A woman has been criticised for making alterations to a family-worn wedding dress as she tailored it into her dream gown, but people now say it’s sadly ‘unrecognisable’
A vintage-loving bride thought she would be creative in transforming her grandmother’s wedding dress from the 1940’s – but people online say her modern twist has ‘ruined it’.
Katie Klinefelter Bruder inherited the stunning dress from her late grandmother who wore it in 1948 but decided to put her own stamp on it for her own wedding. Two of her aunts had worn the gown for their weddings, the most recent being in 1988, and it had undergone some tweaks, so Katie was thrilled to have the chance to wear it.
While she didn’t wear it on her wedding day, she had the “absolute honour” of wearing it for her rehearsal dinner. Katie said she made a few adjustments to the “ivory slipper gown” to make it her own, but was quickly told that she had ‘ruined it’ and made it ‘unrecognisable’ by people online.
The bride, who said she “loves vintage” and has always “cherished heirloom pieces” had “immediately envisioned the transformation” of the family dress. “Knowing how delicate the fabric was, I realised I could only make a few adjustments to preserve its integrity, but that was just enough,” she wrote in a post about the dress.
The elegant dress had the sleeves, lace, and bow removed, all of which had been added by her aunt in the ’80s, and she decided to soften the neckline to a square cut and open the back to make it a scoop style. She also shortened the train and used that fabric to create a removable neck drape – which Katie said “completed the look perfectly”.
It took the tailors 12 months to work on, but it’s something Katie said she would “cherish for a lifetime” and looked forward to every appointment. “I prayed for my Gran to show up in the sunshine on my wedding weekend, and that’s exactly what she did. She shined so much light down on me in this dress. I have never felt so beautiful,” she added.
However people were quick to share their remarks on the tweaks. One Instagram user commented: “It hurts seeing a dress like this loosing all its charm and character. It’s a part of history. There are endless dresses like the result out there,” while a second added: “You literally made it unrecognisable. You should have just had a dress made. Instead, you ripped everything unique and special out that dress.”
But some were in favour of the adjustments, as one fan chimed: “Everyone saying she butchered it, but this was her day and her dress and it’s literally stunning! She modernised it and still paid homage to her Grandmother. I absolutely love it!”
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