By The simple answer to this question is, "of course not!" It's your day, you can wear anything you want! Want to wear an elegant blue dress? You can! Want to wear a camouflage dress? You can (and Mama June did!). Want to wear a penguin suit? You can do that too! (Although we highly discourage it!). The point here is, you don't have to wear white on your wedding day.
But this leads us to the question, where did the tradition of wearing white come from anyways?
If you were to ask your mother or grandmother, they'd probably tell you that you wear white on your wedding day because it's a sign of purity and innocence. And while white does signify these two things, that's not why we actually wear white on our wedding day. And if you were to dig deep into the past of most brides, they would probably tell you that their "innocence" was taken long ago anyways (although we commend anyone who is waiting until marriage - more power to you!).
So if what we have been led to believe about wearing white wedding dresses all of our lives is not true, than what is?
It was actually a trend set by Queen Victoria herself. When married to Prince Albert in 1840, the Queen wore a plain white wedding dress - and from that day forward, the color white became a trend. Not as exciting news as you probably thought right? To make the origins of wearing white even more boring, no, the Queen did not wear white to symbolize her purity or virginity. She wore it simply because she liked white.
So why did such a boring tradition catch on so much? You always want what you can't have, right? Aside from the fact that the Queen was admired by so many, the white wedding gown was so sought after because most people couldn't afford it. Back in that day, white was extremely expensive to wear and to keep clean. As a result, white was rare and could only be afforded by the wealthy, which, of course, made people want it even more.
So where did the rumor of purity and innocence stem from? Simply from the fact that back in the Victorian years, innocent brides were idolized. And yes, so were their white gowns.
So do you have to wear white on your wedding day? Absolutely not. While white is beautiful and stunning, it doesn't actually signify purity and innocence, it's just another trend that we have fallen into over the years.