Vintage Inspirtation: Recipe for My Perfect Vintage-Style Wedding Dress

Hi there, today I have another wedding update. I had my first dress fitting with the fantastic JoanneFleming last week. What a treat! 

But now that I have decided on who and how I am getting my dream dress I thought I should share my experience of making my choice.

Here's my recipe for a perfect wedding dress:

Take one picky girl,

Add one helpful but not quite right shop visit,

Mix with some very stale vintage,

And a sprinkle of wedding fairs,

Bake for two months with a very rude eBay seller and a Chinese Counterfeit,

Top of with some forum research,

And serve with a flair of local designer!

I knew from the moment I was engaged that I would want a fit and flair vintage 1950s style dress. I had watched enough Don't Tell the Bride to know that I liked very few of the typical shaped wedding dresses. One of the designer dresses I liked from magazines was the Rosealba by Stephanie Allin however it seemed a dress like this would cost around £2000! Far above my budget... but served as great inspiration for my subsequent searches.

The Rosealba

So on one Sunday some time ago I decided to go wedding dress shopping with my maid of honour. Unfortunately no-one had told us that wedding dress shops are rarely open on Sundays or that you typically need appointments to go inside - It would seem browsing isn't something wedding dress shops allow. 

We eventually happened into OZone of Brighton and I tried on several dresses some long, some short and while they were very helpful they just didn't have the kind of dress I wanted. They offered to make changes to an existing dress design so that it would be more like what I wanted and advised me on a quote- for £1600!!! I felt it was just too much for an adapted designer dress... 

Furthermore after a few wedding fairs it was clear that finding a short dress may be expensive and this pushed me to dabble in trying to find a vintage dress. 

Months of eBay watching and vintage trawling occurred. But being a size 12-14 meant that I found very few genuine vintage dresses as they were just too small - especially the good quality ones. I decided to risk buying a dress on eBay on a whim, mainly because it was £35 and I thought It may be worth it. The dress was photographed badly and listed as '80s does 50s', unfortunately when it arrived it was exactly that. A sort of net lace fabric with an off white lining and it was quite a bit too big. It wasn't terrible, it just wasn't quite what I wanted. So back on eBay it went, I managed to sell it for £50 so I did make a small profit. However I'm fairly confident this was for a royal wedding party as the buyer 'needed the item delivered by Friday the 29th of April'...  

1980s does 1950s vintage lace wedding dress

I then experimented with vintage replicas like those found on Dolly Couture. I have to say that some of these look gorgeous! And I was very tempted but worries of import tax and shipping costs kept me from buying. So when a dress that looked like one by Dolly Couture appeared on eBay in my size I decided to buy- for £100. 

Dolly Couture The Beverlywood and The Cambridge

When the dress arrived it was nice but it was clearly a fake version of the dress as it lacked labels etc. while i was impressed with the fabric some I the finishing was very cheap and there was what looked like a spot to blood under a pin tuck on the bodice. Of course I was not happy with this at all and asked to rerun the dress. I was very rudely dismissed by the seller who accused me of damaging the dress so I could return it - can you imagine how angry I was at that! During the months that followed there was much to-ing and fri-ing but I did eventually manage to get my money back. It was, however, a very surprising experience for me and was the first real eBay trouble I have had as a buyer.

After all this I decided to go back to basics and went trawling through forums about wedding dresses and came across someone recommending Jo Fleming’s designs. After looking on her website I saw styles that I really liked and made an appointment to visit the studio. After another visit to try on a studio sample gown I was in love and knew what I wanted I was just worried about price.

I have been fortunate enough that my mother has been able to help me out with the price but lets just say I am getting a custom made designer gown in organza silk and lace for just about the average price of a standard wedding dress. These dresses are exceptionally well priced- Grab a bargain while you can!

But I can’t really put a price on my dream dress. Its been a challenge and has taken about a year of research, investigation and some horrible mistakes but thankfully I didn’t lose and money from it and I will now have the dress of my dreams - its just a shame I can't show you it... yet...

Hopefully my hubby to be will like it as much as me.

Vintage Inspirations: Is 2011 the year of the vintage style wedding dress?

So I’ll admit in posting this I am slightly bias… (okay I’m very bias) given that I’m planning a wedding myself but while researching wedding things it has become apparent to me that the trend of having a ‘vintage wedding’ is on the rise.

Vintage weddings have always been popular, as evidenced by websites like Rock N’ Roll Bride and consistent wedding features in VintageLife Magazine. But these days it seems that even the more main-stream wedding has been leaning towards the more vintage-y feel.

In Spring 2011 the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton was seen by millions of people in the UK alone. The event was celebrated with street parties and pub parties, in-fact many shops shut during the ceremony so staff could watch!

While the day was not exactly vintage, the day was steeped in tradition and had a very old fashioned feel to it. In particular Kate’s dress:

The very traditional dress designed by award winning designer Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen and had a distinct vintage flair- with many parallels drawn between this dress and Grace Kelly’s:

Kate with Grace

Image source: eonline

My favourite aspects of the dress are the beautifully fitted lace sleeves and the sweetheart bodice that shows a small amount of decolletage while still remaining very classy- perfect in a wedding dress. Overall the gown managed to look traditional without looking frumpy and is steeped in sumptuous detail. I get the impression people will be asking for replicas of this dress for many years to come!

Speaking of replica gowns the dress was kept under wraps until the moment the future Princess stepped out of the car! However replica dresses have sprung up form several places including high-street store Peacocks. My favourite of the ‘inspired by Kate dresses’ are the shortened versions like The Cambridge sold by Dolly Couture- for the bride aiming for a more 50s swing dress look.

Of course William and Kate was not the only big wedding this year!

The other wedding I am referring to is that of vampire Edward Cullen and Bella Swan from this years Twilight franchise film Breaking Dawn Part 1. Twi-hard fans have been waiting to see Bella’s wedding dress since the books release in 2008. The dress is very well described in the book as a 1900s vintage dress with lace features and modern twists and the final design for the film was kept just as secret as Kate’s!

Bella’s Caroline Herrera designer gown was recently valued at $35 000 and made with satin and Chantilly lace. The dress had a distinctive 20s feel to it, with the plain front, deco lines and again, lace features:

Beautiful lace details

 Image source: HeyUGuys

Although the wedding itself was very quaint its strong rustic feel and use of flowers help to give the ceremony the traditional feeling. However the wedding was filled with some quirky touches that made it seem a little bit different, my favourite of these being Bella’s decision to wear her white sneakers under the dress.

Several replicas of Bella’s dress have surfaced already- in particular this version by Alfred Angelo.

Now I’m not the first to draw parallels between these two weddings, I even found one article suggesting that Pippa Middleton’s dress was the inspiration for Bella’s! However I feel that the similarities in the retro choices of the brides reflect a greater general trend towards vintage styling, as seen in the high-street with 40s tea-dresses, 70s colours and 90s jumpers, but that’s just my humble opinion…

…and in case you were wondering vintage styling will be something I will be considering with my choice of wedding dress ;) but I can’t share details on that yet!

So for now,

Happy Dresscapades!