Modest bridesmaid’s alterations and bolero

The work I did for Ellie included modest bridesmaid’s alterations and helping to make a bolero for each maid. Ellie found bought her bridesmaids dresses from the high street. And then had the necklines extensively altered to meet the modesty standards that were important to her. The gorgeous little boleros were actually finished by Ellie’s mum. She used silk sourced from my fabric books for a perfect colour match.

Official Wedding pictures by Chris Legg

I do not normally take on alterations for anything other than bridal wear. However, as Ellie was having her own wedding dress made agreed to help with her bridesmaids too. The work done on them wasn’t just the usual changes for size anyway, but much more extensive.

How the modest bridesmaids’ alterations were accomplished

‘Before picture’

The dresses as bought from the shop were very pretty but not suitable for Ellie’s wedding day. The sweetheart strapless necklines were too revealing and needed building up for modesty. The dresses came with long satin sashes that tied at the back. So I removed these and used them to create the new necklines. It was a bit of a challenge to accomplish these modest bridesmaid’s alterations but I always relish something that is not straight forward.

‘After Pictures’

I ruched the satin to match the underbust sash and then sewed it across the neckline to create a higher square neck. I then sewed more of the sash from the underarm up and around the neckline into a pretty halter neck providing more coverage. A ribbon at centre back held the new halter neck in place. Lastly, I finished the back waistline with a new ruched satin sash so the line round from the front was continued.

The short sleeved boleros that Ellie’s mum made finished the new, more modest dresses.

Ellie also had extensive style alterations to her own wedding dress. You can see more about the work I did on her dress in her own blog post here.

If you’d like to talk to me about having modesty alterations made to a wedding dress you can get in touch.

I have a whole page about standard wedding dress alterations and how to book in here.