Ever frame a wedding dress?

Rozmataz

SGF, Supreme Grumble Framer
Joined
Jun 13, 2002
Posts
2,773
Loc
Fingerlakes Region of NYS
My customer wants to frame her wedding dress!

Has anyone done this before? Any suggestions, warnings, etc?

Thanks,

Roz
 
That is a huge project, $$$$$ :D :D :D

My next thought is -- Why? But, as a business person.............. Where would one hang such a monstro ..... oops, I mean large piece of "art"?

Have fun with this one!!!

I had someone come in with a flower girl dress they wanted to frame. They didn't want to put too much into it because it would only be on the wall for maybe 7 or 8 years. Yup, you guessed it, it was too pricey.
 
:D :D :D
thumbsup.gif
$$$$

Customer has a HUGE home!

Hugh, thanks - UV for certain!
 
I think this would look fabulous once done. Large textiles always look so rare and wonderful in a frame, even an acrylic box.

I have an artist customer who works in cast paper and she is working on a commission of a paper cast of a wedding dress. I can't wait to see it when it is done. The sad thing is that the act of casting a mold from the dress will ruin it. But the finished piece will be a shopper stopper.

Roz, keep us posted! Sounds like fun.

edie the 24moredaysuntilxmas goddess
 
How about a sink/pressure mount?

Rigid aluminum honeycomb backboard (SmallCorp), Mylar tracing made of dress's outline and used as a guide to cut a 3-D sink mount from layers of foamboard or Ethafoam etc. faced with good quality matboard and covered with needlepunched polyester padding and then a beautiful washed silk or some such dress fabric.

From bottom to top: honeycomb panel, foam sink mount faced with matboard, polyester padding, show fabric.

The wedding dress (padded where need be) is nestled into it's custom made sinkmount. The idea of the 3-D sink mount is to have the bottom raised and lowered where necessary, so that the front surface of the dress lies more or less on one plane. Slight variations are taken care of by the puffiness of the underlying padding.

Tacking stitches can be made in strategic places using a curved needle to hold loose bits in place.

Acrylic glazing is placed on top touching, but not squashing, the dress. The package is slipped into a deep sided frame (Small Corp makes powdercoated Al frames with welded corners) and a basswood strainer is placed at the back. Sides of the frame are screwed into the strainer, holding all together.

This is a broad stroke description - details on request.

This probably won't work if the dress has a very structured bodice though.

Or, you could just order a dress form and display case!

Rebecca
 
Roz, you always seem to get the most interesting challenges!

I've never done anything as large as an entire wedding dress. When framing clothing, I prefer a casual presentation so that the piece looks like it was dropped there rather than stretched out symetrically. (Yes, even on hockey jerseys.)

Your decisions are going to have to be based on the type of dress and the fabric from which it is made. I framed the bodice of an antique wedding dress. The silk was shattered and the customer decided she wanted to enjoy displaying it for whatever time it had left. I used a raised mat so that the disintegrating crumbs of fabric could fall down behind it and not be seen.

Good luck with this one. I hope you're planning to post photos.

Kit
 
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