Sewing my Best Friend's Veil.

On the first weekend of September, my Best Friend had a DIY wedding. Everyone chipped in, and it came together so beautifully. Seriously, one of the best days of my life and I spent most of it weeping, laughing or dancing (or all three!). I was given my chance to pull my weight as she asked me to make her Bridesmaid dresses. Of course, I kept my cool and obliged..... PAH, WHO AM I KIDDING??! SEWING FOR MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING.

But first, THE dress. We spent a day trying on dresses on in Bristol, and the Bride ended up falling in love with the very first dress she tried on! The dress had a romantic almost 'Georgian' feel, and she looked absolutely gorgeous in it. Originally she thought she wouldn't like a veil until we tried on a floor length cathedral veil. She looked so timeless I shed a tear (not surprising really, it does happen A LOT). She was converted. The veil she liked was plain and after glancing at the price tag I offered to make her one. It looked relatively simple, and I could save her a lot of money! The most challenging part was sourcing the tulle, and I found this blog post very useful. I knew I wanted something light weight with a beautiful drape but the idea was to save money - so silk tulles were out of the question!

After much deliberation, we ordered some plain Tulle from Joel and Son Fabrics. We went for this nude polyamide tulle to match the underlay of the bride's dress. We ordered 2m at a bargain price of £12.90 a metre. I crossed my fingers and hoped that the colour matched. I was lucky! It had a lovely drape and it hung beautifully too, pretty similar to English net I suspect. I was happy - I'd nailed the tricky bit!

I then simply sewed two lines of gathering stitches along the top of one edge and gathered as evenly as I could.

When I was happy I enclosed the raw edge with a hand stitch, in some satin gold bias binding to keep everything looking beautifully neat. 

I found this comb in my stash and sewed it to the veil by hand.

I waited to cut it to length when I visited for a manicure the day before the wedding. We tried it on with the dress, and I very carefully cut a curved hem just a little longer than the dress train (a little tricky for one so teary eyed!). The groom was prepping food in the kitchen so I had to keep the whimpering to a minimum.

That was it! Here it is in action on the big day...

Photo credit: Jake Baggaley

Photo Credit: David Cornish

More to follow on the Bridesmaid dresses later this week...

To be continued.


Lots of love, as always,

Vic x