About Audiss Photo Co. | How I found my wedding dress.

August 09, 2014 // I found my wedding dress!

First of all, it was so difficult keeping this exciting news from Micah. I couldn't wait to show him what it looks like and tell him the story of how I found it. My sister Emily, best friend Haley, my Mom and I went up to Portland to do some dress shopping. Emily made me appointments at several different bridal shops.

I had a pretty good idea of what kind of dress I was looking for. I wanted something flowy, easy to move in, tight at the waist, sweetheart neckline, and something definitely with sleeves. (Fun fact about me - I wear long sleeves and layers like all year long. Pretty much always have. Our wedding was in July and I was well aware that it would be a bit toasty... and it was.. like 100 degrees).

We arrived at the first bridal store, and waited for the consultant to help us. The way this place worked was there was like 20 racks of different styles (silhouettes) and I got to pick two that I liked off of each rack (SO MANY DRESSES!). I thought this was a neat concept because I could see where someone would have an idea of the style that they think they want... but then have the opportunity to try a different style and unexpectedly fall in love with that instead.

I tried the first dress. It was definitely not the style I wanted and SUPER hard to walk in… but I showed everyone anyway. I tried on a countless number of dresses, and most of them were absolutely beautiful but not exactly what I was looking for.

Finally... we found one that was amazing. Tears were shed, and all of us were like “this is the one!” ...but I still had this image of having a lace neckline and sleeves. The consultant said we could use some extra fabric and add sleeves to it (so we kept that in mind).

After a few more appointments at other bridal shops, we decided that the dress I had tried on at the first store was “the one” and we would go home and think about it and then call the lady and see if we could add sleeves to it. I was hesitant about adding sleeves to it if I couldn’t see what it would look like beforehand (and it would have took months of alterations, sewing, etc). The peculiar thing was that like NONE of the bridal shops had dresses with sleeves in the silhouette I wanted... so I didn't even get the opportunity to see what that would even look or feel like (I bet there was some with sleeves, but likely way out of my budget).

I grew up in the house right up the road from my grandparents. Also the house my dad grew up in. All of my extended family on my dad's side lives in Oregon / Washington. We are all pretty close & have spent a lot of time together/see each other often. My dad has 2 twin sisters, and both of their wedding dresses were stored for safe keeping at my grandma's house.

We decided that when we got home I would go down to my grandparent's house and try on one of my aunt’s wedding dresses to see if I like the feeling of sleeves. Our game plan was that if I liked sleeves on the dress, we would go ahead and order the dress I found at the bridal shop and opt to put sleeves on. (lol it's kind of crazy thinking back to the hoops we jumped through).

We went down to my grandma's to try on my aunt’s dresses (both of them had sleeves). As we were up in the room where the dresses were, my mom turned around and saw my grandma’s wedding portrait on the wall and said “Erin...isn’t this the dress you have been describing this whole time?” My grandparents looked at each other and my grandma said “I think we still have it"… and Poppy was like … "I think it’s in the shop!" (the shop is large garage-like building in their field that is full of storage and tools, etc).

We all kind of cringed because who knows what kind of condition it's in if its in the shop. It's a 50+ year old dress so none of us knew what we would find. He went out there and came out with a huge, tattered, brown cardboard box.

We were all sure that it was ruined.

Inside the brown box was a beautiful white box that the dry-cleaners had preserved the dress in.

I took it out and I tried it on….

It fit perfectly and it was exactly what I wanted. Not to mention it was extremely special. I didn’t feel pressured at all to choose her dress and everyone kept saying “it’s what you want Erin.” So I went home to think about it… and it turns out I couldn’t stop thinking about it. So the next morning I called my grandma and asked if I could try it on again. And I did - it brought us all to tears. It wasn’t about saving money on a dress that I didn’t have to buy... it was the fact that it was hers, it fit me perfect, and it was exactly what I had been describing this whole time.

We only had to alter a few things. We adjusted the bust-line a tiny bit and opened up the back into a keyhole (thinking it would make it a little more breathable for July). We also did some work on the arms (under the armpit area) so I could have a little more range of motion in my arms (the lace was pretty delicate).

I of course kept the big bow on the back, too. ;)

All Photos by Sarah Gillihan // @braevin