dress alteration question???

[FLgirl41]

I kow it depends on who does it, but I am wandering how much it costs (estimate) to get a dress altered.

My dress is all beaded (it is two layered silk on bottom and an embroidered overlay). It needs to be taken in a ton in the bust and bodice area (waist area ) and a little in the hips also it needs to be hemed. How much would you estimate this to cost???

 

[labbielove]

Definitely depends on your locale,
but in western NYS I paid $205 for a hem and bustle, and only a very minor tweak to the lace inset in the bodice.

my dress was satin with a lace overlay, so to do the hem they had to detach the lace scalloping on the bottom, hem, and then re-attach the lace.

i think my bustle was french style? where they put the loops underneath the gown,so it just looks like its a bit "folded" from the outside (versus the hook and loops on the outside of the dress). As bustles go, i don''t think it was very complicated for them to do, fairly standard

 

[NewEnglandLady]

The more they have to alter, the more it will be. The beading on the altered areas also significantly increases the costs.

I had to have the bust of my dress taken in by about 6 inches and it was all hand-beaded with one layer of silk and one layer of beading--I think the bust alone cost me about $350. The hips, bustle, hem, steaming (none of which were beaded or detailed) ran me another $200 or so--and this was the THIRD seamstress I saw. The rest were more expensive (again, because of the hand beading and significant bust alterations).

I have two friends who got their alterations from the same woman--they had non-beaded dresses and their alterations were only about $200 each for hem, bustle and having various things taken in.

If you just have beading and no boning around the bust, it may be cheaper. As for the hem, if it is detailed at the bottom and has to be taken up at the waist (instead of hemmed at the bottom) it will cost much more.

I would definitley recommend seeing at least two seamstresses just to get an idea of price--unless, of course, the first one comes in far under your budget!

 

[FLgirl41]

WOW!!! I was definetly not planning it to be that much!

Now when I bought my dress they said since it is panled or what ever that it might work just to do the taking in where the zipper is. As for the hem I hoping my fiance doesn''t care and I will just wear 3.5 inch heels and he will just have to get heel risers or something. He is only about 2.5 inches taller than me. EEEk I am worried now that it is going to cost as much as my dress!!! My dress was only $600 and that would suck to pay $600 in alterations!

 

[NewEnglandLady]

I''m sure there are many other women here who have had delicately beaded dresses and didn''t have to pay that much (despite visiting several seamstresses, I STILL think I got ripped off--plus I live in a large city, so that affects the price). Is yours a traditional wedding gown or more like an evening gown? Mine had a whole lotta silk and wasn''t a sheath-style dress. It''s very possible that your material and the style of your dress will be easier to alter.

So sorry! I wasn''t trying to rain on your parade. I just know how shocked I was after visiting the first seamstress--then how even more shocked I was after visiting the other two and wanted to give you my experience.

That reminds me! IG has a beaded evening gown and is using the seamstress at the store where she bought the gown (I believe?) and her price was MUCH more reasonable, but she also had very few alterations. If you''re not happy with the price, don''t be afraid to walk out!

 

[neatfreak]

You''re going to pay a lot in my experience...my very very very simple dress (no beading, no fancy material, and simple alterations) was about $250 to alter. AND this is in Madison, WI which is the cheap capital of the world compared to a lot of places...

As soon as you say the word "beading" I would expect the estimate to go up considerably. Consider also that wedding dresses have more than one layer and all of them need to be altered separately, which is why it is more expensive than a normal dress or a BM dress. I don''t think $5-600 is out of the realm of reality at all unfortunately.

 

[neatfreak]

Double post!

 

[brazen_irish_hussy]

Quite honestly? If you want a good job from what you described, it could easily cost $800. I used to make the costumes for a number of schools and the there are five fabrics I now refuse to work with, one of which is silk. It slips, pulls easily, requires special needles and the going is painfully slow. Now mutiply that by three layers.
I am also and awardwinning bead artist and I will tell why beaded dresses are so expensive. If you pay $300 on an alteration for a beaded dress, they will simply cut the bodice where it needs work and resew it. As a result the beading will start to come undone like when you have a piece of thread hanging out of your clothes and then the whole hem comes undone. A good alteration will require the seamstress to re-sew each of the beaded strands back into the fabric so it does not come apart. In something with a lot of detail, beaders usually uses a lot of shorter strands so if one breaks less damage is done. This means that there could literally be dozens of strands that have to individually be resewn into the dress so they will hold.
On top of all of this, there are other things that could add to the price. If the silk is cut vertically on the bodice, it is harder to alter. If there are stays, it is a lot harder to alter. If you have to take in a lot like in your case, they will have to take it in at the back and on each side or the bodice will distort. That means they have to alter it in four places and possible redo the ends of the beading in each.
I know this is not what you wanted to hear, but if I were doing the alterations, I would charge a great deal. It is such a pain that I don''t do it and some seamstresses simply will refuse to put in the work. Many bridal stores make a muslin gown that is exactly to your mesurements and then send it to the designer to have the beaded dress made exactly because it is such an expensive pain to have it altered.

 

[NewEnglandLady]

Trust me, I know having to pay a ton in alterations stinks. In fact, if I''d known that it cost so much to alter beading I may have gone with a different dress, but in the end I felt it was totally worth it. My seamstress did an amazing job and had to hand sew all of the beads back onto the altered bust and it looked AMAZING! The dress was perfect and I would have been really upset after paying thousands for a dress only to have it butchered because I didn''t want to pay for proper alterations.

It sounds like $500 - $600 (or more) isn''t unreasonable, though I would still suggest going to a couple of seamstresses. Not just for price, but different seamstresses sometimes alter the gown differently and you''ll know which way you''ll like more. For instance, as Brazen pointed out, one of the seamstresses was going to take the bust in on two seams instead of all four, I knew I didn''t want that.

Good luck and I hope you can find something that works in your budget--if not, can you return the dress and get something without beading?

 

[FLgirl41]

So I am preparing myself for the worse. Which is fine because I am saving money in other areas and there is no point in dwelling on something that cannot be controled.

but the question now is how do you choose a seamstress??? I am willing to pay more if it means that my dress will be done properly and not carelessly.

Do I go to the local bridal shops (I live in Tallahassee, FL so I am limited)? Or do I find a local seamstress? I know there is one down the road that she says she does wedding dresses and does bead work as well. A simple hem on pants is lik $10. Would this be a good choice to go to? How do you know they will do a good job?

I am a little worried to put my dress in someone elses hands. Also, when should I start getting it altered if my wedding is Dec 2008?

 

[brazen_irish_hussy]

I would start trying to get it altered sooner rather than later.
Keep in mind some places that sell gowns won''t alter dresses that weren''t bought there. Don''t go to a place that is lesser quality than your gown if that makes sense.
If I were you, here are some of the questions I would ask potential seemstresses:
Do you regularly do wedding dresses? (they are very different from other types of clothing so this is important)
Do you work with silk frequently? (silk is very hard to work with and they need to be experienced, plus it takes special needles, etc)
Do you have a lot of experience with beadwork? (agian, obvious answer)
How do you deal with beadwork? (the right answer is that she sews the beaded sections back in one by one)
Will you take in the bodice on the back or on the back and sides? (Both is better because otherwise the bodice is likely to distort if a lot has to be taken off)
Is there anything else I should do with the dress? (if they answer yes, they should explain to you clearly why they recomend that change. For example moving the straps. If they cannot explain why to do it one way or another, they don''t know enough about it.)
Hope that helps some, I will post if I think of something else.