I’ve never been more proud.

Every now and then I’ll get bored and peruse my Flickr stats, and the one photo that almost always pops up is this one, taken at my friend Katie’s Ugly-Bridesmaid-Dress-themed bachelorette party (by the way, kids:  Best Bachelorette Party theme EVER.  Try it, you won’t be disappointed):

I knew this photo got a lot of hits, but I never dreamed that when I clicked through to the Google image search results for “ugly bridesmaid dress” that I would see myself on the very front page, right next to a pregnant prom goer (clearly on the cutting edge of maternity fashion.)  Yet there I sat, in full peach-polka-dot-ruffled glory holding a beer and smelling like moth balls.  Classy.

Once I got over the initial shock of sharing web-space with the infamous baby bump prom dress, I spent some time examining a few of my ugly dress comrades.  Let’s take a closer look, shall we?  First up, a poor soul I affectionately refer to as Accordion Lady.

Accordion Lady is a good friend, y’all.  She is wearing this horrible dress with more grace than I could muster, and manages to do it with a smile on her face.  That bride is not deserving of such a friend.  You know how you can tell that this is the bride being a jerk who wants her friend to look stupid, and not just unfortunately bad taste?  Look at her dress, veil, hair, flowers.  All pretty much your usual wedding stuff, right?  A little boring, but nothing too bizarre or tacky.  Certainly nothing even close to the realm of Accordion Dress.  I think what we have here is a classic case of “You better not look prettier than me on my wedding day!”

Surprisingly, most of the ladies in these unfortunate dresses seem to have taken the Grin and Bear It route.  I mean, just look at Flag Girl here:

Sure, she’s smiling through the pain, but I think somewhere Betsy Ross is weeping.

Now, this.  This was my favorite of the whole collection:
Not because of the horrific ruffles or the ridiculous hat or even the scary Dick Tracy “the Blank” face.  No, the reason I love this one is because of the matter-of-fact caption:  “That is ugly.”  I love whoever captioned this photo.  No sugar-coating in these parts.

And I’m sure we all would like a closer view of our Prom-going friend, right?  Right?  Though she should probably be disqualified from the “ugly bridesmaid dress” page, as it technically isn’t wedding party attire.  Or is it?  Perhaps it served as both?

If you’re looking for more awesome ugliness, check out uglydress.com. You won’t be able to look away.