Stunning Steampunk Style Wedding

At last I can share the beautiful gown I created last year for Emily's wedding. Her initial brief was for something along the lines of a magical but dark fairytale crinoline, along the lines of film maker Tim Burton's designs. I love the work of his costume designer so I looked carefully at the original gowns she uses as inspiration and continued some of the motifs.

The triangle shapes on the front of the bodice are similar to some I admired on a black and white original Victorian gown in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. and I used jet black Swarovski crystal buttons to fasten them at the points.

The skirt and boned corset style bodice were made separately and worn over a small crinoline caged petticoat with a chemise. The chemise incorporated lots of original Victorian lace, which was fine as cobweb, so beautiful.

The edge of the tulle apron front was also edged in lace. I like to include real vintage trims and fabrics in my work whenever I can at Bridal-Originals, though I would never take garments apart just to get at the trim! There is fortunately still one wonderful company left in Nottingham's lace market who create fine lace, so if I need something a bit more sturdy I always go to them. They supplied the lace for Princess Diana's wedding gown too!

Emily initially considered a scarlet gown, but after seeing the sumptuous purple and turquoise shot silk I had in the studio we decided to go with that instead. I played with the colours in photo shop after the gown was finished just to see what it might have looked like in red.

As you can see there was quite a steampunk theme going on throughout the day! and top hats were much in evidence, I created the brides to match the chemise, with a velvet flocked rococo swirl in black on black. She also had a darling lace choker from vintage lace and velvet ribbon.