Manolo for the Brides

Sadie over at Jezebel recently shared the fact that the wedding gown she’ll be wearing when she marries her current beau is the wedding gown she planned to wear when engaged to a former beau. No, Sadie isn’t some kind of uber budget bride. It’s just that the wedding gown she already had was so… perfect. The idea of the perfect wedding gown is definitely a cliché, but in Sadie’s case, it isn’t far from the truth.

It was the dress I’d had in mind long before I’d met my first boyfriend; he’d never seen it; and, most of all, it had been made for me. It was, and remains, the only custom garment I’ve ever owned, and there seemed an unspeakable luxury to stepping into a dress I’d envisioned and having it fit perfectly. I’d long peered into the windows of the dressmaker’s small shop in lower Manhattan, and it was with great excitement that I’d first breached the doorway and explained what I wanted: Swiss Dot; sweetheart neck; full, ballerina-length skirt. I was quickly persuaded to adopt a pale pink underskirt and a dainty tulle halter that sounds slightly ugly but is, I assure you, truly lovely. Without the crinoline, the dress would simply be a pretty, retro party-frock; with, it reminded me of the wedding gown from Funny Face.

I don’t think *I* could wear the same wedding dress I’d planned to wear to marry some other guy, but I’m not about to jump all over someone who would. Especially if they’ve been dreaming of a particular dress for ages upon ages. After all, why let a less-than-perfect (wo)man ruin the perfect dress? If Sadie is cool with it and her fiancé is cool with it, who am I to tsk-tsk their decision? On the other hand, I would caution against letting the future in-laws know the origins of the wedding dress, depending on their general dispositions.

What do you think? Is this tacky? Resourceful? Overly sentimental? Not sentimental enough?

Note: If you like the dress above, check out Lynns Rags, the Etsy shop of its creatrix!

…the more they stay the same, at least where wedding vendors and brides and wedding gowns are concerned. Check out these vintage bridal ads:

Odd posture? Check. At least she’s doing something, though. I get the feeling that the photographer snapped the model between shots while she was making a necessary wardrobe adjustment on her Priscilla of Boston gown. Or maybe bridal models all had scoliosis back then, too.

Less than friendly facial expressions on bridesmaids? Check, on the left one at least. Oddly huge bows decorating the posterior region of bridesmaids? Check. Random props — in this case palm fronds — poised to devour the models? Check and check!

But lose the butt bow, and I will gladly shell out “about $40 each” for either of these dresses. Now what I need is the vintage waist to go with them, and I’ll be all set.

Welcome to the first round of Twistie’s Sunday Caption Madness for 2009!

You all know the drill. I post a photograph, you give me your best captions via the comments section, and next week I declare a winner. It’s that simple.

And so, here’s the first image of the year:

Ready…set…snark!

Once upon a time, back through the mists of history, there lived a caveman. We’ll call him Og. Why? Because we will. Now stop asking questions and listen up.

Anyway, Og was a Terribly Clever Caveman who had managed to invent himself some fire. Alas! He had nothing to cook over this lovely fire. This made him hungry and grumpy.

Down the road a way, there lived another Terribly Clever Caveman called Zog. He had found a foolproof way to trap one of the giant sloths that lived in the area (just stay with me, okay?) and had a lovely huge giant sloth to eat, when he realized he had no way of cooking the meat. This made him hungry and grumpy.

All of a sudden, Zog smelled Og’s lovely fire and got an idea (I told you he was Terribly Clever). He dragged his sloth down the road to Og’s cave and said that if Og allowed him to cook his sloth over the lovely fire, he would gladly share the meat in exchange. They feasted that night on roast sloth, and in the morning they made superfantastic coats out of the hide.

Thus the barter was born.

Read the rest of this entry »

If you have already bought your wedding gown aaaaaand you live near Panama City, FL, you’re going to be so sad you didn’t go to Yvette’s Bridal while it still existed.

Why choose Yvette’s for your wedding gown, bridesmaids dress, and tuxedo needs? The web site says it all. Specifically, it says “Yvette’s is OPEN SUNDAYS !!!! Yvette’s will be open all holidays !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yay !! Judy !!” and “why do we have hair in our armpits??…………what possible idiosyncrasy could posses a deity to create something with hair in its armpits??…………….I seriously want to know why we have hair in our armpits??”

That is some seriously persuasive sales copy, am I right? But for reals, I don’t know why this site cracks me up so much, especially seeing as that the real Yvette’s web site likely died some time in 2006. It was a legit bridal shop once upon a time, but who knows what happened to it in the interim. Kudos to whoever took it over, as the site offers a few minutes of amusement for those super sick of looking at badly-designed bridal salon web sites that are supposed to be elegant (instead of painfully ironic).

Before you actually visit the chaos that is Yvette’s, please heed these warnings:

Warning I: Music will play. Loudly. On the front page, a piece commemorating the Battle of Flodden Field plays. Different music plays on every single page.

Warning II: Looking at Yvette’s site too long may cause blindness and/or deafness. Possibly also insanity.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, have a look at the map, the poetry, the artwork, and the bizarre ramblings of what must be a junior grade conspiracy theorist. Oh, and this… Popeye and peeping? Wind me up!

Here’s wishing you and yours the most fabulous, most decadent, most love-filled, most glorious 2009! I’ll just have to imagine that you had as much fun last night as these brazen bridesmaids are having in this photograph… and that you’re not paying for it today.

On truly cold mornings, when it’s frosty outside and I am forced by necessity to leave the toasty warm confines of my blissful bedclothes, a nightgown is not always enough. In my sleep-addled state, I will often attempt to wrap myself up in a blanket before making my way to the espresso machine. Oftentimes, I end up looking rather like this:

Needless to say, I am not liking this wedding dress. While I can’t proclaim that I hate, hate, hate it — honestly, it does not deserve that level of emotion — there’s not much to speak in this wedding gown’s favor. I’m down with the black wedding dresses, and I’m all for plaids, but the sash curving around the main frame of the gown looks like it was hastily pinned on at the last second by a bride who was either very chilly or had a wardrobe malfunction that a few strategically placed pins could not fix. What this wedding dress needs, in my opinion, is to be deconstructed and then put back together by someone who has a bit more talent with a sewing machine.

What say you?

When Kate Harding of Kate Harding’s Shapely Prose decides to spice up a Friday night, she goes all the way. On a recent Friday night, for example, she and her sweetie Al decided they could either go visit the Hoover Dam… or they could get married. Guess which option they chose.

They tied the knot, obviously! The pair hit up the famous Little White Wedding Chapel (along with Al’s mom) after what amounted to a few hours of hardcore wedding planning and said their vows.

Can I just say that I’m just a tad jealous? Oh, I’m a lot happy for the resplendent Ms. Harding — don’t they just look lovely? — but still a little jealous. It sounds like she had a joyful, absolutely stress-free wedding, though there’s no word on whether she ever did get to see the Hoover Dam.

Now go check out the Wedding FAQ and wish the newlyweds all the best!

We’ve written about using fruit as reception centerpieces, sweets as wedding decor, and even diamonds as wedding cake embellishments. All in all, we’ve proven we like things that are as yummy as they are pretty, though we definitely recommend picking all gemstones out of your icing before serving your reception dessert. Today I want to put sweet things aside to show you some things you can do with veggies… specifically artichokes.

Artichokes make splendid wedding table decorations for a number of reasons. They can stand up on their own, meaning they can hold a place card or a candle. And they are relatively dry when compared to, say, a cabbage or even a carrot, so you needn’t worry about drowning them in water when using them in centerpieces. You can even use artichokes in your bridal bouquet (as evidenced above), though beware that they add quite a bit of heft.

Sandra Lee, queen of the semi-homemade craft, suggests using artichokes thusly:

1. Group one small, one medium and one tall cylinder glass vase on a tabletop.

2. Stack whole artichokes inside, positioning some upright and some sideways to make an artful arrangement.

(However, she goes on to suggest that you can make gourmet mac & cheese using Kraft dinner, so feel free to disregard most of the advice found on her web site.)