Picking the Right Veil and Headpiece

How to select the head topper that tops off your look perfectly.

Once you know about the different headpiece and veil options, you're ready to find the match. Here are a few tips that will make choosing your crowning glory simpler:

Start with your hairstyle. The way a headpiece looks on you has as much to do with your hairstyle as with your wedding dress. So first settle on your hairstyle—and head out to try on veils with a close approximation (no hairspray required).

Match your veil to your wedding style. An ultra-long veil could be unwieldy at a garden wedding (think: shrubs), but at a massive house of worship, you can really work the look.

Keep your dress in mind. If you have a lot of detail on your dress-all-over embroidery, tons of beading or lace-an elaborate veil and headpiece could be visual overload. If your dress is fairly simple, you have a little more leeway.

Take a test run. If your salon carries veils, make it easy on yourself and choose your headpiece when you buy your dress or at the first fitting. You'll be able to see exactly how the veil and dress look together-no guesswork necessary. And since many veils and headpieces can't be bought off-the-rack, this way you will have ordered yours early. One less thing to worry about.

Try on everything. Headpieces are like bathing suits: You just can't tell what they'll look like on you until you try them on. You may find the tiara you flat-out rejected is actually the perfect finish to your look.

Practice, practice, practice. Get your veil and headpiece in plenty of time for a run-through with your hairdresser—the two of you can wrestle with where exactly you want it to sit. (Just changing where the headpiece sits on your head can make it look drastically different.) And if you'll be sporting an extra-long veil, you might want to walk around in it a few times. You'd be surprised how much work it takes to move around a bunch of airy tulle-but that's the lovely burden of being a vision.