Mumma E's 'Mother-of-the-Bride's Dress

This is the last instalment of my wedding-related blog posts. After this one, it'll be taken as red that, A) I got married, B) we all looked ace, and C) fun was had. Enough said. But in many ways I have saved the best post 'til last! This post is about the dress my mum made herself for her day as Mother-of-the-Bride.

Self-made Garms!

Long term readers of my blog may already have read this post in which I interviewed my mum about sewing in the 1960's. In that interview she relays the story of making her own wedding dress, forty-odd years ago. So I guess it was in keeping with tradition that I should make my own wedding dress, and that she should make her own Mother-of-the-Bride's dress. Mumma E has seriously good sewing skills, but like many people who have used their skills as a form of income over the years, her passion for sewing clothes has waned. I'm so glad she dug deep and mustered the motivation to battle through this project, which I know was a toughie. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

The Pattern

Mum and I had a discussion about the kind of style of the dress she was thinking about, which reminded me of having seen something that sounded similar. Some internet digging around later and I discovered the pattern I'd been thinking about was Vogue 8280 (pictured above) with it's Roland Mouret 'Galaxy dress'-esque elements. I sent the link to Mum and she was in agreement that it was definitely similar to what she had in mind and an excellent place to start. 

Fitting

She found the pattern at her local fabric and haberdashery shop in Essex, and picked up some beautiful purpley crepe and matching lining in London. So far, so good. But, poor mum, getting a good fit with this pattern took her an age and countless toiles (I didn't want to ask her exactly as I didn't want to drag up old wounds!). Part of the difficulty was born from the fact that Mum is very petite so a lot of work had to be done on changing the proportions of the pattern. Plus the lovely shoulder yoke section was a nightmare to get to sit correctly. It's formed from just one pattern piece which has to lay again the curved of the body from shoulder to underarm side seam: a challenge in 2D to 3D that would take the greatest of architects to get to sit perfectly. Scratch that, it would take the greatest architects or MY MUM!!! After all her changes and tweaks, she got that damn yoke detail to fit beautifully! 

Still fitting...

When it came to the fitting, not only must she be praised for her tenacity, but also the trickiness of not having anyone to help her most of the time. I was able to help a couple of times when we saw each other, but otherwise she had to make do with the (now much improved) pinning skills of my dad and her own self-fitting ability.   

Inspiration Strikes

At some point, fairly far into the cutting out and construction of the final garment, my mum had a brain wave. The plan had been to make the sleeves from the same fabric as the rest of the dress and make tiny self-covered buttons to apply to the cuffs and along the top of the centre back. But although the dress was now fitting beautifully, and would doubtlessly be very classic and sleek when finished, Mum was feeling it was a bit plain and not special enough for a very special occasion such as this. From somewhere or other, she had an idea of adding lace sleeves. So off Mum went to an amazing fabric shop on Edgeware Road in London. There she found a fantastic lace in the same colour purple, but at £90 a pop (metre), and requiring over a metre in case of mistakes, it was somewhat outside of her budget, special occasion or no! 

Further Inspiration Strikes

All along Mum had planned to wear black shoes and accessories with her dress. From that she drew inspiration that perhaps black lace would work. When she was down in Brighton for my hen weekend, we visited a fabric shop here and came across a beautiful (and reasonable) black lace that fit the bill perfectly.  Then she got the idea of covering the shoulder yoke detail and adding lace to the top of the back piece to make a bolero/shrug effect. Genius, no?! Look how perfectly she matched up the lace, and then PUT A DAMN CONCEALED ZIP THROUGH IT! Awe-inspiring. 

But inspiration still hadn't finished striking! She then decided to harvest the remaining scalloped edging and apply it round the curve of the yoke detail to match the scalloped edges of the cuffs and the back pieces. Oh, and she had inserted the centre back concealed zip so well that apparently she had to point it out to my dad when he couldn't figure out how she was going to get in and out of the dress!

To say that I am proud of my mum doesn't even begin to cover it. Not just for making this dress, of course. For also being the sweetest and loveliest lady I ever did meet. And also for hitting the dance floor hard at the wedding reception and showing everyone how to bust some serious moves! I'm also hugely proud of my dad for looking equally dapper at the wedding and throwing some shapes of his own on the night! Massive love to Mumma and Papa E xxx

Pat's Wedding Waistcoat

I am very aware that I owe you a couple more wedding-related blog posts. I've been waiting for the proper photos to arrive so I can fully illustrate the last two handmade garments that I want to share with you. A quick recap: you can see my self-made wedding dress here; Vic's bridesmaid dress here; and pics from our NYC honeymoon here. Later this week I'll show you the AMAZING 'Mother of the Bride' dress my mum made herself, but today I'm going to talk about the waistcoat I made for Pat (AKA, The Groom). 

I hesitate to use the word 'theme', but we definitely wanted our wedding to have an overall look. Because we were going down a very DIY route with everything, and had picked a reception venue that looked like a club that we could decorate as we pleased, we had to think hard about what we wanted because we were going to have to invent it all. Everything from the venue to our dresses ended up referencing a mid-century vintage/cocktail/casino/playing cards/speak-easy/cabaret kind of vibe. 

The Elements

Pat had to come up with what kind of look he wanted to rock, and he decided he wanted to wear a slick suit of some kind. We were totally lucky that the kind of mens suits that are in the shops at the moment are of a particularly slim-fit, skinny nature, which work fantastically on his own slim physique. We found the perfect dark grey suit with black sateen collar in the very first shop we visited. He later got himself a beautiful slim-fitting shirt and skinny black sateen tie. Our friend Kirstin (who made my fascinator/hat) made him some wonderful playing card cufflinks. But even though the suit he chose also had a matching waistcoat available, I wanted to add a Zoe-made element to his outfit as well, so it was agreed I would make his waistcoat. 

    

The Inspiration

From early on, Pat was floating Tybalt from Baz Luhrman's version of Romeo and Juliet as a style inspiration. He's long been drawn to latino/Mexican/Catholic/Gangster style, and John Leguizamo shows how good a slender guy can wear such a vibe. We obviously decided to go down a less costumey road with our interpretation, but decided a Maria de Guadalupe on the back of the waistcoat would provide an appropriate touch of the Catholic/latino kitsch we both enjoy so much, whilst simultaneously referencing Pat's own Catholic heritage (albeit of a far more Irish origin).  Although I doubt everyone would fully appreciate it, it was also our homage to the whole Catholic thing, as we were the first couple in his family not to get married in a church (or more specifically, one particular Catholic church in his mother's home town). 

Fabric and Pattern

So where to start? I bought extra black sateen when getting the fabric for Vic's bridesmaid dress (which I hoped would also look sufficiently similar to the sateen of the jacket collar) and I ordered a panel of the Henry Alexander Virgin of Guadalupe fabric pictured above (from someone on Etsy though, not from that site I just linked to, I should mention). With the fabric order taken care of, it was on to the pattern dilemma. I randomly got hold of this questionable 1990's mens formal attire pattern pictured below. (Incidentally, you can get your own copy here! Should you want to...) I think it came from a public donation when I worked for Traid and I had kept it stashed with half an eye on the fact we had a wedding coming up. 

Alterations and Fitting

Even the smallest size was way too roomy for Pat, so I did several rounds of toiles until I was happy with the fit and how it would look under the jacket when it was buttoned up. One of the changes I made included adding back shaping darts instead of the pull tab detail because I wanted a very sleek silhouette rather than a bunched up gathered effect. I also initially thought the entire back panel would be made from the Guadalupe fabric, so I had to change the back of the pattern so it could be cut on the fold rather than with a centre back seam. There was actually quite a bit of shaping in the centre back seam, so transferring all that into the new back shaping darts was something of a challenge. However, the big back shaping darts and the positioning of the Mary/Maria on the panel of fabric I finally ended up with meant that cutting the whole back piece from the fabric panel wouldn't have worked so it was back to the drawing board. 

Appliqué Detail 

Thankfully I have mad-skillz when it comes to machine appliqué (which is how I spent a big chunk of my twenties when I wasn't working in casinos and pizza restaurants or guzzling chardonnay). I sped off to the local fabric shop and bought some nice black fabric to form the new back panel and got some bondaweb stuff (isn't it annoying when you could have sworn you have a large stash of something but can't lay your hands on it when it's needed?!) to secure the Maria whilst I satin stitched her down. I should have added a layer of fusible interfacing to the wrong side of the back panel before I started to satin stitch, so the stitching is a tiny bit wavy, but NOONE is going to notice that but me. Pat certainly didn't. He just kept repeating 'Strong', when I showed him the appliquéd back panel.  

A couple of years ago I decided I would try and make Pat a shirt for every year we are together. I think I'll reword that to a 'garment' for every year we are together, which will bring me in line with the four years we've clocked up so far. Perhaps surprisingly, this waistcoat has actually been worn since the wedding. Pictured above is Pat rocking his sans jacket look for my birthday drinks last month.

Honeymoon in NYC!

I'm guessing the last time you saw some images of NYC, the ground was covered with water and bits of tree were in places you wouldn't normally expect to find them. It has been crazy to see the wreckage brought by super-storm Sandy on the place we were honeymooning in just a month before and I feel awful for everyone who has suffered because of it. That said, I know that some of my lovely readers would like to hear a bit about how our honeymoon went, so here we go...

We spent a week in total in NYC, spending two nights in a hotel in midtown Manhattan and the other five nights in an apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, that we rented via air bnb. Oh my goodness we had a good time! The whole place was sooo interesting, and we walked about seeing, eating and drinking as much as we physically could! 

During the first couple of days, whilst dealing with our jet lag, we put ourselves on those open-top tourist buses which gave us a fantastic over view of Manhattan and helped us to decide which parts of it we wanted to head back to and explore more thoroughly. Our criteria for 'places we'd like to head back to and explore more thoroughly' basically involves interesting, old architecture with fantastic looking cafes and bars. Using this criteria we found our way back to Greenwich Village, the East Village and the Lower East Side. 

Whilst we were in Manhattan, it may not surprise you to learn that we headed to the Garment District. Thanks everyone who made suggestions of where is worth going, all your suggestions were very helpful. I could easily have spent a whole day going to each location, but I was very aware that it was Pat's honeymoon too, and I would have felt bad dragging him to more than a few fabric and notion shops, no matter how many book stores I took him to in return. 

Seeing as I wasn't messing around, I went straight to Mood fabrics. Thanks very much to the ladies that explained how to find the entrance! No obvious to the uninitiated, eh?! I ran round that place like a game show contestant, trying to see every single section. Notice the mild panic in my expression in the picture above as I desperately try to see every damn roll of fabric. Just because I don't tend to buy new fabric and try to stash-bust instead, doesn't mean that I don't want to gaze at it all! As I mentioned in my previous post, I had decided that I would allow myself to buy some fabric if I fell in love with some. 

I was on the look out for some red, mustard or jade stretch denim type trouser fabric, but nothing there seemed quite right. I did, however, buy one yard of this ex-Just Cavalli leopard print twill with elastane content. It was $25 a yard, so although a pair of trousers in it would be epically awesome, I think I'll have to settle for making a high waisted pencil skirt!

I also visited a couple of notions shops, but there really is only so many anchor buttons a girl can own so I walked away empty handed from those. I did also visit Metro Textiles, another well hidden fabric cave owned by the inimitable Mr Kashi. Check out Erica B's amusing video to see this master salesman at work. As some people have noted, if you don't like very attentive salesmen, this shop might not be for you. I was able to deflect his attentions onto a couple of Canadian students and viewed his Aladdin's cave in peace. There are probably some awesome bargains to be found in there, but nothing particularly caught my eye. 

I also walked in and then out of Spandex House. Once again, I'm sure there are bargains to be found in there, but with all the off-putting super-synthetic leotard fabrics positioned at the front of the shop, and a cupboard full of jersey already in my flat, I didn't feel it was worth spending valuable time there when Happy Hour was fast approaching. Another shop, away from the Garment District in the Lower East Side opposite the Tenement Museum was a predominantly upholstery fabric outlet called Joey's (or something) which seemed like bargains lay within (see above). As we've previously discussed, at the end of the day who's to say what is curtaining and what is dress/coat/skirt fabric anyways?!

The Tenement Museum, incidentally, was incredibly interesting and I'd definitely recommend their Sweat Shop tour for learning about both how the immigrant population lived and how clothing used to be produced. It was really eye-opening and I felt super pleased we went on it.

Also in Manhattan, we were very lucky to spend an evening with the very lovely and gorgeous sewing blogger Janice from She's In Fashion (pictured above). It was great to meet her and have a chance to ask a New York resident lots of the questions Pat and I had by then racked up! And who would have guessed it, Janice practises martial arts so the conversation switched regularly between ninja stuff and sewing!

In terms of creative stuff, I could talk more about the inspirational markets, fairs, shops and so on we found in Manhattan and Brooklyn, but I could equally expand upon the epic Mexican food, Moritos (frozen Margarita and Mojito blends! Seriously Karen, that's a thing!), crack pie and so on that we experienced. Instead, I'll share a few extra little nuggets from out trip. 

A chicken caesar salad on a pizza! It was hot but somehow the lettuce was still crunchy. I don't claim to understand science. 

Somehow, as big as this flea market store was, there wasn't one thing I wanted in here. Weird.

Inspiration for my Autumn/Winter wardrobe.

Whilst we were drinking our coffees, a woman sitting close by announced loudly on her phone that she was stalking our table. We stayed there for ages longer that we otherwise would have. 

Moritos!!! It took me a couple of these to realise I would have been happier with a straight up Margarita, the fake mint flavour was dragging it down.

Drunken boy!!! Very cute.

Basically a warehouse full of Mad Men era furniture. I nearly wept. 

A Homage to Saint Chihuahua. I assume.  

Brooklyn Bridge! Sunshine! Hurrah!

Pat could easily have moved in to this Mexican restaurant/bar. I'm lucky he finally chose to come back to UK with me. 

Seriously?! ANOTHER amazing cafe/bar/restaurant?! You know my Achilles heel, New York. 

These croissants don't look as big in this picture as they were in real life. They were more the size of a new-born infant. They could sustain a girl for days. Or at least until the next lovely cafe/bar/restaurant.

Street Art! Boom! Did I mention that we saw TWO street art books that Pat has written for sale in New York book shops? No? Well, we did.  

Another food item the size of my face!

Bridesmaid Dress!

Time for another instalment of wedding related business. As well as organising my fabulous hen do (which I know was a lot like herding cats), spending the entire first half of my wedding day repeating the mantra 'everything is ok, everything is fine' to me AND being generally incredibly supportive and amazing from the minute I told her I'd got engaged, she also performed the task of looking incredible as my wing-woman/bridesmaid.

Vic didn't even bat an eyelid when I flipped out and abandoned the initial plan I had for her bridesmaid dress about four weeks before the actual event. Instead she calmed me down and encouraged me to do some research and then talk through with her possible alternatives. When I'd come up with the  new plan and the sewing pattern I wanted to go for, she even bought it for me and got it sent to my flat so I could crack on. There is literally no one on earth who is capable of calming me down like Vic is. Whenever I have a super-busy day ahead or I'm going on a trip and she's around, she is amazing at helping me plan things out and making me feel I haven't forgotten anything. She's basically my unpaid, part-time PA!

I won't bore you with what might have been, instead I'll explain that I finally opted to use a vintage repro pattern, Simplicity 3673 (pictured below), as the basis for her bridesmaid dress. Bless Vic for believing me when I told her this pattern could yield suitably glamorous results. The basic elements were there: the flattering gentle scoop of a bateau neckline (a feature Vic loves), the bust gathers into an empire line waist, a potentially sleek silhouette and general overall mid-century vibe to reflect the feel of my own dress. I knew I wanted to make Vic something that should could wear again and I really wanted her to feel comfortable all day and night, so I chose this sateen-like black fabric from Borovicks fabric's, the same place I bought my wedding dress fabric. It is quite weighty with a nice body to it to create a sleek silhouette yet it has a decent elastane/lycra content to it so dancing, sitting and eating were also firmly on the cards for her!

I wasn't a massive fan of the lower section of this dress pattern, so I frankensteined the top detail with the pattern I used to make my coral dress and leopard Rockabilly dress, which I know fits Vic well. The tricky part lay in the fact that Vic and I live in different places so meeting up for fittings was a bit tricky. We were able to have a brief fitting on the weekend of my hen do which highlighted a couple of fit issues (too wide in the bodice under the arms and an excess of fabric at the CB at the upper back). I made those changes and crossed my fingers. Vic came down to Brighton a couple of weeks before the wedding for a second and final fitting and, thank goodness, it fit like a glove!

I left her to find a diamante brooch for the centre bow detail of her dress. I think she found this beauty on Etsy and it really couldn't have been more perfect. She chose these fabulous red shoes to reflect the roses in our bouquets. She did her own makeup and hair which looked absolutely stunning. Unfortunately you can't see it in these pictures, but the back of her hair was in a glamorous 1960's-esque bun using one of those hair donuts. Her makeup also reflected the early 1960's feel with black liquid eye liner flicks, fantastic false eyelashes and pale pink, almost nude lipstick.

I really can't thank Vic enough for her help as I made this weird change from being someone's girlfriend to someone's wife. She really has been the most awesome best-mate to me for the last 20-ish years, and this whole wedding-thing was all the more special because she was such a significant part of it. 

My Wedding Dress!

Ok peops, here it is! The most important, most photographed and most stressful garment I'll ever make: my wedding dress! Thank you to everyone who expressed a desire to see the pictures, here you are.

Style:

Those of you who have read my previous posts on the planning of my dress will know that I was always going for a mid-century retro look. By the time I'd narrowed down my research, I was definitely erring towards a wiggle silhouette made from a separate skirt and bodice and lots of shoulder/decolletage on show. Above all else, this dress had to make me feel special, so it didn't seem like a time to hold back on the sexiness or glamour! Pat's Best Man told me on the night 'a bride's job is to make other men feel sad you're no longer on the market'! Apparently.

Pattern:

I chose the Burdastyle bustier/bombshell dress pattern (pictured below) as my basis because it had the general wiggle silhouette, waist seam and tight fitting bodice I knew I wanted. I ignored the cups sections and proceeded with toiling the bodice (with frequent fitting help from the ever-amazing Rehanon) again and again until we achieved a really good fit. Instead of the faceted bust of the original pattern, I wanted to recreate a draped, gathered bust effect something like the white Modcloth dress pictured below (underneath the next paragraph).

For that I knew I'd have to attempt some draping using my own body as the mannequin. With lots of encouragement and pin-passing from Rehanon, I finally got a good shape for the bust panels. It was very scary deconstructing my draped bodice toile to make a the bust piece pattern, I can tell you!

As for the skirt, I was initially going for a draped effect like Gertie's bombshell version of this pattern, but it kind of, umm, evolved in a different direction. What I mean to say is that the gathered skirt toile to look very good and I felt unsure how to approach getting a nicer effect. Time for completing this dress was getting tight, especially with all the other elements planning a DIY wedding entailed, so I decided to go for a straight wiggle skirt. As soon as I took that headache away, I breathed a sigh of relief and knew I'd done the right thing. I love the sleek, straight skirt in these pictures, and I think it allows the gathered bust design to really stand out.

Fabric and colour:

My mum and I planned to buy the fabric for my dress and my best mate's bridesmaid dress in one of the fancy-fabric purveyors on Berwick Street in London, knowing that if we drew a blank, we still had all of Goldhawk Road to plunder. For my dress I went with an open mind, but knew it needed to have some structure, be a bit special (AKA, shiny or something) and red. I also had one eye out for a nice brocade. In one of the silk shops I was drawn to some fantastic red silk that had a vintage-y embroidered flower motif but it was very narrow and a squillion pounds per metre. The search continued...

In Borovick Fabrics, I found the most perfect red acetate duchess satin stuff (its official name escapes me) at about £30 a metre. Hurrah! I thought. I glanced at the other colours it came in and was instantly drawn to an incredible peacock colour that really shone out. The sales guy was really helpful and pulled   a long length of each colour of the rolls and held it up to me so I could see in the mirror which worked best with my colouring. He even dimmed to lights to create for me a night time effect, bless him! Both looked great, so he cut a swatch of each and we went off to have some lunch and a margarita to deliberate. Rather wonderfully, whilst my mum and I were staring at menus in the windows of potential lunch venues, I spotted Kat, the editor of the only wedding website I allowed myself to read: Rock n Roll Bride!

We thought and ate, chatted and drank, and although Mum was on 'Team Red' at the beginning of the meal, she'd switched over to 'Team Peacock' by the end. Uncharacteristically, I felt pretty relaxed about having to choose between them. I think it was because I thought both were so lovely, I knew whichever I picked would have looked fantastic. The peacock won because it was just so vibrant and special.

Construction:

My goodness this dress took some work. For example, the bodice is underlined in calico to give extra support and structure, and there was so much hand-stitching, including a belt section that I eventually removed. Following Gertie's Bombshell Dress class, I added boning to the lining, effectively making an inbuilt corset.

I made the whole thing in secret away from Pat because I didn't want to see it before our wedding day. I didn't even want him to know that I'd gone for a different coloured fabric than the red he (and almost everyone else) was expecting. I had planned to make this dress at work, but when the TRAIDremade studio closed down, I had to make it in our bedroom on my own with the door closed! I wish I had a pound for every time I said to Pat, 'Don't go in there'! I repeatedly vacuum the carpets and went around picking up tiny threads because the raw edges fray constantly.

Accessories and extras:

Early on in our engagement, I went to a posh vintage dress shop to try on some of their stock (even though I had absolutely no intention of buying anything) to get some idea. I saw an amazing head piece thing that was apparently called a 'bubble veil' which was basically some netting which covered most of the face only attached to a small fascinator/hat base. Then after attending a vintage-themed wedding fair in Hove back in the Spring with my friend Kirstin where we saw another, she declared she would make me one! She ordered heaps of supplied from Etsy and started playing about figuring out how to get the right look.

When I bought the peacock fabric instead of red, it was back to the drawing board a bit, because Kirstin had initially bought red netting because we thought it would show up well against my dark hair. She got some black netting and requested some of the fabric to cover the base, and she made me the most awesome veil that clipped onto my hair with a big hair clip.

I decided very early in in the wedding planning that I would do my own hair and makeup. Getting someone else to do those things seemed like an unnecessary expense when we were trying to keep to a small budget, plus I just didn't trust anyone else to get the kind of look I've spent years practising and feel most 'myself' with.

For my hair, I had to consider the placement of the hat/veil above anything else. I even got my fringe cut twice to get it to look correct with the veil. On one side at the top I made a victory roll, and on the other side I pinned the side of my hair up and towards the back so my veil had something to be clipped on to. The length of my hair was left to hang loose having mastered heated rollers to get relaxed, vintage-y curls.

My makeup was a variation of my usual 'going out' look, but with recently acquired additions of mac highlighter for the inside corners of my eyes and on the brow bone, greyish-brown shadow on my eye lids and a light tinted moisturiser/foundation to give a more even skin tone.

For jewellery, I'd wanted some vintage costume diamante pieces but my Etsy and Ebay hunts just weren't unearthing the right things. I thought a swallow brooch would be nice, but all the ones I found online were either too new and trashy looking, or old and beyond wearable. It was incredibly serendipitous that I found the perfect 1950's diamante swallow brooch at a local street fair in August!

I knew I wanted some dangly diamante earrings, but all the ones I'd found online had screw or clip-on backs. I wanted some for pierced ears but that didn't seem to be an option with the vintage earrings. New diamante earrings seemed to look quite tacky or were really expensive, so I was delighted when my friend Sarah leant me the perfect pair of dangly earrings for pierced ears. Hurrah!!!

I wore a pair of black heels that I love, are vaguely comfortable, and suited the style of dress really well. I wore them with some Pamela Mann love-seamed tights:

So there you go my friends! That's the low-down on my wedding outfit. Please keep your eyes peeled over the next few weeks for more wedding-related posts, there are lots of other handmade elements that made my wedding wonderful that I'd like to share with you all.