I know absolutely nothing about altering a wedding dress, but won't the store where you bought it alter it as needed? It seems like that should be included in the purchase price, as much as wedding dresses cost!

Donna

Yikes! I'm having apoplexy for you - that sounds like a TALL order!

The organza is your biggest challenge. I think you have the order correct.

For the cap sleeves, I think you have to open the top seam and adjust them equally from the inside, back and front. I just made a dress with that kind of sleeve/strap and had to shorten them - from the inside! Made me mad, as I added the sleeve to a strapless bodice, measured it myself...and got it wrong!

When I made my dtr's gown, we used the same covered buttons and loops for the bustle as for the back of the bodice. The spacing was on the pattern. Try the library for sewing books on bustling.

As for bulk, it's murder! I once made a prom dress for another dtr that had forty (yes, 40!) yards of material! It took several shades of pink organza layered to achieve the color she wanted. The thing was heavy as lead but swished beautifully and she was happy....If you have room and an extra table, pull your machine cabinet away from the wall and put the table behind it to hold the fabric while you sew. That's much easier and more reliable than asking a helper to hold up the dress while you sew.

Better get to work - mid-August is closer than you think! I hope it all goes smoothly for you.

Sherry

....Feel free to come back here and yell and scream if you encounter any problems. You'll feel better - I know!

Donna posted while I was writing: Heck no, they won't alter for free! In fact, I think they make you buy your dress (including bridesmaid's dresses) too large and long so you almost have to pay for alterations. And they charge for each thing they do, so it adds up.

I have three dtrs who are always in weddings these days, and I'd rather make all the gowns for all the wedding parties than alter those blasted dresses, but, alas, I keep altering and complaining.

Your plan sounds good. First, shorten the shoulder straps. *I* would just take an inch off each end where they attached to the dress, but that's me. You want to pin those up first, before you pin the hem. One inch off the floor is fine. Taking up the underlayers from the bottom and the top from the waist is the smart way to go. You may find yourself taking in the side seams on the organza to make it fit back into the waist, or since it is slightly gathered, just gather a bit more.

In the store, we pin the bustle first, then the front hem, then taper the side to the bustled back. "Two part bustle" could mean several things, I'm guessing the satin is bustled separately from the organza? Sometimes we do it that way. Sometimes we add extra bustle points for just the organza (or chiffon, or tulle, too) as it doesn't drape or behave like the satin.

Most styles of dresses these days are better served with a French bustle, it's a bit easier on the fabric, less likely to tear, but you can do whatever you like. You sound like you're doing an overbustle, though. Run the ribbon or bustle thread through a clear button on the underside, to take some of the strain off the fabric. If the train is very long and wide, you may need seven (or more) points to support the weight.

A hem as you've described costs $120 at our store. A bustle like the one I've described will cost about $80 for a bustle with seven pick-ups. So yeah, $200 is about the going rate.

A small rant:
[Quoting:
In fact, I think they make you buy your dress (including bridesmaid's dresses) too large and long so you almost have to pay for alterations. And they charge for each thing they do, so it adds up. End quote]

I've worked in three bridal shops. Only one ever tracked whether the alts made a profit. That *one* does, but not by doing unnecessary work.

Every single dress I've taken in *has* fit some part of the body, (bust, waist, or hip) The general public thinks that taking three measurements gets a custom garment. It gets you the size *off the rack* the manufacturer determines will fit that particular body in the style ordered. Dresses are manufactured for a woman of 5'7" or thereabouts. We can always make it shorter, after all. Above a certain height, extra length gown can be ordered.

The dresses for the stores I've worked in have all been very well constructed, worth the price the customers paid. They have underlinings, linings, tulle, built in petticoats, so much boning that in altering, sometimes we can eliminate a couple pieces and still have the dress stay up.

The alterations aren't free, in most cases, because the thing that Americans are most concerned with is ***the price***. The stores are giving the buying public what they've asked for. While folks will complain about the lack of service, they won't in fact, pay for it if they can find the product cheaper elsewhere. The better, smaller, more personal-service oriented department stores in our area went out of business years ago, 'cause folks could "buy it cheaper at the Mall."

I have to agree with sherrmann on the ordering of bridal gowns. I worked at two bridal salons. I found it amazing that a high school girl with no sewing experience would size the brides. I heard over and over again, "oh, the seamstress can take that in". The thought was it's always better to order large because you really didn't have the confidence to order the correct size. Of course, so many brides and their mothers didn't sew so they didn't know any better. The years that I worked in the bridal industry I only had two size issues. A child who was so overweight I should have just told them we couldn't get the dress in her size and a bride who neglected to tell me she was 3 months pregnant. I don't believe that the intention is to make money. I think most alteration depts more than likely lose money. I think that some stores need to better educate their sales staff.

Anyway, here is a link for bridal gown information. Hopefully there is something that information on the bustle that you can use.

http://www.leanna.com/Bridal/index.htm

flameon beat me to it...leanna's site is great.

Thanks for the comments, they will be helpful.
Research results:
I found the following resources helpful as I have been planning my approach, mainly for bustling and hemming:
1. Singer "Sewing for Special Occasions" which has photos and excellent guides for the bustling.
2. The "Sew News" website library had a great description of bustling a wedding gown at this page:
http://www.sewnews.com/library/sewnews/qa/aaqa0300a.htm
3. Another website which explains bustles including the Austrian, French [inverted] and over bustle. I learned a lot at the following:
http://www.rencentral.com/oct_nov_fo11/bustles.shtml
4. A slim book from the library with no photos and only a few sketches, but titled: "How to Alter a Bridal Gown" by Susan Ormond. This book has a chapter on hems.
The important point she makes is to follow the manufacturer's method of construction when you reconstruct.
5. Google search. It brought me back to the forum which I had not used for sewing.

Good Laugh for all of you who work with brides:
Use a search engine on the words bustle or bustling a wedding gown. You will locate the U-Tube video of bridesmaids searching for ribbons to underbustle the bride. Finally, the bride lays face down, with petticoats exposed while bridesmaids consider the mystery of all those ribbons!

Bustle comments:
The comment about a 2-point take-up--I understood as take the center back up in two parts, then do side bustles. There's no place to put a button part-way up the back, so a simple 3-point seems to look fine with pins. I will use the suggestion to fasten a small button on the wrong side of the fabric to support the fabric and weight. I may try a 5-point to see if it looks better.

My daughter did not like the looks of the underbustle. I thought the Austrian could maybe be used to get the heavy satin pulled up [done like a balloon shade with loops sew to the inside seam allowance and ribbons pulled through to gather up the skirt, or scrunch it up]. Then the beautiful organza could be pulled up on top in the overbustle and attached to the waist area to emphasize the delicacy of the fabric and show off the beading and silver threads of sewn flowers.

I did notice how I need to take the front hem around just a bit to the back for this bustle to work, so thanks for the comment about pinning the bustle, then mark the hem.

Sleeves.
These are totally decorative, the bodice and the nifty inside waist piece hold the dress perfectly in place.

I will use the suggestion of shortening the caps at the junction with the gown. It seems the organza will allow me to fold it a bit and I could tack the edge a bit to keep the crescent shape coming to a point and not have to rip stitches in the organza. For the $20 most shops offered on this, they certainly weren't ripping many stitches! I found nothing on this small alteration in any resource I checked, so this forum was great!

Research is done . . . I am nearly ready. I mailed the check for the cake today and finished a 4th revision of the seating chart for our sit-down dinner. The bride has calculated the meals and other charges at the reception site and we had to spend more! They have a minimum, so we added some appetizers for those arriving at the reception site early. The bride has her program ready to get printed and has finalized the flower order. The bridesmaids are wearing tea-length dresses and need no alterations! The bride chose these to avoid the usual $100 hem charge on simple dresses.

Time to dig in! I am not scheduled for any meetings for two weeks. I am a local elected official. I have no one home expecting a meal today. The Elna was taken from her cabinet and is on the seldom used dining table. Thanks for that tip about a big table! I have a black lab to avoid and she dislikes her feet on wood floors.

If I have time, I'll give a progress report.

While I didn't check out the U-Tube video, I was powerfully reminded of bustling my daughter's dress. We have a great video of me, on my knees under the back of her dress, while she chats away to the videographer. There were FIFTEEN ties under there! BTW--they used flat 1/2" lace for the ties. Lace worked much, much better than ribbon which is slippery and can come untied as the evening progresses.

Annie

I did have a colleague narrow her eyes a tad when I came in one day a couple months ago. A bride had taken the better part of an hour and a half to decide on a bustle. I tried over bustles, under bustles, in as many configurations as I could conjure. I suggested that after seeing so many, perhaps she might want to think about it and come back again. We finally agreed on a design with ten points. I did number them, though. The other trick is to mark the points that come together with pastel thread, a different color for each set.

One of my pet peeves is the customer who expresses disbelief that we can't work her into the schedule. Each one swears it will only take a few minutes to do this...it's so simple!

People also ask for the impossible. Last week, we were sent a skirt and told to hem it sixteen inches from the floor...even worse, the head of the department (nice lady, but math-impaired) thought we should be able to do that.

I sure admire you ladies!! I'd rather eat bread & water for a month to pay for alterations than take on the challenge described here...but then alterations have ever been a thorn in my side- much rather make a garment from scratch.

It's been many years since I've made a wedding dress & wouldn't tackle one now for all the tea in China.

Suzi

UPDATE:

Hemming:
After I hemmed the underskirts [which went quite fast], we did a fitting. The petticoats had been too long to get an accurate hem estimate before because the bride was always standing on portions during the initial fitting. I had suspected things might change, but not as much as they did.

Surprise, the billowing out of the dress from shorter petticoats has shortened the dress about 1.5"! I went through most of a bobbin taking tucks in the petticoat and netting layers--they are very full.

Now I only need a scant 2.5" hem. This may allow me to take the rest up from the bottom--it's borderline. I'll do the satin next and check things when the bride is home later. The organza has about that amount of space below the beadwork and will hang lower than the satin.
Q: Sheer overskirt hangs about a 1/4" or 1/2" below the satin?
Q: Which would be easier, the fine rolled hem on the bottom, or pulling stitches and lifting it up at the waist [size 10 dress]?

Bustle:
Q: Since the organza has no seams and I can only hide loops where there is beadwork, is there anything wrong with bringing a side portion over to the center on a bustle of only the organza? [I'm now planning to handle the heavy satin with a French bustle as you suggested, it is heavy, and is shaped differently than the overskirt of organza.]

I can hide a center loop in beadwork but the beadwork to each side is much lower on the dress. The effect is pretty, with just the organza billowing and showing off it's stitching, etc.

I may go to the dress shop for comments. The owner used to do alterations and had made comments about each alteration needed. If it wasn't an hour round trip, I probably would have.

To those of you who question my sanity, I really enjoy sewing and this has been FUN to me, it's like a good soduko puzzle, some challenge, and the fabric is beautiful to touch and it's a joy to see my daughter try it on as we make progress.

This weekend the grandparents came over to check out the dress and give their advise. Grandma still sews PJs for her great-great grandchildren. The Bride was at a bridesmaid shower and one of the gifts we really marveled at was an apron sewn by her 14-year-old cousin, along with a stack of family recipes. It's great to see the tradition my grandmother encouraged me with, passed along to her great-greats! One day I saw a stack of totes matching my bedroom drapes! The bride had used scraps to make gift bags for the children in the wedding.

Ahem. Give the underskirts a really good shake. Are we down to two inches off the hem, now?

One-half inch to three quarters is a good overhang for chiffon over satin. I prefer the fine rolled hem.

No matter where you put those bustle points, they'll barely be noticeable when she walks down the aisle. I routinely slide the side portions toward the center back, if I can. It helps to keep the sides from hanging longer than the front and back.

I bustled a dress very much the way you've described (I think) just today. The tulle over skirt was an entirely different shape from the satin underneath. I bustled the satin underlayer with one button underneath, and the lace-embellished tulle with a three-button traditional bustle.

Thanks for your comments, I'll use them all. This is coming together very well. Yes, the hem is down to about 2-1/4". I basted the satin and organza the same amounts to preserve the original proportions and I can do all the hemming from the bottom. There's a layer of tulle just under the organza which will need to be cut off the same amount when I'm satisfied with the hem.

I now understand that alteration charges are as much for the fittings, as the actual work. Plus, there is a lot of creativity and problem-solving involved, which probably makes each job a bit unique and the work rewarding.

The dress is now only about 1/2" off the floor, but since the church has tile floor, this will not be a problem.

For anyone else considering this, I found that I gleaned many pearls of wisdom from the Q & A's on the Leanna website. I think there's a strong advantage to being able to do frequent fittings to get the adjustments just right. I have time to baste and double check each step.

For the bustle, today we simply tried 3 points [overbustle], with the satin and organza layers pinned together and it looked fine. It also helped me realize the hem needs to be shortened further around than I had planned to look good when bustled.

I may pin the bustle method you used today with the dress hanging up just to see if how that looks. It's kind of fun to get different looks.

I experimented with the Austrian bustle by pinning 8 very small plastic rings to the center back inside seam allowances of the satin. Then I tied a twill tape to the top ring and pulled it through and tied it to the bottom. The gathering of the Satin close to the floor looked great, but since there were still piles of fabric touching the floor to each side of the gathers, it would take 3 parallel rows of rings to get the dress off the floor. This is shown on the Leanna website. I'm not going to do all that work!

Thanks for the encouragement with your writings. It helps to get a second opinion.

Everything is now close to being done and seems manageable!
Julie