A Disney-obsessed bridal consultant is matching wedding dresses to Disney characters to challenge preconceptions about how brides should look

• A bridal consultant has gone viral on TikTok for matching Disney characters with wedding dresses.
• Lillie Ann Dawson uses the wedding dresses in her Alabama store to film promotional TikTok content.

A 23-year-old bridal consultant has gone viral on TikTok for posting videos that match Disney characters to different types of wedding dresses in her Alabama store.

Lillie Ann Dawson, who has worked at Bella's Bridal and Formal in Birmingham, Alabama for over a year, posted a video with an on-screen caption that read, "Wedding dresses inspired by Disney princesses," on February 9. It currently has 15 million TikTok views.

In the video, Dawson edited several clips of herself trying on different dresses, with on-screen captions that matched a princess from a Disney film, such as Cinderella, Ariel, and Belle, to a wedding dress that looked similar to outfits the characters wore in the films.

The bridal consultant said she decided to imagine "what these characters might be like in real life" if they were alive today, and translate those ideas into modern dresses she had in her store as a way to promote the business on social media.

"I was scrolling on TikTok and came across some wedding dress videos. I love being creative, and since Bella's have plenty of dresses for me to do something cool with, I just had to think of an original idea to make a similar video of my own."

As someone with a Disney "obsession," Dawson said she was inspired to make the video by Disney films that she loves. "There are these iconic Disney wedding scenes at the very end of most of the movies, but it's only a glimpse. So I thought, what if we thought more about what happens after that glimpse, at what the wedding really looks like."

The video is now her most viewed TikTok, and she posted a second version of it, including more Disney princesses in the video, on May 19, receiving 2.2 million views, while most of her other videos have received hundreds of thousands of views each.

Dawson makes content to challenge stereotypes about the 'perfect' wedding dress

Dawson has posted several other similar videos, where she matches dresses in the store to characters from shows and films like "Bridgerton," "Mean Girls," and "Into The Woods." She also posted a video in March that was inspired by villains in Disney films, such as Cruella from "101 Dalmations" and Mother Gothel from "Tangled," which currently has 2 million views.

She told Insider she wanted her content to incorporate as broad a range of characters and dresses as possible to reflect the diverse tastes and styles that brides tend to have.

"I think social media has perpetuated this idea of what a perfect wedding looks like," said Dawson, who suggested that many online adverts often show a "slim woman" wearing a princess-style dress and resembling a "cake topper."

While some people want to wear a poofy, princess-style wedding dress, according to Dawson, the consultant also said that "some brides come in and say, 'if you put me in a princess-style dress, I will be miserable.'"

Dawson told Insider she has included all kinds of wedding dresses in her TikTok videos, including black dresses, red dresses, and traditional white dresses, to show brides "that they don't need to be nervous to let your true personality shine," adding, "You can wear a dress that's not white, or that's short, whatever you want."

Since Dawson found success on TikTok with her wedding dress videos, she told Insider that many customers request to try on dresses they've seen in her videos.

"I think many businesses are now seeing the relevance of TikTok," said Dawson, who posts wedding dress content on both her personal account, which has 124,000 followers, and the Bella's Bridal account, which has 3,600 followers.

She went on to say, "It's so special when you're working with a bride who's seen what you've done online on TikTok, and you then get to do it for them in real life."

"I want every bride to have the experience of finding an outfit that makes her feel like the best version of herself, and that she deserves that happily ever after," Dawson added.

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