Wedding season has begun and the engagement parties, showers, bachelorette weekends, and the actual wedding days have found places on my summer calendar! I was at a bridal shower today fête-ing the bride-to-be with tea...
and scones...
...so I thought this ridiculously fabulous piece that Erika submitted was perfect to feature. I think you'll agree that this is one for the upcycled wedding books!
I had a wedding to plan, but our budget wasn't very big. Also after watching too many "Say Yes to the Dress" marathons, I decided that going to a bridal salon was not for me. I heard about shopgoodwill.com and scoped out the site and found quite a few wedding dress options. I scoured the site for dresses that I liked the "bones" of and ones that were about the right size.
The empire waist, neckline and lace appliques on this dress caught my eye and when the measurements seemed to be right, I bid and won it for the bargain basement price of 9.99! (It cost more to ship it!)
When it arrived, I immediately tried it on and lo and behold it fit! It had some movement restriction in the arms - I couldn't lift them above my shoulders - but why do I need to lift things up on that day anyway, right?? :) Other than that it was quite comfortable.
After I had it cleaned, I went about permanently affixing the glued-on appliques by hand-sewing the loosest. Also there were two small holes in the train that I had to cover. I took appliques from the sleeve/cuff and affixed them over the holes - you can't even tell unless you look very closely.
What else will Erika do to make this the dress of her dreams??
I decided that the dress would look better with a sash, so I made one out of some silk fabric I had from a previous project (hello free!). The sash covered some of the funny bunching going on and added a little bit of color, which I liked. I had to do something with those sleeves, so I got a little help from a friend because trying to reach around your body or cut a sleeve with one hand is pretty difficult! My friend helped baste the sash onto the dress and then we cut the sleeves to a cap sleeve length.
I took the lace applique from the cuffs and put it onto the edge of the sleeves.
The dress has a little hand loop at the back of the train, but no bustle. I thought the hand loop would get annoying because I didn't want to worry about stepping on the dress or it getting stepped on after the ceremony, so I dragged the dress on the bus from Boston to NYC to meet my sister because she works in the wedding industry and has experience bustling dresses. She got everything pinned in just the right places!
Hand sewing the bustle ribbons took a while to finish, but I was so glad I got done and that it looked as gorgeous as it did!
ERIKA!!!! Way to create the most stunning dress on a budget that is pretty unfathomable in the world of wedding dresses! You look gorgeous! You transformed this vintage dress and made it look current and turned it into something that suits your tastes. That sash is perfect and that little hint of color looks just so pretty with your skin tone and hair. The most blushing bride, you are!
