Bespoke Wedding dress with sleeves in silk dupion

top hat and morning coat groom ivory silk wedding dress english summer

Gerry commissioned an elegant bespoke wedding dress with sleeves in ivory dupion with ruched bodice and off the shoulder sleeves.

Official photographs by www.timelesspictures.co.uk

Gerry’s dress was made with a fitted and boned bodice with ruched silk sweeping in a cross over design to one side. The sweetheart neckline flowed into the off the shoulder line around the top of her elbow length sleeves. The dress was gently fitted around the hips before flaring out and falling into a train. ‘Godet’ panels created the fullness of the skirt whist complementing the hang of the silk fabric. The dress was finished with covered buttons at the back and beaded motifs at the hip and the bottom of the back opening.

graceful window lit bride with veil and train

Two tier veil with beaded motifs

I also made a veil for Gerry in plain ivory tulle. It was cut to fall longer than her dress’ train and with a blusher for over her face before the ceremony. We finished the veil with the same beaded motifs as on the dress, placed to show up where the veil spread across the floor.

 original design sketch sweethear fitted wedding dress by Felicity Westmacott

Original design sketch

bride on the staircase traditional ivory silk dress

Gerry wrote: Just so you know – the dress was a huge success. Very beautiful. Just loved it! Thanks so much for making it such a lovely experience. I really appreciate your kindness, advice and all the hard work you have put into the dress. Your quality of work is amazing, Fliss, and incredible value for money. Thank you for all that extra work. I will certainly be recommending you to anyone I hear is getting married!! So will my friends!!! Thank you for making them feel so welcome too.
Best wishes, G
xxx

bride and her father church wedding traditional dress
 train wrist loop ruched silk wedding dress
something blue ivory silk dupion wedding dress
dancing with wrist loop wedding dress bride train
dancing bride sleeves wedding dress button back

To see another classic English bride visit Vicki’s dress

To see another bespoke wedding dress with sleeves visit Lisa’s dress

Making the bespoke wedding dress with sleeves

 intermediate fitting picture pinning the hem

Pictures from a mid-fitting with a partially finished dress.

creating the ruched bodice making the dress

The ruched bodice was created by draping the silk on a stand and then carefully hand stitching all the folds in place.

wrist loop wedding dress train hidden something blue

A wrist loop was sewn inside the train so Gerry could carry her dress safely across the grass when outside. A hidden ‘something blue’ was revealed when she lifted her dress up

final fitting pictures wedding gown

Pictures from the final fitting, showing the front and back with the train spread out and bustled up for dancing.

finished dress in the mirror dress fitting room

fitting picture bride reclines

A reclining bride in her partly made dress…

Embellishment for Georgina

black lace applique on collar for mother of the bride

Gerry’s lovely mother in law, Georgina Butler wanted her shop bought dress to have something extra and we came up with adding this beaded black lace to the lapel and sleeves to create a very elegant finish.

mother of bride sleeve edge applique alteration
mother of the groom applique black lace on collar

To commission your own bespoke wedding dress just get in touch and I can book you in for a free design consultation.

Or see more examples of wedding dresses with sleeves, Winter wedding dress and Chantilly lace wedding dress.

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Felicity Westmacott

I write about all aspects of weddings, dressmaking, fashion history, and the human relation to clothing. I welcome comments and debate.

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It's giving bridal Sun Goddess 🌞 Just look at that colour!

One of my favourite bespoke wedding dresses to date. I made this opulent bronze gold look for an equally gorgeous bride who wanted something a little different for her wedding day. 

My favourite features have got to be the statement bow on the shoulder and the cartridge pleats around the waist. This style of pleating helped add volume to this unbelievable iridescent dupion silk. Cartridge pleating was popular in the first Elizabethan era and always gives a touch of the historical to any garment on which it's included.

I also included a bustle hook (you can see what the dress looks like up in the last clip), which totally transforms the dress and makes it much easier to move in when it's time to dance!

This is bride was a dream client - elegant and adventurous, with a touch of the dramatic 😉 drop me a DM if you've got wedding dress dreams that you're dying to bring to life!

#weddingdress #ukbride #bespokeweddingdress #bridetobe
I thought it would be fun to see the differences between various bridal petticoats and hoop skirts. Meet the Aurora wedding dress, she's one of my favourites, especially because of the excellent dramatic vibes she gives. So she felt like the perfect dress to experiment with.

The Aurora dress already has some layers of netting built into the dress, so she's already got a bit of volume from the get go. But I wanted to see what difference adding more underlayers would have.

The first addition was a single hoop skirt. Hoop skirts come in all sorts of variations - the single hoop is pretty much what it sounds like. There's a single hoop at the bottom of the skirt, translating into more width at the bottom of the dress.

Then I took off the hoop skirt, and put on a 5-layer petticoat. This thing is a monster! But adds so much more airy, fluffy volume.

The second hoop skirt I tried was a bell hoop skirt. This one has hoops built in all the way up the skirt, creating more of a...you guessed it...bell shape.

And then finally, for the ultimate princess vibes, I tried both the 5-layer petticoat and the bell hoop skirt together. It's giving fairy tale bride, for sure. Perfect for twirling in whilst you dance with your prince, princess or princep.

When ordering a dress from me, talking about what kind of silhouette you want is really useful. And I've got loads of seamstress secrets to achieve pretty much anything you can imagine!

#weddingdress #dipdyeweddingdress #seamstress #pinkweddingdress #princessweddingdress #balloonsleeves
"I cannot begin to put into words how thankful I am that I found you to make my wedding dress of my dreams. The dress was perfect in every way and the colours looked glorious in the Cornish sunshine. Everyone fell in love with the dress and I even got likened to the Porthleven mermaid! It even stood up to rambling down cliffs. You truly are a genius and I can never thank you enough."⁠

Nicola wanted an elegant and figure-hugging mermaid wedding dress made in pale ivory lace. To add colour to her look, she chose a vibrant yellow, orange, red and purple dip dye skirt. 

If you want to see how the dress looked on the day of Nicola's wedding, have a look at my previous post. I love how the colours of the dress really stand out against the dramatic setting of the Cornish coast.⁠
⁠
If you're also looking for a completely unique wedding dress, then you've come to the right place. Starting with your ideas and working together during the entire process, I'll design and make your dream wedding dress. Drop me and DM and let's have a chat!
⁠
~⁠
Photography - Thomas Frost - @t.frost.photography⁠
Venue - Beacon Crag B&B, Porthleven - @beaconcragweddingvenue⁠
Flowers - Fullers Flowers - @fullersflowers⁠
Hair & Makeup - Amy Needham @amyellenhairandmakeup
Part 2!

In Part 1 I spent all day prepping my bridal window display. There was a looot of dismantling and tidying involved before I could even begin to start thinking about which wedding dresses I wanted to include in my Pride themed window. Now that's all done, let's just enjoy all this glorious colour!

Which outfit is your favourite? I would love to see a bride wearing both the skirt and veil in one, fabulous, rainbow look.

And, of course, happy Pride 🏳️‍🌈

#pride #bridalboutique #surreybride #sussexbride #altbride #alternativebride #colourfulbride #bespokeweddingdress #weddingdress
emailme@felicitywestmacott.co.ukTEL 07762 543230TOUCHGet in
from design to completionbespoke wedding dressesFelicity Westmacott
Dorking, RH4 1RT241 High Street• Visit the Studio •
Dorking, RH4 1RT241 High Street• Visit the Studio •
emailme@felicitywestmacott.co.ukTEL 07762 543230TOUCHGet in