re getting your hair cut every 6-8 weeks so that it’s in excellent condition on the day of your wedding. If you’re looking to incorporate additional treatments into your haircare routine, Team AMM rate Olaplex and Kerastase.
3 Months Before The Wedding: Tweak and Trial
At AMM, we believe every bride is beautiful whether you’re a fan of tweakments or prefer to take a more natural approach. If you’d like to get any injectable treatments and you’ve not experimented with them before, Frances at FTT Clinics says this is the right time to do it. “You don’t want to be getting treatments like this for the first time too close to the wedding,” she says.
This is also generally the point in your bridal beauty timeline at which you’ll go for your hair and make-up trials so that you can see how your wedding hair and make-up will look.
To get the best results from your trial, we advise bringing some pictures of hair and make-up you like (including pics of yourself where you’ve been happy with your hair and make-up!) as well as images of your dress, shoes, flowers or jewellery. The more details we know about, the better.
Make sure you bring any hair accessories you plan to wear, and come with freshly washed hair and no make-up on. Planning to wear fake tan on your wedding day? Apply the tan for your trial too, as that will allow us to select suitable colours for you.
Most importantly – be honest! The whole purpose of the trial is to figure out what you like and what you’re not so sure about, so that we can make any adjustments required to ensure your wedding look is exactly what you dreamed of.
2 Weeks Before The Wedding: Colour Your Hair
If you dye your hair, get it coloured a couple of weeks before the big day to give it a bit of time to settle. This also means that if it doesn’t work out exactly as planned, there’s plenty of time to rectify it.
2-3 Days Before The Wedding: Tan and Nails
There’s absolutely no need to tan if you don’t want to, but if you’d feel more confident with a bit of faux bronze glow, it’s best to do it a few days before. Remember that you should wax and exfoliate 24 hours before a tan for the best result.
This is also the perfect point in your bridal beauty timeline to get your nails done, and lash extensions if you want them.
The Night Before The Wedding
This is not the time to be trialling anything new – we suggest the only thing you do the day before is wash your hair so it’s not too slippery to style on the wedding day.
Don’t experiment with any new skincare products just in case any break you out. Just chill out, and try to get some beauty sleep!
The Wedding Day
Relax! This is your special day so sit back, get pampered and know that you’re in the most capable hands with AMM. We can’t wait to be part of your big day.