Dress Shopping - Take One

Dress Shoppping. It was certainly an experience and there are some U-G-L-Y bridal gowns out there, that's for sure. So many beads, so little time. Since we had a kick ass night out on Friday with G & E, 8 am definitely came early. I gave myself a pep talk and the minute I heard my stomach grumbling for some food, I knew I'd make it through the day sans hangover.

I met my mom and Lames at 9:30 am at Kleinfelds. The store is on 20th street in Manhattan. We waited about 15 minutes in the lobby (BTW - its by appointment only) before we were matched up with our "consultant". The only problem - I would have killed for something to drink - anything to drink. Anything. A.N.Y.T.H.I.N.G. I wish I was offered water or coffee or iced tea or iced coffee - just SOMETHING while we waited. Trying on dresses is tiring and us brides-to-be need to keep up our energy level, people!

Our consultant, Barbara, came out to greet us and promptly escorted us to her dressing room; it was labeled as such - "Barbara's Dressing Room". I have heard mixed opinions about Kleinfelds from various brides-to-be saying that the consultants were, mostly, difficult to work with. This was anything but the case. Barbara was perfectly lovely. She listened ever so patiently while I gave her my list of requirements for the gown of my dreams:

1. Nothing too poofy (read: poofy = bad)
2. Nothing that looked like The Bedazzler had something to do with the design and manufacturing process.
3. No Tulle. Absolutely. No. Tulle.
4. No Bunching. I like the occasional frech croissant but I don't want to look like a french pastry.
5. Simple and elegant is key. (read: simple and elegant = good)
6. A-line or Trumpet cuts look best on me as I have childbearing hips (read: child-bearing = good; the groom-to-be says so.)
7. Mermaid cut is bad as are skin tight dresses.

I didn't think my list of demands was anything too outrageous and thankfully, neither did Barbara. She had sent us into "the racks" where there were hundreds upon hundreds of dresses to choose from. Barbara said to grab 5 and bring them back to the room while she pulled a few dresses that she thought I might like. I felt like I had walked into Macy's in Herald Square. Completely overwhelmed, I felt my first jolt of panic. Thankfully, mom expected as much and went to right to work grabbing armfuls of dress and mumbling something that sounded like; "Stefania, sweetie, calm down. This is so exciting! Breath, sweetie, breath." Lamey did the same - without the mumbling of course - and I even started to get on the action. After finding about 8 or so, I decided it was time to start trying them on.

Kleinfelds, thankfully, supplies all brides-to-be with a strapless/backless bra to wear while trying on dresses. Barbara, thankfully, reminded me to NOT go out and buy any undergarments until after my first fitting. AS I found out, most stores tell you exactly what you should purchase. Also, practically every dress I tried on was a size 10 which meant they had to be clipped in the back to fit my hopefully-soon-to-be-size-4-but-still-a-size-6-figure.

I started trying on a few dresses but I wasn't getting that "holy crap this is THE dress" feeling. Uh-oh. Lamey was cute; while she liked every dress she wasn't exactly thrilled to the core about any of them. Barbara was a real trooper and kept at it, leaving me every so often to pull another dress off "the racks". Like a golden (and wonderfully gay) ray of sunshine, Randy knocked on my door. Randy is the Fashion Director at Kleinfelds and absolutely loves his job, and I, absolutely love him. He started pulling dresses for me to try on as well. He has vision. Every time I remotely semi-loved a dress, I took a walk, put on the matching veil and shoes and took a walk down the aisle, err I mean, hallway. He offered his best criticism and gave the proverbial thumbs up or thumbs down.

Finally, nearing the end of my appointment that just happened to run 30 minutes over, I put on a dress by Christos; a dress that gave me my first "holy crap - this is the dress" feeling. But alas, I almost started to cry, my mom had goose bumps and I thought this was it. Well - almost. To me, there were more dresses to be tried on. Much like a great pair of shoes, there is always something better around the corner.

Randy, my new found confidante, equipped with his honest, and best, opinion, thought that this dress was the best dress - so far. (What does that mean really??) As expected, he talked me and my mother out of my other goose-bump factor dress; a beautiful Ulla-Maijer design. You know what?!? Randy was 100% correct. I left Kleinfelds feeling confident that that would be the dress...

Next stop - the Saks Fifth Avenue bridal salon. Again, unfortunately, we were not offered anything to drink -what gives anyway!?! Champagne would have been perfectly acceptable and appreciated. Hopefully when the dress is purchased I'll get my glass of Champagne. Hopefully. Champagne aside, I met with our bridal consultant Stephanie, who, totally got me.

She brought in a variety of designers - Vera, Carolina, Ulla-Maijer, Melissa Sweet,and Amsale, to name a few. When I first heard her say Vera Wang and Carolina Herrera, I thought "Um, yeah that's definitely out of budget, but alright, twist my arm, it can't hurt to try them on." But I was in for a nice surprise when the Herrera dress came in within budget! Cha-ching.

Alas, Vera, was not....but can you really put a price on beauty (dad)?!

To my shocked surprise, Charles Bunstine (aka the designer from Ulla-Maijer) was at the bridal salon. We small talked and got along great but I'm pretty sure my mom insulted him. She didn't like the first dress I tried on that just happened to be his design. GASP. She said something about "the bunching" and "draping" and how she didn't like it. He wasn't too pleased. Oh well. "On to the next dress" I said.

After more than a dozen or so dresses, I didn't think that I would find anything I loved more than the Christos dress until I tried on two dresses; a black and ivory Carolina Herrera dress and a different Ulla-Maijer dress. My mother, forever perplexed, had an even more perplexed look on her face. I wasn't sure she liked it but as it turns out, she was too confused about which dress she liked best! As am I. Or was. I left Kleinfelds so sure that I had found my dress, and now, I just can't decide!

After all is said and done, the deciding factor will be this: I need to see the Ulla-Maijer dress with the detachable train. Somehow Saks "misplaced" it. In fact, Saks was disappointing over all. A lot of their dresses were missing pieces, a bow here, a train there. The dresses looked as if they had been through a war - white should never look gray. I was shocked and I'm an SFA groupie. Also, they did not have the sample size 10 in all of the dresses. Some were made for mannequins! The mannequins I know are clearly diminutive, zero or maybe a 2. I couldn't get most of them zipped up which was a real letdown. Charles reassured me and asked me to go check out the dress I was interested in "in all it's glory" (aka with the train) on the Ulla-Maijer website. I have to say, he was right. Once I saw it with the train I fell in love. This might be the dress. I just now need to find it with the train.

Randy, of Kleinfelds was nice enough to give me his cell phone number if I had any questions at all. Well, I had plenty of questions today and I am currently waiting for him to return my call so I can find out if he can get the Herrera and the Ulla-Maijer dress in stock. I need to see them side by side and then my girls can come and give me their opinion. If not, then I will start making phone calls all over the city to find this darn dress and train. But let's wait and see what Randy has to say...