The Decluttering Project : Wedding Dress
One of the decluttering topics that slipped into the back of my mind recently is the topic of wedding dresses. I think it’s all of the beautiful invitations, announcements, and beautiful parties this time of year. So beautiful.
I really, really don’t like the idea of putting the words “declutter” and “wedding dress” in the same sentence. Do you?
But what do we do with our old wedding dresses? What have you done with yours?
Is it in the closet? Did you rent one or borrow? This topic is certainly one where I don’t have the answers, so I thought I would open it all to you. What have you done with your wedding dress, and are you happy with the outcome?
I cannot wait to hear your thoughts!
July 21st, 2010 at 7:02 am
My lovely dress is languishing in our closet. My mother-in-law, who died years before I met my husband, was a dressmaker. She made it for a bride who didn’t end up with it because she upset my MIL with all of the changes she wanted. I’m not sure that it would go over well if I mentioned passing it along, but I guess I won’t know for sure until I broach the subject with my dh. It would be nice for someone else to be able to enjoy it…
July 21st, 2010 at 7:12 am
I have mine in a dress bag hanging in the back of a closet in our second bedroom. It doesn’t take up that much space – it’s not a huge ball gown or anything like that. If I really needed the space, I’d probably donate it, but as of right now, I’m happy to just let it hang.
July 21st, 2010 at 7:17 am
The mums of some friends of mine get together every 5 years or so and have a wine night, all wearing their wedding dresses. From photos that have surfaced it looks absolutely ridiculous.
Was impressed with Sherry from Young House Love’s trick – she dyed hers ((http://www.younghouselove.com/2008/10/i-wanted-to-dye/).
July 21st, 2010 at 7:26 am
My dress is still stored up in my closet (since 1982)….my one and only daughter has made it a firm
statement she wants to have one she’s picked out…and not mine. I totally understand
this with lots of love in saying so…..but just maybe, just maybe..in case she changes her
mind…I’ll keep it for her still.
After that, in either way my daughter decides….I plan on saving it….and when my 1st grand-child comes…making
the skirt of the dress into a lovely skirting for the baby bassinet!!! Saw it done in
a magazine many years ago…and thought what a perfect thing for me to do with mine!!!!
July 21st, 2010 at 7:40 am
I did not have a traditional wedding dress. I wore a pretty skirt with matching jacket. I have it in a box in the basement. It’s made of beautiful fabric and has pretty lace inserts. Maybe someday I will figure out something I could do with it.
July 21st, 2010 at 7:49 am
Mine is languishing in the basement. I had it professionally cleaned and boxed, and it is stuffed with tissue paper andd looks like part of a torso in a box. It’s really creepy. Will probably save until my daughter tells me she doesn’t want it……
July 21st, 2010 at 7:53 am
Not to be a commenting bother…but just had to write and let you know what a blessing you
are in how you connect people with you blog…after reading Lauren’s comment…I went to
younghouselove’s blog and spent quite a bit of reading all about her wedding. I’m so impressed.
You young girls these days are just awesome creatures!!!
July 21st, 2010 at 7:55 am
Error! The “you blog” should have stated “your blog”!
It’s a 2 cup morning for me!!!!
July 21st, 2010 at 8:39 am
Mine is in my closet. It’s not a glam formal gown; it looks like this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/twobugshindig/229626361/ So I could wear it again, but frankly I probably won’t — it’s so pristine white I’d probably spill something on it, and it requires complicated undergarments. ;b I like to look at the dress from time to time and let the memories wash over me.
As for the red evening dress I wore to our Chinese banquet (http://www.flickr.com/photos/twobugshindig/229625634/in/set-72157594262078011/), I’ve worn it when we’ve gone on silly cruises that require formal dress for certain dinners. :) So it’s earned its keep!
July 21st, 2010 at 9:29 am
Le sigh….oh, what to do with a languishing wedding dress…
I moved cross country about a year after my wedding and *had* to have to stored so I could move it. So I did the museum quality box thing and it’s certainly much smaller than it used to be. I can even open it and peer at it through the window – though it’s funny because the “bodice” they used to fill out the dress is much larger than I actually am, so it makes my dress look HUUUUGE!
Before that it hung on the back of my door and I would wear it now and again – hey, it’s MY dress…may as well! Honestly, I *love* the idea of re-wearing your dress for silly occasions (like wine drinking, birthday parties, etc.). I actually saw somebody recently who was the last of her girlfriends to get married and all of her bridesmaids wore their old wedding dresses – how freaking cute is that?!
It’s an indulgence, for sure, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything. It’s beautiful, like the day and the relationship. May as well keep the dress around for the purpose of good memories. I keep so little else around that i think it’s worth it…
Love your blog!!!
xoxo,
Lindsay
July 21st, 2010 at 9:40 am
When my daughters were young, they were fascinated with my wedding dress and veil (especially the veil!) and I ended up letting them have it for dress-up play!! Then I probably donated it to Goodwill? Can’t remember.
July 21st, 2010 at 9:56 am
My grandmother made my mother’s wedding dress and then I wore it for my wedding. My mother thinks it cost about $35 to make fifty-some years ago. It’d be a perfect style for now – retro 50′s style. I always was amazed and felt fortunate that it fit me to a T! My mom is storing it for now.
July 21st, 2010 at 10:24 am
I gave mine to a friend. I bought my dress new and paid about $400 for it, (not too bad of a price for one these days!), and when a friend of mine was getting kind of serious with a guy I had her try it on. Since it fit her and she liked it, I gave it to her so that if they decided to get married quickly then she wouldn’t need to find a dress. They didn’t end up getting married, but she still has the dress. And I’m fine with that, because since I moved overseas, I really didn’t want to be hauling it with me all over the world anyways!
July 21st, 2010 at 1:41 pm
I have mine hanging in my closet still with no plans to get rid of it. My own mother is 7 inches shorter than I am so by the time I was in 6th grade I could wear her wedding dress during dress-up time. We don’t have any daughters yet, but my little sister and I had so much fun carefully putting the dress and the veil on (with mom’s supervision of course!), standing in front of the mirror and humming the wedding march as we tromped through the house when we were little that I think I’d like to keep it for my own daughters/granddaughters to play dress up.
July 21st, 2010 at 1:54 pm
I donated mine to the Brides Against Breast Cancer program about four years after I got married. I kept my veil and have pictures of me in my beautiful dress. I do not regret donating it at all!
July 21st, 2010 at 2:32 pm
I’m loving the ideas! Sandy, you did a beautiful thing, donating your dress to Brides Against Breast Cancer. I’d never heard of the org before – I love it.
Katie
July 21st, 2010 at 2:48 pm
I’d love to dye mine – as you know its a short simple dress. As soon as I fit into it again I’m going to look into doing that. Perhaps a light aqua! :)
July 21st, 2010 at 7:03 pm
I still have mine in the closet. I really ought to find a way of passing it along. I am not much of a clothing keeper – seems hard to keep something for sentiment when others could be using it. If I do get rid of it, I would keep the veil and probably the crinoline. The only thing I kept from my kids clothing was the outfit they came home from the hospital in. And I still have my prom dress – a vintage dress from the 1920s – that I find occasion to wear from time to time. I actually like that more than my wedding dress. So why am I keeping the wedding dress? Thanks for putting my mind along this track.
July 21st, 2010 at 8:38 pm
Does the fact that I sold my wedding dress (*gasp!*) mean that I am totally lacking in sentimentality and have a heart of stone? Two years after we got married, we moved to Asia. I didn’t really have anywhere to store it, and even though it was a beautiful, traditional gown, I had no illusions that any future daughter of mine might want to wear it. Both my mother and mother-in-law kept their gowns and very kindly offered them to me, but they were reminiscent of the decade in which they were purchased (the 70s), so I bought my own. I figured mine would be thought of the same way by future generations, so I sold it to a bridal store that refurbishes gowns. If I had known about any charities that could have used it, I would have gladly donated it, but I wasn’t aware of anything like that at the time. I don’t regret not keeping it–I have lovely photos of the day, and that’s enough for me.
July 21st, 2010 at 8:58 pm
Cold?! Not at all, Morgan. I think that selling your dress so that someone else can use it is a very smart decision. You have no regret and no extra baggage, which has brought you happiness. That’s what matters most – I like this idea!
Katie
July 22nd, 2010 at 12:49 am
I wore my grandmother’s wedding dress. After the wedding it went back into storage at my aunt’s house. It’s the best of both worlds – I didn’t have to get rid of it, but I also don’t have it here cluttering up my space. :)
July 22nd, 2010 at 8:03 am
I don’t know what to do with my dress! I wore my grandmother’s long satin gown from 1949. It’s now hanging in my closet. I don’t even know where to have it taken care of to be preserved, but I don’t want it ‘museum’ done up – when I was younger, and even a teenager, I loved wearing it just to see how it felt, and I’d like my girls (if I have any) to be able to do the same. Every time I take it to a cleaner or seamstress, their eyes get wide and they send me to someone else. It’s definitely something I don’t want to declutter, no matter what. I like the idea of storing it at someone else’s house, though!
July 22nd, 2010 at 10:31 am
I made my dress…Then a couple of years ago I needed a party dress, so I dyed it with Rit dye: http://www.flickr.com/photos/victorianlibrarian/3156273271/ The color came out well, but it was a bit nerve-wracking waiting to see how it would look when it dried! Now it’s back to hanging on the back of the door…
July 22nd, 2010 at 11:38 am
Mine is hanging in a closet at my parents’ house.
Worst part is – I will never wear it. It was purchased for the wedding I didn’t have to the fiance I realized I couldn’t marry. I need to sell it, but just am not looking forward to the logistics of it.
And my, how my taste has changed. When I DO get married, i will not be wearing a heavy huge gown like the one in my mom’s closet.
July 22nd, 2010 at 12:46 pm
I wore a dress that my grandmother made for my mom and my aunt. Some of my cousins have worn it, too. Obviously it was altered to fit all the various brides. Since I was the most recent person to wear it (17 years ago), it is in my mom’s possession, packed away carefully. I have three daughters, but don’t feel like they should wear it if they get married in years to come. Plus, by then it could be about 75 years old. Yikes!
July 22nd, 2010 at 2:47 pm
I have thought about this topic recently. I have wanted to do something with it but couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it. I want to find a seamstress and convert my dress into my daughter’s first communion dress. I’ve thought that maybe someday she could pass it as her daughter’s first communion dress!
July 22nd, 2010 at 3:58 pm
I don’t understand why there’s a need to declutter a sentimental and beautiful item representing a wonderful time, or a heartfelt gift, especially if you don’t have to cart it around on your travels. But that is just me. My (2nd) dress was a $40 dress off ebay…and though I will never get rid of it, I have thought of having it dyed a less wedding-y color so I could wear it more often. A long dress could be dyed and shortened for another use, and thus recycled into your own life.
July 24th, 2010 at 12:41 pm
My wedding gown wasn’t a special heirloom, hand-made by loving family. It was pretty, and it fit my budget! It also took up way too much closet space in our tiny home. I had already had the experience of being offered an heirloom wedding gown that I didn’t care for at all, and didn’t want to invest the roughly 2-3 cubic feet of real estate at various prices per square foot over the next 18-plus years in order to inflict the same awkwardness on some other bride-to-be.
I put an add in the local penny saver paper, and found a taker. It fit her perfectly, and was a becoming style for her. She got a great deal on it! The only other thing she wanted to know was why I was selling it, and I assured her that we had been happily married for 5 years (as opposed to some nightmare divorce situation with bad vibes associated with the dress), and I simply didn’t want to sacrifice the storage space when someone else might be enjoying this pretty dress.
She got a deal, and I got the cash plus freedom from storing something I was never going to use again. I can look at photos of the dress and the day whenever I get nostalgic.
July 26th, 2010 at 6:29 am
First of all, let me say that I spent way too much on my wedding dress. I bought it second hand and I still spent way too much. I purposely bought something, however, that I could alter and wear later. It was a 1930′s inspired gown with a very long gauzy cape. After the wedding, I had the cape removed and took up some of the length. Paired with bright blue vintage jewelry and have worn it to some military balls. It’s cream colored, but because the style is so classic, I can wear it with gloves or jewelry and no one suspects that it was my wedding dress.
July 26th, 2010 at 9:15 am
Oprah had some lady on that took wedding gowns that were donated and used the money she got from selling them to help single moms with cancer have a special wish with their children. I donated my wedding gown for this cause. It was a touching episode and the woman seemed genuine. They showed some of the things they had done for these women and their families and it was wonderful.
July 26th, 2010 at 4:21 pm
my wedding dress came from a thrift shop, and two years after I got married, it went back to a thrift shop – now in a different country. I hadn’t had any intention of wearing a white dress that I’d pay through the nose for and wear once, but suddenly, there it was, hanging in the window of my favourite thrift shop for less than 20 quid. it fit perfectly, as if it was made for me. it went to a thrift shop in the netherlands and I hope that someone else was able to use it, if not for a wedding, then for a fancy dress or costume party.
July 28th, 2010 at 9:53 pm
I sent mine off to the consignment shop. It was beautiful, the day was beautiful, but I had beautiful pictures of it! I made $29.80 off a dress that originally cost $500…but I don’t have it taking up physical and emotional space, especially since the marriage didn’t last. SO many people thought that it was cold-hearted or mercenary of me, but it was just a part of the WEDDING, which was much less important to me than the actual marriage.
August 13th, 2010 at 5:03 pm
I just recently stumbled on a website that you can donate your wedding gown to. They take the dress and make newborn gowns for children who pass away in their first few days. The site goes on to explain that things aren’t made for that kind of situation and it is one less thing grieving parents have to worry about.
Here is the website: http://marymadelineproject.org/
August 18th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
My daughter couldn’t fit into my wedding dress, which relieved her greatly. Instead, we took my veil and had it made over for her to wear. That made us both happy.
January 3rd, 2011 at 8:08 pm
I borrowed a self-designed wedding dress from a friend. I obviously took lots of pictures. When it was all over, I returned it. Within 6 years, the dress was dated and my personal style had changed. No big boxes. No precious packing. Only good memories.