03/22/2026
Edit: the wedding has happened so I’ll show you my gorgeous bride and handsome groom. I went to their reception and they were glowing. See in posted pics.
This ended up being one of my more involved projects and I have included pics of the process for posterity. I usually don’t post anything on a client’s gown until after the wedding but I do have her permission and I didn’t want to forget.
The story goes, or as closely as I can remember, my beautiful bride and her mother came to my studio, the middle part of December. They explained that they had been to an estate sale and saw a vintage wedding dress hanging in a closet in a plastic bag. They looked at it and my bride loved it, so they bought it. The seller said that it had been worn by her mother in the 1970s. It was quite yellow and much too small for my bride. I was contracted to clean it for them, alter it, and press it up. I thought this was gonna be a little 10 hour job, but it ended up being much more than that. Not that I’m complaining! The dress had a lace overlay on the bodice with a layer of vintage taffeta and an underneath layer of Pelon. I was really shocked at the Pelon because that’s usually used to interface and not as a lining. I started out by soaking and soaking and more soaking the dress. The color actually lightened significantly to the point that it wasn’t white and it wasn’t ivory, but a beautiful, mellow candlelight and there was no way I could find anything to match the color. The dress had a detachable train with four rows of about 3 inch wide lace vertically down the length and so I had the only source of more matching lace. I started by removing the skirt from the bodice, as well as the sleeves off of the bodice. I re-cut the bodice in white satin with two layers of ivory net fabric over, which gave us the right color. At the second fitting, we decided that the bodice was too short in the waist, so I opted to dissemble and to re-cut the lining of the bodice again instead of a seam around and add a piece added to it. Once I got the lining of the bodice made, I then sew the lace where it would go, and then used pieces of the lace from the train to cover the extra. Even though the lace was appliquéd in a mish mash it completely melded and looks like one continuous piece of lace. Whew! I had to add about 3 inches around the body circumference and neck line. While I had everything apart, I pressed the skirt, the net under skirt and the sleeve. While I had the sleeve apart, I was able to press the organza sleeve because there was a shorter under-piece in a tube shape that held the bubble of the puff sleeve. There’s no way to get in there to press it flat once it’s completed because of this. We fit my bride a total of six times, with each time making progress and correcting anything that was not to her liking. She had a definite vision. I was starting to really tired of this dress because I had had it for 2 1/2 months. She was really busy and I had other projects going. But her wedding isn’t for a couple of months so we were good. I had to reset the sleeve a couple of times because it wasn’t laying as flat as she wanted it to, and I was concerned with allowing her movement. We needed to come to happy medium. When I finally got the dress completed, and my Bride came to try it on, I was elated as I watched her face. She loved her dress! I asked her to go out in the living room and show my husband who used to work with me in my Bridal store and understands the process. The sun was shining through the window as she stepped into the living room and she started to glow like an angel. Even though I put more work into it than I expected, the end result was worth far more than I put into it. Even though they were very generous with my compensation.
People keep asking me when I’m going to retire from this, and although I’ve slowed down a lot, and don’t take nearly as much work as I used to, how can I walk away from such wonderful experiences? Being retired, I have time to really take my time and do it right. I look forward to seeing pictures of my bride in her gown. I will post them when I get them
