To recap a bit, after my first shopping excursion to Priscilla of Boston in search of Fern, I was newly obsessed with Melissa Sweet's Bee. However, I was not ready to make a purchase 2 years out from my wedding day, and the price was steep.
My new plan of action? To find a second-hand Bee. It would be cost effective, eco-friendly, and it would give me something to focus on for the next year. The problem? Bee was brand-spankin new and second-hand Bees wouldn't hit the used dress market until... well... spring 2010 it would seem. Nevertheless, I scoured the web and penciled in sample sales on my calendar. In March 2009, I needed another tangible dress shoppe experience. My mother came up to Manhattan on a Saturday for an appointment at The Bridal Garden in the Grammercy/Flat Iron/Chelsea-ish area. On the same block as the famous Kleinfeld bridal salon.
The Bridal Garden is no Kleinfeld's. The service was spotty for us and the store is a very cramped little office space, and both of these things were accentuated because our appointment was on a busy Saturday. I'll borrow a picture I found here to illustrate:
The woman crawling on the floor in the background could totally be my mother. It's something she would do. I actually thought this bride and I may have been there on the same day until I realized the dates didn't quite line up.
The good, nay FANTASTIC thing about The Bridal Garden is that they sell donated "gently worn" (some better than others) gowns and donated samples from designers at steep discounts, and all the profits go to a charter school in Brooklyn. (You can read about it here). Dual purpose wedding purchase? BINGO!
My first order of business at BG was to dig through the racks for Bee. When it wasn't there, I decided to have fun and pull couture gowns and give give my mother's picks a try. Many were big fails, but one emerged as a very strong contender. Not unlike the bride pictured above's recaps on her blog, I put this dress on, and someone's grandmother (sitting where the lady whose knees and arm we see above on the left) told me it was the one. I thought it could be true indeed and we had a game-changer on our hands by Anne Barge:
Anne Barge #467 {source}
She was a little beat up, clearly a donated sample as the length is for an Amazon. I wasn't considering a non-Bee purchase for the price tag, but the whole shop was gushing over me (ok not quite gushing but very complimentary), NY MoH had tears in her eyes, and the actual price came out to be $1000.00 less than the tag.
We put the dress on hold for 24 hours. I decided I'd buy it, and I decided that if I ever found Bee I'd sell the Anne Barge. When I went to pick up the dress that Tuesday night (which included a fun subway ride back to Queens with it), I thought I might have seen a Bee-like bit of lace hanging in the racks but I was too chicken to go look. My heart skipped a beat, and I knew I was in trouble.
Rookie mistake no. 2: Buying a dress without being 100% absolutely sure about it. Anyone else make this one too?
Welcome to heart the day, my name is Becky, I am finding my way as a writer, designer, newlywed and puppy mom.
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