A Wedding Dress Update – How’s It Going?

Less than two months to go until our woodland wedding… I think it’s time for a little update on my DIY wedding dress.
In the last wedding dress post I showed you my inspiration and the general direction I wanted to go in. That was before I started doing anything, including the design process and fabric shopping.

I’m currently looking at the nearly-finished bodice on my dressform and how different it is from what I thought it would be. Boy has this been a process, haha!
Let’s start at the beginning: fabric shopping.

Finding the perfect bridal fabric proved harder than I thought it would. Several trips to fabric stores in central Amsterdam proved futile, as there was simply barely any bride-appropriate fabric available. I ended up finding a store that had a whole wedding fabric section on their website, with by far the nicest fabrics I’d found anywhere online.

The store is located all the way in Tilburg on the other side of the country, though. Considering my limited options and the pressure of an impeding lockdown, I hopped into my car with my best friend and we made it a proper road trip.

I was over the moon when we arrived at the store, Van Gool Stoffen. They had an entire corner of the store dedicated to bridal fabrics, bolts upon bolts of laces ranging from the most delicate florals to modern, minimalist patterns. We started scanning the shelves and pulling fabrics we liked. One bolt in particular caught my eye nearly immediately, but I dismissed it straight away as it wasn’t all white.

We pulled the most amazingly gorgeous lace fabrics, but none of them felt quite right. I kept feeling drawn back to that one first bolt of lace and, as I’m sure you can guess, that’s the one I ended up choosing. I really wanted a lace that wouldn’t feel to old-fashioned or formal as I don’t think that goes with a woodland wedding, but I did want it to have a classic feel and be dainty and feminine. I was adamant about not having a rose pattern in the lace, but did really want something floral. This lace was perfect.

And that is how I ended up with an accent colour. Who’d have thought? Actually, when I look back at my Pinterest board now, it’s pretty clear to me that most of the dresses I’ve pinned aren’t fully white. I wonder how I hadn’t noticed that before, haha! I’m not going to disclose the colour yet, but I actually think it’s gorgeous and so much more visually interesting than an all-white dress. I absolutely adore my lace and cannot wait to show it to you.

Aside from the lace, we also ended up picking up the tulle for the skirt and a lining fabric. Again, keeping the impeding lockdown in mind, I ended up getting generous amounts of fabric. This was a great decision in hindsight, as we did actually go into lockdown in December and still haven’t gotten out of it.

Once I had my fabric and a much clearer view of my options, I felt ready to start working on my pattern and mockup. The drafting phase took the most time and effort by far, but perhaps only because I didn’t particularly enjoy it that much. I need to be able to see where a project is going in order to feel inspired and motivated, and calico mockups just don’t do that for me. I couldn’t wait to actually start seeing the dress taking shape, but knew I couldn’t afford to mess around with my precious lace with no plan. So calico it was.

Initially, I really wanted a dress with a deep V front and a deep V back. I found out rather quickly though that that isn’t something you just make and be done with; no matter what I tried, my shoulders kept slipping once I added sleeves.

A lovely viewer of mine, who is a professional seamstress, sent me an email when I announced our engagement and offered to help me, should I run into any problems in the sewing process. I contacted her and she explained the trick to making a double-sided deep V work. I spent a little time trying to make it happen, but ended up admitting defeat. The technique it requires is simply beyond my skill at the moment, and the fabric I’m working with is less than ideal as well.

So I went back to the drawing board, and designed a new back that would be much simpler to sew. I wish I’d made that decision sooner and saved myself a lot of time and trouble, but I was hell-bent on the deep V-neck at first. I’m happy to tell you, however, that I’m absolutely in love with my new back, even though it’s a style I never would’ve considered originally.

I currently have the bodice almost completely finished. It has drafted princess seams, sleeves, three layers of fabric, and hand-sewn lace appliqués that took a week to cut out and attach. It’s a dream. All it needs now are buttons, which I’ve ordered and am hoping will arrive sometime this week. Then I can get started on the skirt. That’s going to be a whole ‘nother story, as I don’t have a very clear view of where I want to go with it yet. I’m planning to just trust the process and go with the flow; that’s how I prefer to work and that usually yields the best results for me. And the most joy in working, if nothing else.

As promised, I’m filming the entire process and will upload that soon after the wedding. I can’t wait!