All About Sarah Jessica Parker's Iconic Black Wedding Dress — Including Her One Regret About the Gown (2024)

Sarah Jessica Parker’s iconic black wedding dress may have sparked a lasting trend, but it was never meant to be a style statement.

"Oh, I wish it was because I was badass," Parker lamented to Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen in 2016. "I just was too embarrassed to spend any time looking for a wedding dress.”

The gown Parker chose for her nuptials to Matthew Broderick on May 19, 1997, was unique in that it was completely black. "I was too embarrassed to get married in white, and both Matthew and I were reluctant to have people pay so much attention to us,” she later told Marie Claire. “Which is ridiculous, because that's when you can relish the attention, when it's natural.”

Like her dress, the couple’s ceremony was rather unconventional — in fact, it was a total surprise to the 100 guests who attended, all of whom were simply told in the invitation (which Parker shared for the duo's 25th-anniversary celebration) to join Parker and Broderick for “a party.”

When they arrived at the Angel Orensanz Center on the Lower East side, however, they were treated to a vow exchange from the pair, which was officiated by Broderick’s sister, Janet Broderick Kraft.

“We treated it like it was a big party on a Monday night, and I regret it,” the Sex and the City star told Marie Claire of her casual nuptials.

Parker later told the TODAY show that if she had to do it all over again, she’d choose differently. “[I’d] white it up,” she said. “I’d wear a beautiful, proper wedding dress like I should have worn that day.”

Regardless, Parker's ruffled, black gown became an iconic style moment that's still influencing brides today. Ahead, read all the details about Sarah Jessica Parker's memorable wedding dress — including how many gowns she tried on first and what she wishes she wore instead.

Parker never envisioned herself in a wedding gown before her big day

While many brides dream of the gown they’ll walk down the aisle in, Parker told PEOPLE in 2018 that she was more focused on her would-be groom.

“I never thought about a wedding dress. Never. Had not one daydream about it,” she said. “At one point I just simply remember thinking, ‘God, I really hope he asks me to marry him.’ I don’t know when or why. It was fairly early on.”

The gown was off the rack

While discussing her big day with Cohen on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen in 2016, Parker revealed that the dress was not a custom design. “There was a store that I liked that I knew, and I just went and got whatever they had hanging,” she told the talk show host.

In fact, as the Divorce star told Glamour in 2008, “I bought the first dress I looked at.”

It was designed by Morgane le Fay

Chelsea-based designer Morgana le Fay, which was founded in 1983 by Liliana Casabal, was behind the frock Parker exchanged her vows in. According to the company’s website, the brand’s identity is based in “feminine form and diaphanous story-telling." Its motto: “Fashion should be a healing force that makes the wearer feel limitless.”

The black color was meant to be understated

Given Parker’s high-fashion background, one might assume that the nontraditional black hue of her gown was worn to make a serious style statement, but it was actually quite the opposite.

As she explained to Glamour, the dress was meant to keep the focus off the bride and on the guests who attended the ceremony. “Our logic was we didn't want to call attention to ourselves that day, because we're actors and we get attention all day long,” she explained. “It was a party for everybody else.”

Despite the actress’s desire for something more demure, the dress itself was actually quite ornate. The bodice was simple enough, with a plain spaghetti strap top and scoop neckline, but the bottom cascaded out into a pouf of black ruffles for the skirt.

Parker has returned to the LBD look several times over the years, and most recently rocked a black ballerina-inspired gown from Carolina Herrera — paired with an oversized black hair bow — at the New York City Ballet’s 2023 Fall Gala.

Her shoes were her “something blue”

Like Carrie Bradshaw, who tied the knot with Chris Noth’s Mr. Big in a pair of Manolo Blahnik blue Hangisi stilettos at their courthouse wedding, Parker opted for a pair of colored heels while saying her own “I dos.”

“I wore teal blue velvet Robert Clergeries with a rounded toe and a classic Clergerie heel, from Barneys,” she said at the debut of her SJP Shoe brand’s bridal collaboration with Gilt in New York City in 2018.

Unfortunately, there are no surviving photos of the heels. “We brought electricity into that place, they didn’t even have indoor plumbing,” she said of her venue. "We had to redo the bathrooms. But it was so beautiful. We only hung candelabras from the ceiling and we didn’t even have an aisle to walk down,” Parker remembered to Martha Stewart Weddings. “So there were no shoe shots. There were no real photo shots. We were too embarrassed, which probably was foolish.”

Her accessories served as her “something old” and “something borrowed”

In addition to her shoes, which took care of one part of the old “something borrowed” adage, Parker incorporated several other key accessories into her big day. "I borrowed a handkerchief, someone gave me an old coin, and the dress was new, so I covered all my bases,” she told Martha Stewart Weddings in 2015.

It opened the door for other celebrities to wear black down the aisle

While black wedding dresses have since become a common choice for unconventional brides, in 1997, the hue was a rare one, and like it or not, SJP paved the sartorial way for other celebrity brides, including Ellen Pompeo, Avril Lavigne, Selling Sunset’s Christine Quinn and Shenae Grimes — all of whom said their “I dos” while wearing onyx — to do the same.

According to industry experts, the fad officially peaked in 2020 with the onset of COVID-19. “It’s our hottest trend,” Laura McKeever, head of public relations for David’s Bridal, told the Washington Post in May 2022.

Parker would wear a totally different wedding gown, given the chance

Nowadays, Parker’s dress would be far more conventional. "If I were getting married today, I'd likely wear cream, just to have that bridal experience," she told Martha Stewart Weddings in 2015.

The Failure to Launch star also elaborated to the publication on what it might look like. "Now, I would want my dress to have an Oscar de la Renta feel, pockets below the waist, a very fitted bodice, a huge skirt, in taffeta or duch*esse satin,” she explained. “That silhouette appeals to me because it's old-fashioned, yet can look very modern."