Fast forward to this fall, when my mother and grandmother visited me from out-of-state. True, I would never have that "trying-on-dresses" feeling with my mother there, but this would have to do.
My mother is a third generation sewing enthusiast. She learned the craft from my great-grandmother, with whom she spent her summers as a little girl. My mother made many of the clothes I wore as a kid. Old Christmas ornaments, many of my baby clothes, a quilt, and a Christmas dress that I remember being made from a pattern my mom cut out of paper bags. Eventually, we moved too many times and my mother remarked that buying clothes became cheaper than sewing, so I haven't seen her pull out her old Bernina in quite a while.
But I have many great memories of sewing with my mom. The picture at left is the sewing machine my mom used, a Bernina 830 (circa 1979 or so). She'll be happy to emphasize to you that it still works.
When I told her about Fabrique, that it was a couture fabric store that had an entire section dedicated to bridal fabrics, she was so excited! So I made sure to take her and my grandmother, and I felt like I had two experts on hand to help me in this first stage of bridal dress shopping.
The store has a good selection of bridal fabrics; almost any bridal dress fabric you've heard of is there: silk satin, silk dupioni, shantung, mikado, and even a few high quality poly-satins if I remember correctly. Here's my mom checking them all out:
And here's my beautiful grandmother, looking on (and surrounded by trim):
But my favorite is the lace. Lace!!! I don't want an all-over beaded lace dress (although I think they're beautiful), but I want to incorporate lace in some way. The laces at Fabrique range from $50 to over $400 per yard. Some are domestic, some are imported, but every one of them is stunning. Here, the store owner shows a hand-beaded lace, with crystals attached. You just have to click these to see the beautiful lace up close!
Yep, you read the price tag correctly. Here's another...
And this is the one I bought!
I bought some trim, and the beads happen to be nearly identical to this lace. Perfect!
My grandmother's hands rest next to my iPod. I bring that thing everywhere -- it's so helpful to be able to show vendors exactly what I want. I even have a runway video of the dress on my iPod, and it's indispensable. If you look carefully, you can see my sketch in the foreground.
Also in this picture, my grandmother is wearing her original wedding set. I wish I'd taken a better picture. She recently found this after it had been packed away. The set is over 50 years old, as it was given to her by my late grandfather when they married. How sweet!
Despite originally wanting to wear a matte fabric like silk dupioni or radzimir (if I could ever find it), I ended up choosing a smooth, lustrous silk satin. Silk satin is responsible for beautiful gowns like these (click to see the fabric in motion):
Along with the fabric, I chose the beaded lace, and the matching trim. My grandmother decided to buy the dress fabric for me as a birthday present! I am so humbled by this and hope the dress is as beautiful as we envision it.
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