Make Your Own Wedding Dress By Following These Tips

Design your own wedding dress graphic

When should you make your own wedding dress? Only if you have good sewing skills!

If you make your own clothes, then you might decide to tackle designing your own wedding dress.

  • Do you have the skills necessary to do this project from beginning to end?
  • Do you have the time to dedicate to your dress?
  • Can you start well in advance of your wedding date?

Those are the questions you need to answer. If you were able to answer yes to those questions... then you should consider making your wedding dress.

If you had any no answers... I want you to reconsider making your dress. Why?

If you don't have the skills to make your own wedding dress, or your are a busy bride who is short on time, or you haven't started planning well in advance of your wedding... you are setting yourself up for a lot of stress and frustration.

Planning a wedding adds stress in itself. But if you add the stress of making your gown on top of that... you are asking for trouble if you don't have the time to plan and sew the gown. What will most likely happen is that you will end up having to buy one.

So if your circumstances are not ideal to make your gown... do yourself a favor and buy your gown and consider having parts of it restyled if you want to add your personal style. This article "How to create your own wedding gown for something unique" will give you some ideas on how to restyle a bridal dress.

Another option would be to have a wedding dressmaker create your gown for you. You may be able to use a sewing professional for advice and possibly to help you with parts of the gown, like fitting it to you. Check to see if anyone is available in your community.

"But if you have the time, patience and skills needed to make your own wedding dress... then do it!"


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Wedding dress tips for those making your own wedding dress: There are some books available that have traceable brides, gown silhouettes and design details in them to design your own wedding dress.

One book entitled Bridal Gowns: How to Make the Wedding Dress of Your Dreams by Susan E. Andriks, has traceable outlines available to help you design your own bridal gown when you plan on making it yourself. This book has great sewing techniques and suggestions. I highly recommend this book.

Below are some other books I recommend and found helpful when I designed bridal gowns as a wedding dressmaker.






Make Your Own Wedding Dress: "First Access Your Time And Skills"

  • Access your skills. If you consider yourself to have intermediate skills or advanced, then you might want to consider making your gown. Do not attempt to do this if you are a beginner or sew only once in a while.
  • If you have time you can try out your sewing skills first by making yourself an evening gown. If you want lace or beadwork on your wedding gown, then make yourself an evening gown with these details to see how you do. You can make your flower girl's dress also to try your skills on bridal fabrics.
  • Ideally you should start 1 year in advance of your wedding working on your dress. Start by choosing your wedding dress pattern. Pay attention to the sewing level codes on the package. The simpler the style the better.
  • Pick a design that will compliment your figure, your wedding setting, formality and theme. Unless you sew for yourself a lot... don't get an advance pattern or one labeled difficult when you make your own wedding dress. When you choose a pattern look at the guide sheet to see if you understand it.
  • Write out a schedule for yourself. Do a project task sheet. List when you will start and complete each task. Plan to have your gown finished 6 to 8 weeks in advance of your wedding.

Sewing Tips To Help You Make Your Own Wedding Dress

There are some suggestions I am going to make to help you with your sewing experience.

  • Time to pick your wedding dress fabric. Look at the fabrics that are suggested on the back. Do you have experience working with them? Locate them in the store. The easiest fabric to work with is a polyester matte satin. Chiffon and organza are very difficult to work with.
  • Purchase all of the supplies you need at one time. Buy your lining, underlining fabric, interfacing, boning, thread, zipper, buttons, loop tape, etc... Buy any supplies you need like fine point straight pins, seam ripper, sharp scissors, and vinyl tape measure are a few of the basic items you will need.
  • Have someone assist you in taking your measurements when you make your own wedding dress. Take measurements in the undergarments (bra, shapewear) you plan to wear under your gown.
  • Make a muslin gown first. What you are going to do is make your wedding gown in muslin fabric first. Fit this dress to you. Make adjustments to the muslin. Then use it as a pattern when laying out and cutting out your gown.
  • Do not skip the muslin gown. I have to emphasize this. I know the muslin gown may sound like an unnecessary step but this one is very important. You get to work out the fitting and design problems in the muslin.
  • The muslin gown becomes your pattern. Yes... you will have to baste the muslin together and then take it apart to use as a pattern. Do this instead of cutting straight into your fabric and then trying to fit yourself. You don't want to end up with a very expensive mistake.

After these steps you can go on to lay out and cut your fabric. Put your gown together to a point, leaving areas pinned together or basted. Now try on the gown.

When you make your own wedding dress you will not be able to pin yourself. This is where you will have to get someone to help you with the pinning for this fitting. Make adjustments and finish your sewing to completion.

When you make your own dress, try to complete your gown six weeks ahead of time. It gets hectic the last month before the wedding, so you don't want to have to worry about finishing your gown.

Try it on about two weeks before the wedding to make sure it still fits. Try not to gain or loose any weight during this time frame. Do a steaming of your dress a few days before the wedding. You can use a hand held steamer or arrange for someone to professionally steam it for you.

Give yourself a pat on the back because you have just accomplished something most brides don't get to experience.... you were able to make your own wedding dress!


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