Wednesday, October 29, 2008

#411: badassness.

my first 'featured guest'? um, more like 'SUPERSTAR'.

post #407 had a lot of you drooling. i rule! nah, i'm joking, it was all kimi. and like you, i was dying to know how she did what she did. so i reached out to her and she graciously agreed to give us the deets. i'm sure her words will inspire you as much as they did me. enjoy.

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I am not a wedding person. Before I met my now-husband I had never even entertained the thought of getting married, let alone having a big wedding. If I'd had my way we would have run off to the woods and gotten married by ourselves, and then had a big party afterwards. But other people had other (strong) opinions. So a slightly more traditional shindig it was. But I decided to make as many things as possible, so it would feel more 'me', from invitations to favors to The Dress.

Not being a wedding person, I am also definitively not a wedding-dress person. I went into a couple of bridal stores but promptly ran out hyperventilating before even looking at anything. After a couple of J.Crew dresses that had to be returned due to total cleavage obscenity, I ordered a cheapo sheath dress from Target. It was so cheapo ($68 on sale) that I really held out no hopes for it. But when it arrived, it fit perfectly and was made of quite decent material. I thought to myself, If you don't want to be typical, here's your chance to get creative. I quickly ordered a 2nd one as a backup, just in case my attempts backfired. I mean, they were $68 for pete's sake.

After many experiments with cutting into the dress, fabric flowers, paint, beads etc., I decided on cutout silhouettes. I went to fabric stores and in the dusty basement of one found a kind of flocked velvet backed with acrylic. If it was regular velvet, or any other normal fabric, the edges would have shredded with the thin delicate shapes I was planning. There aren't really any d.i.y. instructions because they would have to say "Be an Artist and Graphic Designer Like Me", which isn't very helpful. I just took a pair of scissors and went at it—but there are tons of patterns on the web that people could trace. I cut out hundreds of leaves and vines and animals until I had shapes that looked good. Then I took the clean dress and laid it out on the floor and began arranging all the pieces until I got a pattern I liked. Then the hot glue gun came out (superglue also works I discovered later, and I was too lazy to even try fabric glue). I attached a piece of netting to extend the train and glued more trailing leaves down that. Several weeks-worth of evenings later, I had my dress. It has birds, deer, mice, our initials, a big fox, and the words we have inscribed in our rings—"It's all true". Meaning every dream, every fairytale, every story about dragons or empires or even true love, it's simply all true.

And then came the wedding. And even though it poured and we couldn't get married outside, it was lovely. A friend gave us the gift of an original composition for harp and string quartet, his father did an audience-participation jug band, and all these new yorkers got drunk and played washtub bass. The location was an Audubon center in beautiful prospect park in Brooklyn, so bird mobiles were everywhere and we got married next to a giant fiberglass chipmunk. The dress was a smashing success. Everyone wrote and drew such lovely things in the little books. Everyone took the paper flowers and adorned themselves with them, and everything and everyone looked gorgeous.

And that's the story of my wedding and my dress. I'm thinking re-commitment ceremony with yet another dress, in the woods, with a decorated umbrella. Just in case of rain.

The End.

(And there's a brief story of another dress. We had always planned on doing a mountaintop ceremony, just the two of us, sharing personal vows. So I made a 2nd dress for it, using an old silk nightgown of mine with leaves of matching silk that I hot-glued onto it, with a train of leaves in back. It's a pretty risqué dress when worn, not appropriate for the web, so I'm only attaching a picture of it hanging up. The dress brought tears to the boy's eyes, and it was all beautiful, even though it was raining again and we once again had to stay indoors.)

For anyone who wants to see more pics, click here to view our flickr set. I feel incredibly honored that people love my dress and want to know more about it.









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{thank you kimi.}

23 comments:

lovely bird said...

pure awesome-ness!

Brittany said...

wow. I am overwhelmed with the utter coolness that is Kimi.

And also, super super jealous. I want to be creative!

Loopy said...

Dude! Where did she get that badass invitation!?
I want to be her when I grow up.

Kaitlyn Gumpper said...

Oh man, I LOVE the Audobon Center in Prospect Park. This dress and wedding are too cool. Thanks for sharing!

Bridechka said...

Completely awesome wedding and the dress is amazing!

Kerry S. said...

wozer! I am so inspired by this dress. I only hope to make something 1/2 as cool. Way to go, Kimi!

Kimi Weart said...

Kimi here, I am tickled pink by the comments! I designed the invites, from various clip art of old engravings, printed 'em out on an inkjet on heavy paper. And everyone should try playing w/ a glue gun and an old dress—-I want to make more!! Silk flowers growing over one shoulder! silhouette of bird wings on the back! I want to do it all!!! And how cool is ms. tenthousandonly.

Anonymous said...

Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful! Kimi--you are so talented and creative--you should consider opening an Etsy shop! Thanks for posting more on Kimi's wedding!

Kristy said...

Awesome. Thanks for sharing!

Anonymous said...

superstar is right!

Stephanie said...

Hey there...I happened upon your blog by google. I just have to laugh because I feel like I am writing it! We too, are trying to stay within a budget that some feel is impossible. We too, eloped. We were married on August 30th, but our wedding will be January 10th - and it was for insurance purposes!

Oh, and I'm addicted to the Hills, too. I can't STAND Spencer. Ugh. Keep writing...I enjoy the reading! :)

Meg said...

KIMI!!!!!! Oh my god!!!!! I'm feeling so so so burned out about weddings right now, so burned out. I know, I know, I have a blog and I write about inspiring weddings, and I read the amazing Ms.tenthousandonly but I'm still burned. out.

And I think you just gave me my faith back again. And for that, I double, triple, quadruple thank you. It makes it so much cooler for me that you got married at the Audubon center. I used to live right by there in Brooklyn, and I walked to it every day on my walk. I love it so much there. Ok, now on to flckr stalking your wedding.

Really, two both of you, blogger and bride, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

erinmaureen said...

were you inspired by rob ryan? it reminds me of the dress he made for vogue. Gorgeous! So creative and awesome!

Jenna said...

I am triply impressed by the dress now that I have heard the story of how it was constructed. Beautiful wedding, beautiful dress. And "it's all true" as a theme? Sigh.

Cate Subrosa said...

Oh, I loved this. Love how they did it their way, but thought so much about others' feelings. Love how they went for the mountain thing anyway, just did it alone separately. Brilliant.

Anonymous said...

I saw this wedding on offbeatbride and I was just floored by this dress, It s funky loveliness incarnate, I want that dress ao bad and her "risque" dress looks like a dream as well!

Sara said...

wow...beautiful dress!! simply fantastic! :)

Anonymous said...

I love the "what is the song that will make you get up and dance" question on the RSVP card. I'm totally stealing that. Oh yes, and I love everything else, too. That's a pretty sweet dress for $6800, nevermind $68.

Anonymous said...

wow~! I am half way through my bottle of wine! Loving every bit of your quips! Not a wedding or bride personality myself...you have given me so much inspiration and also make me miss the city...NYU was my home and favorite graduation...Hope all is well in Brooklyn....
Living peacefully by the beach in NC,
Nicole

sera said...

I am literally moved to tears.

Kelley at My Island Wedding said...

Oh, I think your dress was included in my first entry to the My Island Wedding - Inspiration Board Contest!!!

It's fabulous!!!

Feel inspired to enter for yourself, I would love to see what you come up with for your "ultimate wedding" inspiration board!!!

Hope all is well!
www.myislandwedding.com

Bridal Jewelry said...

Interesting read! Nice reading rsvp invites!

Unknown said...

I know Kimi has said she wants to experiment and make more dresses...my question is if she is willing to sell any of her creative dresses? I can't find "the dress" and my wedding is only getting closer. I am not as artistic and i think i would just end up getting more frustrated in the process. So i am very interested if she is going to be selling any of these gorgeous and unique pieces???