Former students at the Royal College of Art, David and Elizabeth had previously designed for HRH the Duchess of Kent, although Diana had worn one of their outfits (a pale-pink blouse and a pale-pink taffeta skirt) when she was photographed by Lord Snowdon for Vogue magazine. They had then gone on to design a black low-cut evening dress for her first official outing as royal fiancée. But when she called them up and asked them to design the actual wedding dress, no one could believe it.
With no brief from Buckingham Palace and no commission, they made it up as they went along. Talk to any bridal designers now and they’ll tell you the huge leg o’mutton sleeves were hideous and the Emmanuels’ biggest mistake was to use English silk from Lullingstone Silk Farm, the only silk farm in the UK. They should have used French silk rather than the English stuff, which crumpled like toilet paper. But they got away with it. Most people remember the twenty-five-foot train and the embroidery – which was done by Elizabeth Emmanuel and her mother using Carrickmacross lace, which belonged to Queen Mary and formed the ‘something old’ part of the frock. The whole dress featured ten thousand mother-of-pearl sequins and pearls and went on to put nearly every subsequent bride in a meringue for a decade to come. And all for the nominal cost to Raine Spencer of £1,000.
Alice’s dress is three times the price. But she does look fantastic. She turns across the room to look at her mother for approval.
‘That’s dreadful. I knew I should have come with you in the first place,’ announces Louise, after the longest of pauses.
The whole room turns to stare in shock. Can she be looking at the same girl, in the same dress, as we all are?
‘You can’t wear that!’
Alice’s mouth is hanging ajar, her hand covering it. She is too overcome to say anything.
‘The bodice is half an inch too long and it looks terrible. It pushes your bottom out of line and your waist looks too long.’
Alice starts to cry. Her shoulders shake and she does small hiccups along with her sobs. She looks like she might actually throw up.
‘Oh, don’t worry,’ says Andrea, spinning Alice around and squatting down on the floor. ‘That is very easily fixed.’ Her voice is singsong calm, like she is trying to soothe an overwrought child.
‘Is it?’ steams Louise. ‘Because the wedding is on Saturday and I am not having my daughter walking down the aisle in that monstrosity.’
‘As I said, it’s easily fixed. There are thirteen buttons going down the back of the bodice. What I’ll do is take the skirt off, remove one button, shorten the bodice and sew it all back together. The dress will be ready for pick-up tomorrow.’
‘Really?’ asks Bernadette, her eyes widening at the amount of work she has just been asked to do in such a short space of time.
‘No problem at all,’ insists Andrea.
‘I really love it,’ declares Alice weakly, staring at her tear-stained face in the mirror.
‘Well, you would, wouldn’t you?’ replies Louise. ‘You’ve never been one for the details in life and you’ve always had rather poor taste. How else do you explain Richard?’
‘You’ve never liked him,’ mumbles Alice.
‘No, I haven’t, and I haven’t made a secret of it either. Once you’ve met the mother,’ she says to me, trying to recruit an ally, ‘you’ll see what I mean. Terrible family.’
‘Well,’ interrupts Andrea, ‘just imagine the dress is fixed, shall we? And shall we have a look at the veil?’
‘Mum?’ snivels Alice. ‘Did you remember?’
‘Oh, of course,’ says Louise, picking up her large red handbag. ‘Now this,’ she says with great portent, ‘is the family veil. I got married in it. My sister, your aunt, got married in it, as did your cousin Emily. It’s been in the family for a whole generation.’ Out of the red bag she produces a Sainsbury’s bag, and out of that she teases the veil. We all stand and stare, waiting for something along the lines of marvellous. Instead, out flaps a rather moribund ball of yellow net.
‘Oh,’ says Andrea, wrinkling her short nose. ‘It looks like it might need cleaning.’
‘Well, that shouldn’t be a problem,’ declares Louise, still flapping and billowing the musty fusty bit of tea-stained net.
As veils go, it is not the worst I’ve seen, but it is pretty shit. I don’t know what it is about veils, but mothers of the bride often get quite belligerent and insistent that we use the ‘family’ veil, only for some moth-eaten square of crappy lace to be laid across the desk like it has been sanctified by the Pope.
A few months ago we had one very grand mother at the initial meeting, who wanted the designer to use the lace off her own dress, which had been designed by the same company thirty years before. She went on and on about ‘the lace, the lace, the lace’. In fact, there was such a tra-la-la about the lace that the designer was actually quite excited about using it. He called me a few times to ask if the mother had dropped it off. He was intrigued to see quite how wonderful and fabulous it was. Eventually a jiffy bag arrived and at the bottom there was a shitty little pile of crap that was yellow and gnawed by a mouse. It wasn’t a complete piece – it was scraps. Each little bit had to be washed by hand and pieced together. Eventually the poor bloke managed to cobble together some sort of bodice with it, because there was bugger all else he could do with it. But that is typical of the sort of client who thinks they are very, very smart and chic. They are people of significance and substance; they have ‘family lace’ or a ‘family veil’.
But talk to any decent couturier or designer and they will tell you that it is the ‘dressing’ or stiffness in a veil that makes it come alive. Veils don’t like being stored in Sainsbury’s bags in the loft, they become flat and floppy and they often don’t last more than one wedding. Also something that looked fabulous in the 1930s doesn’t necessarily translate to today’s dress. The example of the shower curtain worn by Victoria Lockwood when she got married to Charles Spencer is reason enough to ditch the family-lace look. It clung around her face and drowned her; it was surely not the image that Tomasz Starzewski was after when he designed her £12,000 medieval-style dress with gold lace and fur trim.
‘Well, it might take more than a couple of cleans,’ says Bernadette, picking the net up gingerly in her white-gloved hand. ‘It is really very yellow.’
‘I’m sure an overnight soak in some Vanish would do the trick,’ insists Louise, the loose skin below her chin beginning to wobble like a pelican eating lunch. ‘It has been in my family for a generation,’ she says again, flapping it out. ‘It’s a tradition.’
‘I know,’ agrees Andrea, coming over and putting a gloved hand on Louise’s shoulder. She is clearly used to dealing with such emotions in the claustrophobic confines of the rear of the shop. ‘But sometimes these things might be for the best. I am sure you looked beautiful in it.’
‘I did,’ nods Louise, fondling the veil between her fingers. ‘Everyone said so.’
‘I know,’ agrees Andrea again. ‘But the bride’s dress won’t match the veil, and if you wash it, it will lose all its bounce. So,’ she suggests, ‘do you have another daughter?’
‘Grace.’
‘Well, if I were you, I’d give it a good old clean and save it for Grace.’ Andrea pats Louise’s shoulder.
‘Yes,’ she replies, shooting her daughter a look. ‘I’ll save it for someone who might actually appreciate it.’
Alice just stares at her mother, looking slightly defeated. I have to say, I have heard of Bridezilla rearing her monstrous head at about this point in the proceedings, demanding more jewels on the dress, prettier shoes, a different veil. But Mumzilla usually waits until after the final fitting before she starts getting critical. Either that or she has had her moment much earlier on, at the engagement or when it came to drawing up the guest list. Perhaps Saturday is not going to be as easy a ride as I had thought.
‘Fortunately,’ says Andrea, with the breezy efficiency of a saleswoman sensing a retail opportunity, ‘we have a
few lovely veils right here the bride can try on if she wishes.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ gushes Alice. ‘Which one do you think would go with the dress?’
‘Well, we usually team the Maria with Agnes.’
At this point I just have to get out. There is only so much anthropomorphism of dresses and veils I can cope with. They are not people, they don’t have characters, and they don’t need to be called girls’ names. This is not the first time I have come across names for wedding dresses, but naming the veils sends me over the edge. I say I am just popping outside for a minute and all the women look at me in astonishment, as though I am about to miss out on the best bit.
Outside in the street, I spark up a cigarette, inhale deeply and start to pace up and down. I dial in for my messages on my mobile. There are a couple from Nigel at The Lilac Olive just checking what time he is allowed access to the site on Friday, and another from Steve the marquee man, asking what time I will be down at the venue on Thursday, when they will be striking the marquee. There is also another more intriguing one from Bernard. He sounds excited and wants me to call back ASAP.
‘Hello, it’s me,’ I say when Bernard picks up.
‘Guess what?’ I can hear he is grinning.
‘What?’
‘We’ve got our first gay enquiry,’ he beams down the phone.
‘What, for a wedding?’
‘Well, a blessing,’ he corrects. ‘You can’t have a gay wedding in church, although that vicar at St Bartholomew’s did one and ignited the wrath of the Anglican Church, but it is more usually a blessing.’
‘So a gay blessing stroke wedding.’
‘I know!’ He giggles. ‘The pink pound, here we come!’
Bernard has been keen to crack the gay-wedding market for a while, ever since he had a chat with a friend in Hatton Garden who said that the pink pound was making a huge difference down there. Heterosexual couples only shell out on one wedding band each, and it is usually something plain and simple in either platinum or gold. Gay couples apparently will buy a couple of rings each. One for the office, where they might have to appear a little more conservative, and another for the weekend, which will be a touch more flamboyant, with diamonds on the outside or even inside the ring. According to Bernard, the metropolitan gay couple have much more disposable income than their hetero counterparts. How else would things like embroidered white-leather jockstraps that sell at £1,800 each be so goddamn popular?
There are a couple of gay-wedding shows that are just beginning to get going. Held in Manchester and Brighton, they are small and staid and not quite reflective of the market, which is usually more high style and high concept than a straight wedding. Only the other day Nigel was telling us about a gay wedding he is catering next year, which is totally themed in black and white with art deco furniture being shipped in to the venue, plus a white and perspex grand piano. The couple have asked for an enormous glitter ball, plenty of caviar and a roaring band. Apparently photos of the desired wedding cake were sent over recently, only to reduce Nigel’s pastry chef to tears. The details, the layers, the false layers – it all proved too much for him.
Even my friend Alex, the florist, finds it hard to keep up. He’s done a couple of gay weddings recently and he says he had to keep himself very firmly on his toes. So far, he says, they have all really known their stuff. They buy flowers every week, they might have someone come in and do their flowers at home if they are having a party, or even a little intimate dinner. They know their dahlias from their daffs; in short, they know what they are talking about. Lesbians, he confided, are a little different. One of them usually knows what she wants and the other doesn’t give a shit. He said that at the only lesbian wedding he’s done, one had sublime taste and the other one thought it a huge imposition on her valuable time that she had to think about such irritations and distractions as bloody flowers.
‘That’s so exciting,’ I enthuse back at Bernard. ‘Have you booked them in for a meeting?’
‘You bet I bloody have,’ he says. ‘Next week – Thursday. And you’re doing it with me.’
‘Brilliant.’
‘Are you coming back to the office?’
‘In about half an hour.’
‘Good,’ he says. ‘We’ve got appointments,’ he adds ominously.
‘I know. I’ll be there.’
‘You’d better be.’
I stub out my cigarette and look around for a bin, but failing to find one, I kick it into the kerb.
Back in the changing room, the atmosphere is improved. Louise is sitting on the chaise longue nursing a cup of tea and a pink wafer biscuit, while Bernadette and Andrea puff out Alice’s floor-length veil and adjust her diamond-studded tiara. Even from behind, the effect is breathtaking. She has to be one of the prettiest brides I have ever looked after. She doesn’t notice me as I walk in and carries on chatting.
‘I had a friend who was chucked at her final dress-fitting while wearing her wedding dress,’ she says.
‘Really!’ exclaims Bernadette, fanning out the bottom of the veil while crouching on the floor. ‘What, by mobile phone?’
‘Yes.’
‘Text or call?’ asks Andrea.
‘Text.’
‘Coward.’
‘I agree,’ says Alice. ‘I mean, if you are going to dump a girl three days before the wedding, then at least have the balls to call.’
‘Do people really behave like that?’ asks Louise, taking a sip of tea.
‘Men do,’ says Andrea. ‘They’re just not good at confrontation, they’d do anything to avoid it. I know a girl who’d been married for fourteen months. She’d had a big £60,000 wedding, which she was still paying off in instalments. Her husband told her he was leaving via text message while she was at work, and when she got home the flat was empty.’
‘Take it from me, darling,’ says Louise, crunching into her wafer, ‘all men are shits. Oh, hello,’ she says, turning to look at me. ‘I didn’t see you there.’
‘Oh, hello,’ says Alice, turning around. ‘What do you think?’
‘Stunning,’ I say, feeling my cheeks flush slightly. ‘Totally stunning.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ she says, coming towards me. She plants a kiss on my cheek and gives me an expansive hug. She smells so clean and fresh and delicious. ‘Not all men are ghastly, Mum.’
Ten minutes later, after Louise Oxford has dropped another £750 on a veil and crystal tiara for her daughter, we prepare to leave the shop. Alice thanks everyone profusely and sweetly kisses the two plump women before hailing a cab with her mother. I’m left to sort out the final arrangements for the dress.
‘So, shall I come and collect it tomorrow after the alterations have been made, or will you need another day just to be safe?’ I say, consulting my schedule. ‘I am not leaving town until Thursday, or Friday at the latest, and we can always get it couriered if you want.’
‘It’s ready to go now,’ says Andrea.
‘Sorry – but thirteen buttons down to twelve?’
‘There are only twelve on the dress. It fits the bride like a glove. The mother doesn’t know what she is talking about it.’
‘Oh.’
‘I just said it to keep her quiet. It happens all the time.’ She shrugs, handing me the large dress in the transparent plastic cover.
‘If you are sure,’ I say, grabbing hold of the white satin hanger.
‘Trust me,’ replies Andrea. ‘She won’t notice a thing.’
As I load the dress into the car, I check the twelve satin buttons going down the back of the bodice, and pray silently that these two wily women are right.
Tuesday p.m.
I ARRIVE BACK in the office with the wedding dress over one shoulder, a ham sandwich in one hand and a latte in the other. If either of those ladies could see me now they might actually need smelling salts.
‘All right?’ sniffs Jez. His feet are on the desk and his nose is in a men’s glossy magazine that cunningly seems to combin
e boys’ gadgets with girls’ tits.
‘Fine, thanks.’ I plonk the dress down on the desk. I have a momentary panic that some black marker pen might be devoid of a lid, but the dress is covered in plastic – how dirty can it get? ‘How’s everything here?’
‘Fine,’ he replies, scratching his bollocks. ‘Camilla is having her legs waxed or her pussy, I’m not sure which, and Bernard’s gone out to get some lunch from the organic health-food shop around the corner.’
‘OK.’
‘Oh, and that mad bitch came to see you this morning.’ He sits up and pats down a particularly troublesome frond of gelled hair, checking his reflection in his computer screen, which he only ever has on when he’s looking for trainers or surf shit on eBay.
‘Which one?’ I laugh, like I have so many mad bitches chasing me.
‘The blonde. Caroline.’
‘Oh, her.’
‘Apparently you, like, had an appointment?’
‘Well, actually we didn’t,’ I reply. ‘She said she might pop in and I made sure I wasn’t here. Did she leave a message?’
‘The normal one,’ nods Jez. I look at him questioningly. He looks back at me as if I am a moron. ‘You know – call her?’
‘Right,’ I say, putting my latte down on my desk and carefully removing the dress and hanging it on the hat stand behind me.
‘You should just put the poor bitch out of her misery,’ continues Jez. ‘You know, tell her you ain’t going to fuck her.’
‘OK,’ I reply, turning on my computer to check my emails. ‘And how do you suggest I do that?’
‘I don’t know – just say, “Listen, I’m not going to shag you, get off my case, you nutter.”’
‘I suppose that might do it,’ I reply, spamming all the offers for Viagra, ‘ladies’ and watches that persist on coming through on my account.
‘Yeah, well,’ he replies. ‘Don’t come crying to me when it all ends in tears.’
Wedding Babylon Page 9