Up-Cycled Wedding Dress Turned Memory Pillow

by Barbara Added 0 year ago

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I desperately wanted to hang onto my wedding dress for obvious reasons, but practicality was beating sentimentality out as we recently downsized (significantly) and space is at a premium. After much thought and some inspirational ladies I decided that I was ready to deconstruct my wedding dress to create a memory pillow and an actual wearable dress using RIT dye.

I'm a sentimental girl. I cried when I gave my dollhouse to Goodwill. But I'm also a practical girl. I gave my dollhouse to Goodwill. Which means that I was unlikely to spend hundreds of dollars to preserve my wedding dress in a box for years to come.

So when my husband kept asking me what I wanted to do with my wedding dress, I had finally decided to give it to the Glass Slipper Project. But I kept dragging my feet. It's my wedding dress. Then I started touring around blog land (leading to me starting this blog), I started to get the bug to DO something with it. It's really more of an evening gown, and with a little bit of work, I could wear it out to a nice restaurant for a hot date night or something.

I learned, that it IS okay to cut up your wedding dress to make something you might use, and it IS okay to dye your wedding dress to make it into a dress that you can still wear. Love it!

So I put on my big girl britches, gathered up my supplies, teared up when I made that first cut, and went for it.

I love this because:
1) Wedding memories {sigh}
2) My hunky hubster helped make some of the decisions and also loves it :-) Since he helped and I love him, this is his Valentine's Day gift :-)
3) I'm now addicted to stencils and am already planning my next stencil.
4) The only thing new is the dye, thread and paint (material = wedding dress and bridesmaids, cord = old sleeping bag ties, pillow form = reused from pillow that had indestructible goo on it.)

Step 1:

Since I am not a super seamstress, I hung a similar dress of desirable length over my wedding dress, and made a mark on my wedding dress (WD) 2 inches below the hem of the other dress. Then I measured up from the bottom of the (WD) hem, (19.5 inches) and made marks all the way around my skirt 19.5 inches from the hem.

I forgot about the liner, but I wanted to cut that separately, so for the time being, I rolled it up and pinned it out of my way. Then I cut from mark to mark all the way around my skirt. {Sniff}

Step 2:

I wanted my memory pillow to reflect our wedding colors ( Winter Wonderland - ice blue and silver). I also wanted to practice dye the material before dyeing the rest of my dress. So I decided to dye the material using Royal Blue from the RIT Liquid Dye Line. I used less than the ratio that was suggested on the bottle, because I wanted a lighter color - I used about 1/4 of the bottle for about 1 gallon of water. {Note: I don't know that my water was warm enough b/c I was worried about the fabric. Next time I will use hotter water.}

Stir and soak and stir and soak. I dyed my fabric for about 30 minutes. Bottle said 30 - 60 minutes. I erred on the low side because I was impatient wanted a lighter fabric. And it looked dark in the dark pot...

Step 3:

I wanted to batik the fabric. Unfortunately, my Internet was down, and I tried to wing it, but forgot some of the details. All I could remember was saran wrap and microwave. I definitely didn't nuke it long enough. I am going to have to try the technique again, because I LOVE BATIK. But alas not on this project.

Step 4:

I made my own stencil: wrote up what I wanted on the pillow (est. 12.23.2008 - did anyone guess that is my wedding day?), printed it out, and covered the front only of the paper with contact paper. Mistake. I think that had I covered both sides, the stencil wouldn't have curled up as much as it did. Fortunately, I had pinned the stencil to the fabric, so it wasn't too bad. {I have started keeping an electronic Word document with where I find all these things, so that I can remember & reference later}Then I cut out the letters.

I used Metallic Silver Acrylic Paint and the textile medium to make my fabric paint (directions are on the bottle - easy peasy). And then I stenciled away using a sponge.

Step 5:

I decided that the ribbon I wanted to put on the pillow looked too washed out against the blue, so instead, I used material from my bridesmaid's shawls to create piping for around the pillow.

Step 6:

Sprinkle a little love dust and give your honey a kiss, Memories await! :-)

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Details

Category:Fashion and Accessories Home Decor

Origin:Community

Difficulty:Moderate

Techniques:Microwave Sink or Bucket Batik

Inspirations
I Wanted to Dye by Sherry @ Young House Love
Wedding Dress/Daddy Shirt turned Flower Pillows by Charlie @ Attempting Aloha

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Materials Used

1 Wedding Dress {gasp}
RIT Royal Blue Dye
1 Recycled Pillow Form
Leftover material from my bridesmaids shawls
Metallic Silver Paint
Textile Medium
Handmade Stencil
Stencil Sponge

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Up-Cycled Wedding Dress Turned Memory Pillow