Woman goes viral for $500 wedding that included a $47 dress

Kiara Brokenbrough and her husband planned their budget wedding in two months

A US couple planned their $500 budget wedding in two months. Alamy Stock Photo

The idea of spending lots of money on a wedding is nothing new, however, one bride has gone viral on TikTok for taking the opposite approach.

Kiara Brokenbrough has uploaded a video that shows her $47 wedding dress, purchased from the e-commerce website Shein. The clip has been viewed almost one million times.

"I didn't want to spend a lot of money on a dress because I had the mindset I'm going to wear this one time for a few hours," she said during an interview with Good Morning America.

"Our goal was to just be as minimal as possible and to spend the least amount of money as possible."

She says that they spent less than two months planning for the wedding on February 12 and that they didn't want to start off their marriage with debt, as the average cost of a wedding in the US is $34,000, according to wedding planning website The Knot.

In a follow-up video on TikTok, Brokenbrough has shared tips on what helped keep the cost of her big day down, including finding a free location off the California motorway and having guests (who she says were family and very close friends) pay for their own food and drinks at a nearby restaurant-lounge.

She and her husband were also gifted many things for the wedding such as flowers and a runner from her family.

Finally, she says that in order to pull off a wedding on a budget, it’s important to have supportive loved ones. She also mentions that through it all, couples must remember their end goal, which is marriage.

"The people we have there, they understood the assignment, they understood the things that we were trying to do, and they really supported us," she said.