The Dress

FYI the train of this dress does bustle up onto a few buttons sewn on the back to form a beautiful mermaid style dress perfect for dancing and moving about freely.

The story behind this dress is just as amazing as the dress itself! Vacationing in Rome, Italy with my mother when my then boyfriend told me he'd asked my dad for my hand in marriage. Of course mom and I had to look! We found only one small wedding gown store, but it looked closed. As I looked through the window a gorgeous woman walked up to us and I asked if this was a wedding store since there was only one wedding dress on a pedestal at the center of the store... she smiled politely and answered "yes, this is a CUSTOM (emphasis mine) wedding dress boutique. XO And SHE was the owner.I nearly turned back thinking no way I could afford a custom wedding gown. But I didn't even get a chance to say anything else, the woman gently took my arm and pulled me in. I felt so bad thinking "ugh I'm just gonna waste this poor woman's time!"

she took me upstairs to her studio where the walls were lined with raw fabric, lace of all sheens, buttons, and corsets! She sat me down and asked "do you have pictures of what you like?" I decided just to hurry up and show her a Pinterest photo of this amazing dress and veil I'd found but couldn't find in a single store in the US. I told her so and she glanced at it once and instantly replied, "you can't find that dress anywhere because that's a custom gown".... well now that made sense!

she then pulled a piece of paper from her desk and handed it to me with a pen and said, "write down what your budget is."

i laughed inside thinking no way will my little budget would fit her price!!! So I wrote and handed the paper back. She looked at it and then looked up at me and nodded yes... I was like "what?! You'll design and make my dress custom and ship it back to me in Texas?!" And she smiled saying yes.

The next three days we're a whirlwind of fittings before I left the country to go back home. It was incredible seeing the dress form bit by bit on me each day. By the third day she'd had enough completed that she could finish the rest without me present. I went home and one month later my beautiful gown and long veil were delivered to me in perfect condition.

We're not having kids so versus storing it in my closet for years I want to pass it on to someone else who's ready to add more magic stories to this stunning gown.