Wedding Dress Part II: Inspiration & Design
Helloooo everyone! I’m back after my thee-month-blogging-break….and I’m married!
It still sounds pretty unbelievable, but we had the most amazing wedding anyone could imagine. And… I actually wore a handmade wedding dress.
I have to admit, there were times when I did not believe this would happen as it wasn’t an easy process and things didn’t always go too smoothly, but in the end I wore a dress I made. A dress I am very happy with and super proud of.
I promised to share the process of making my wedding dress myself, and, of course, pictures of me in my wedding dress. I didn’t share much before the wedding as I didn’t want my friends and family know too many details about the project. Of course they sort of knew about it and it was sweet of them and annoying af to ask me about my progress constantly.
In this post I’ll share some of my favourite designs that inspired me and (scroll down if you’re impatient) the design I went for in the end.
Here’s a selection of my favourite designs from my many Pinterest sprees:
As you can see, one side of me was really inspired by very romantic, fairy-like dresses with long tulle skirts and lacey tops. I really love this look and was so close to making a dusty blue tulle dress! Luckily, I talked to the Mr. before and learned that he wasn’t fond of neither tulle nor lace. Happy that I asked.
It was important to me to make something he’d love as well, and this also helped me to narrow down some options. I had another design vision which was very different to the layers and layers of tulle. There would’ve been no way of combining both styles, so having the Mr speak his mind was more than helpful for my peace of mind.
While looking for the perfect dress, I really fell in love with designers like Kaviar Gauche and Jenny Packham. I love the classic, elegant style and vintage vibe of those dress designs. The silhouette is very clear and the fabrics are very effective.
Also, on a practical matter: It’s hard to find luxurious-looking tulle in the perfect not-tacky-looking colour that also is affordable. It’s near impossible I can tell you that much! I didn’t completely ditch the tulle skirt as I made one for my hen do, but I wouldn’t have found anything wedding-dress worthy within my budget.
Anyway…
This is all good and all that, but I’m pretty sure you’re much more interested in the design I used eventually.
Once I decided to go with the more elegant, simple silhouette, I did a lot of sketching. And again I couldn’t make my mind up. Until I found THE MOST PERFECT dress of all time. It’s so perfect (in my opinion) I would’ve bought it of the rack if it wasn’t for the price tag.
I absolutely fell in love with the Jenny Packham dress design called “Esme”. (“Alicia” and “Bardot” fell in second place). 
This Jenny Packham design is so so elegant and has that 1930’s feel to it which I absolutely love. I love 1920’s and 30’s Hollywood gowns and this seems to be the incarnation of all those beautiful art deco dresses.
Since I didn’t want to pay for it, I had no other option than to make it myself. Luckily, I know how to sew. What a coincidence!
I decided to incorporate the following aspects into my dress design:
- simple, elegant silhouette
- long skirt (maybe a short train)
- sheer layer over a spaghetti top
- embroidery (provided I manage that technically)
- plunging back neckline
- pastell colour (either champagne, blush pink or dusty blue)
That’s enough for today. I hope you enjoyed this post!
I’ll share more about the draping, drafting, muslining and sewing as well as the understructure with you in the next posts. For now, I can tell you that much: I managed to tick everything off that list, eventually!
xx
Charlie
Happy sewing!
♥
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It was basically a rectangular, light-weight long dress that looked suspiciously handmade, but had some sort of label in it, so I’m not too sure about that fact. The dress itself had no shape whatsoever, the hem going way below knee-length. At first I thought it might be edgy and cool but when I put it on it simply looked horrible and I felt like wearing a potato sack.
The dress was too narrow to give me enough fabric for cutting out a whole new garment, so I decided to take the easy way out and cut the bottom off. Chop, chop!
I overlocked the raw seam and hemmed it by hand using matching gold thread.
Oh hay!
The two Tilly & The Buttons Agnes tops I’m showing you today were Christmas presents for my bff. So, please ignore the fit! We are similar sizes and shapes but the tops were ultimately made for her and not a perfect fit on me.
The Fabric:
Anyway, I had already bought the second & safe fabric, so I made another one. These tops are so easy and quick to sew, it didn’t even make much of a difference.
(Ignore the turned up sleeve, I don’t know how to dress myself!)
Happy Holidays everyone!
Start of by sketching out the shape or letters you want to create. Alternatively, you can use Word or Photoshop to create a layout you can print off and cut out.
I used the sketch to check if the size was right and to mark the position on the shirt.
Because I couldn’t find a good font and sketched my own, I copied them onto squared paper to make sure they were even and all the exact same size. I positioned them on the shirt and used chalk for markings.
When transferring the template onto the foil, make sure everything is mirrored. Draw the shape onto the matt side of the foil, you can use pen or pencil. If you don’t want to mirror your letters, you can try to draw them onto the “right” side, but since it has a protective film it might be a bit tricky and the ink of your pen might come off and ruin your iron.
Cut out the letters, place the onto your shirt and press the iron onto them one by one to prevent them from slipping out of positon. Don’t remove the protective film until all the letters are firmly applied and have cooled off. 
You can now remove the plastic film and use the extra sheet of protective paper that comes with the foil to set the glue a second time. Never iron without the paper after that otherwise the foils sticks to your iron and the whole this is ruined. You can wash the shirt at 60° and iron it from the wrong side if necessary. 
