Stitched up properly.... a dieting issue

The big day is hours away, you need to go in for one last fitting and the perfect dress DOESN’T FIT! There's only Hours to go!

All your friends are deciding between a choice of perfectly fitting dresses, your Mother is trying on her outfit and – its perfect – the Bridesmaids dresses fit flawlessly; all except yours! Disaster? Relax, the suppliers’ ready for it….

Over coffee recently I was chatting with the Manager of Hickeys in Henry Street, Philip Byrne, about what are the biggest problems with Bridal Dresses. Hickeys have probably the biggest Bridal Dress Department in the Ireland. He said “Dieting.”

“No, its dieting brides,” he said definitively, based on their experience and they have had thousands of clients over thirty years. I had expected it to be something to do with holding and finding new designs, keeping stock or even just displaying dresses.

“A Bride-to-be comes in 18 months before her big day, picks her dress, tries it on and we measure her up. Often 16 months later she comes back, puts on the dress exactly as it was originally measured; it doesn’t fit. The dress hasn’t changed shape; she has. She’ll lose a few pounds here and there and it gets worse as it gets closer to the day, the weight often just falls off and sometimes in the “wrong places” if the design shows cleavage….

“All good bridal dress designers and shops know this, in Hickeys we have people on standby to do last-minute alterations,” he added. “Not many brides realise that weight change and especially losing weight may change how a dress fits. Of course not everyone loses weight; some add it, and then it is usually around the waist because their family circumstances are about to change due to a new arrival!”

New Arrivals? Babies? That’s a whole different area! If you thought getting married was expensive; try raising a child!