No, this is not a dress for cats of indeterminate breeding, it is, in fact, my Mother of the Groom dress, which became known as the Moggy dress!
My dress is based on Vogue 1542, which I bought in LA when I went shopping with PammyOh.
I think this pattern is rather gorgeous, however, I knew the fit would be off so took it to my patternmaking class where Sarah and I completely changed it. For a while there I thought the only original part was the shoulders, but the skirt is pretty similar.
So, what did we change? For a start, we got rid of the princess seams and redrafted the bodice so that it was completely on the bias. This also meant that I didn’t need a zip at the centre back. We began this whole process in July, 2017. I was so organised, but I still didn’t finish it until a week before the wedding, so it was actually ten months in the making!
I spent a lot of time worrying about this dress. Was it appropriate for the MOG? I did a lot of research and lace, sequins and suits featured heavily in fairly subdued colours. I am not really a lace or sequins person, although I do have both in my wardrobe, and I prefer bright colours. I also began to worry about the weather, and how cold I might be, and also how much weight I had gained during the last three holidays, which made that bias-cut dress get shorter and shorter. I did a lot of worrying!!
To the dress then: I made it from this rather brilliant blue wool crepe, kindly provided by Sarah from her rather epic stash and dubbed “bluetiful” by my friend Sophie. The mustard rouleaux are made from wool also from Sarah’s stash, and the murky green bits are derived from some grey wool crepe which I dyed with correopsis.
The dress lining was separately drafted and is made from some beautiful silk I bought in India. It is also cut on the bias and I could not believe how much it dropped, hanging at least 20cms below the dress by the time I was finished.
This photo is taken with Tom’s Godmother, Suzanne, whilst we waited for the bride to arrive. I am wearing a wrist corsage which I made and which didn’t survive the ceremony! It is even looking rather sad here.
I have only two photographs from the actual ceremony, so all the others are taken later. In this one I am examining Bridgette’s bouquet. She had a miniature made with her beloved grandparents’ photo in it, which she attached to the ribbons with some blue ribbon. I gave her a new silver horseshoe charm, and lent her a black cat brooch of my mother’s dating from the 1940s. This all became her “something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue”.
I got Suzanne to take a photo of the back of my dress when we got back to our accommodation after the wedding (very early hours of the morning). Due to the fact that we eliminated the zip, I was able to take the decoration around the back, which pleased me hugely. Sarah and I added two darts either side of the centre back to give more shaping in the back.
The rest of these photos are taken at home, after the event, so no proper makeup or jewellery, but you’ll get the idea. I might add some of the professional photos when they come.
My neck decoration is slightly different from that of the pattern, but I really like the way it sits.
The only bit of bling on the entire outfit is this tiny bead inside the flower. I suspect that not a single person saw it!
For most of the evening I just wore the dress, but I did make a wrap, which was drafted from Mark’s mother’s fox fur, as per the blue one in my previous post. However, instead of self-lining the wrap, I found some silk in my stash that I had bought at Potters, and dyed it with correopsis. This turned out to tone perfectly with the mustard accents, whilst feeling very luxurious.
As you can see I found some mustard suede shoes in Cos, which were just perfect for the outfit, and I also took a bag that my mother had made back in the 1960s. The colours in the bag toned in perfectly and I love that tapestry design.
Whilst not being twirly, the skirt was quite flirty and it felt fabulous whilst dancing, with the bias cut providing just enough movement to be interesting.
A last photograph (for now), where Mark was making me laugh!
So the wedding is over, and it was fabulous. The weather was very threatening with thunderstorms predicted, and given the actual ceremony was planned to be outside under trees, it was all very stressful, and Plan A was abandoned, with a Plan B and C put in place. However the weather was really quite nice so we didn’t need to go past Plan B. The wind dropped and the sun peeped out, so all was well.