My Home-Sewn Wedding Dress

I married the love of my life on 20th June in a lovely, intimate ceremony with our closest family and friends. We got married in Mayfair Library, the oldest library in London, and it was wonderful. Then we all piled onto a vintage Routemaster and drove over the river to an entirely wonderful reception above one of our most favourite pubs. It was such a wonderful day and we are over the moon with happiness!!!

“The dress! The dress!” all the sewing enthusiasts cry. Well, I decided pretty early on into our engagement that I wanted to have a go at making my dress. I also knew that I’d want to keep the making of the dress a secret. Secret from Liam, and secret from my blog (just in case he saw it!) until after the wedding. Again, this was SUCH a challenge, especially living in a tiny one bedroom flat, but ultimately I’m so glad I kept it as a surprise!! However, I did write blog posts and take photos as I went along, so that now I have a series of “Making My Wedding Dress” posts to share with you, which I’m so, so excited about! Before I go way back to the beginning to share my process with you (along with a huge learning curve!) I thought I would show you what I ended up with.

These images are by the extremely wonderful Hannah Mia Photography. As you can see her photographs are excellent and she is also a lovely person! Thoroughly recommend.

Without further a-do, here is my wedding dress!

Also, I just want to point out that my bridesmaid in the photo above is wearing the first dress she has ever made - a tiffany blue silk satin and chiffon affair which was INCREDIBLE. 

In pursuit of the perfect bow. Also I'm very proud of all those covered buttons.

Here you can sort of see the fit across the bust, and the princess seams of the under bodice. Plus the pretty scalloped edge of the lace which I used on the neckline and sleeve hems. Oh, and yes, here we are getting actual-fact MARRIED.

It was such an incredible, emotional, joyous day and I adored wearing my home-sewn wedding dress. The hours, the love and the determination I poured into that dress made me love wearing it all the more. If I'm honest I still can't quite believe it turned out so well!

Stay tuned for a blow-by-blow account of the dressmaking process!

EDIT: find the blow-by-blow account of the dressmaking process here. I split up the making of my wedding dress into a few posts, documenting each stage of the journey. You can find an index of them all on this page.