Wordless Wednesday Wedding
Lord Freddie Windsor and Sophie Winkleman pose at Base Court after their Sept. 12, 2009, wedding at the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace in Richmond upon Thames, England. © Photo by John Stillwell/WPA Pool/Getty Images
Running my fingers across the pearl trim on the bodice of my wedding gown is soothing. Every so often, when I'm certain no one is looking, I open the closet doors and do just that. The scent of the satin and the tiny bit of lace that peeks out the pearl-covered trim brings a smile to my face. It's been almost one year since I wore my wedding dress to walk down the aisle toward my groom, and I'll probably never wear it (at least not in public) again. When I slipped into it on my wedding day, I didn't just feel my most beautiful. I also somehow felt stronger and ready to take on the world. I felt comforted and content, secure and sure of my decision to wed my husband.
The wedding dress that Sophie Winkleman wears in the photo above immediately drew me to this photo. Aside from looking stunning in a very traditional dress with long sleeves and a full gown, she seems confident and powerful. I never expected that from wearing my wedding dress, and now that I've experienced such feelings, I notice them in others. These emotions have brought new meaning to the already quite significant wedding dress for me. After the wedding, there are ways to honor your wedding dress. Here are just a few examples:
Preserve Your Gown -- you can have your gown properly cleaned and stored by professionals, so you can one day pass it down to your children or grandchildren. It's also a great way to maintain the quality of the dress, even if you choose to keep it for yourself. One warning: some preservation companies put the gowns in a box without a window, so you can't look at it and regardless of the box you won't be able to touch it.
Trash the Dress -- This is the opposite of preserving the gown. Trashing the dress refers to taking artistic photos in your wedding attire at some point after your wedding day in which you throw caution to the wind and do crazy things -- from lying on a city street in your white gown to jumping into the ocean with it. Many people hire professional photographers to organize such a photo session and then use the images as art in their home or in a secondary photo album.
Wedding Dress Art -- Hiring an artist to create a drawing or painting of your wedding dress is a way to preserve the memory of your dress and put it on display so you can look at it all the time.
Use Pieces of the Dress -- Some women use the fabric from their wedding dress to make their children's baptism or communion outfits, pillows for their matrimonial bed, or other items that would be meaningful and keep the dress (at least somewhat) on display. Young brides have also been known to take pieces of their mom's dress to use on their train or veil. I have heard of at least one bride who had a seamstress turn the bodice of her dress into an elegant strapless top that she wore to other formal events.
What have you done with your wedding dress? Or what will you do with it once you get married?
I preserved mine (luckily, I had a daughter – maybe she will want to wear it), but I got to play dress-up in my mother’s wedding dress! Someone spilled coffee on it during her reception and she could not get the stain out, so she let me wear it. I’m sure you can imagine how many hundreds of times my little friends and I sang “Here Comes the Bride.”
I’ve read of a creative way to preserve your wedding dress! Ceramic artist Jen Champlin coated hers in slip and fired it, making a permanent ceramic sculpture of and out of it!! (Its creation is detailed in a chapter of Ceramic Sculpture.)
Making it into a ceramic sculpture – that had to be a huge kiln!
I don’t remember what I wore at my wedding. I thought I wore red, but thinking back, the reception was delayed a day and I wore a borrowed red dress there, but at the wedding??? The photos didn’t come out, either.
For now, I put mine back in its bag, but it will be cleaned eventually and then stored somewhere safe.
The Groom looks so happy! The bride does look confident, who wouldn’t in a stunning outfit in which they look their best. I like this because it has long sleeves and simple lines. It’s simplicity makes it very classy. I wore a simple white muslin caftan my mother had brought from Israel for my wedding. Later on I used to wear it on the beach.
I eventually need to preserve mine, it might be to late though!
Now that’s a formal wedding. They seem to know how to do it up right in Merry Olde England.
What a lovely couple. The formal style wedding wasn’t for me, but if you can afford to pull it off, I do love a traditional wedding!
Her dress is gorgeous! I like the idea of using pieces of a wedding dress to make other things, like a baptism outfit for a baby. It seems more practical than just storing it away and possibly never using it again.
I’ll have to plead the fifth on my wedding dress. But it’s good information. The pic is beautiful.
Great picture! Happy WW
I actually decided to make a painting of my own and my husband’s tux. I liked it so much I offered to do paintings for other people.
It’s been a really fun hobby I launched into thanks to my wedding dress.
I decided to cut it up….yup!!! CUT IT UP,from the waist up and I mounted it to a black felt board and framed it in a shadow/photo box style frame. The frame is large and I also added the earrings and necklace I wore too.Now it hangs on my wall of my office(wedding planner)
))