When my husband and I got married two years ago I knew I wanted to make some things for the wedding. I considered sewing my own wedding dress, for about 5 seconds. With all the other things going on in my life at the time, sewing a wedding dress had the potential to become a bit too stressful.
We had chosen a dark fuchsia colour for our wedding and this was featured on our invitation, a belt on my dress, my jacket, my husband’s tie and the corsages for the wedding party.

Picture take by our wedding photographer Rita van de Poel.
I debated for long time whether I wanted a white dress because white is not the best colour for me to wear and I don’t really care about these kinds of traditions anyway. To both my sisters’ relief I did eventually buy a white dress but I simply had to add some colour. The dress came with a black belt that I didn’t like so it was removed and I replaced it with a dark fuchsia one. I also made a jacket because I don’t like being cold and as it turned out I wore it for most of the day.

Picture taken by our wedding photographer Rita van de Poel.
My first attempt at a jacket didn’t work out at all (imagine the stress if this would have been my dress!), so I switched to the cropped version of By Hand London’s Victoria blazer that I had made once before (but unblogged). I removed some of the fullness in the back as I found it stood out quite a bit on my first version. I also moved the shoulder seams forward and made some small changes to the sleeves. I used the collar but left off the lapel.
Construction wise I changed a whole lot of things. The entire jacket is underlined in silk organza. The seam allowances were catch stitched to the silk organza so they remain flat. Sadly, I don’t think I made any in progress pictures of this step. I also created facings and a separate lining pattern. The lining was attached by hand.
For the lining I originally intended to use a white Bemberg rayon, but I found it was a bit too sheer as you could see all the seam allowances (and catch stitches) through it, which for a skirt lining would have been fine, but not for a jacket where the lining can be on display while you’re wearing it. I found a pretty wild fabric that had some of the fuchsia colour in it and used that, I like how it added even more colour to my outfit.
We had a great wedding day and after two years we still can’t help but smile when we bring back memories of this day.

Because I know some of you will be curious about the dress without the jacket. Picture taken by our wedding photographer Rita van de Poel.
A very pretty jacket, a lovely dress and a beautiful bride! I’m not at all surprised you have great memories of the day.
Thank you! It’s quite funny, when we first decided to get married I thought we could do a small ceremony but my husband thought we should throw a party and he was totally right. We had a blast and it was absolutely great to celebrate with our friends and family.
We did something similar: a lunch for friends and family, with a small wedding thrown in as an excuse to get dressed up!
Very lovely, and quite traditional enough. The wedding jacket was actually a great idea with chilly venues and changeable weather! You did a super job on it, and took so much care!
Thank you! The week before the wedding it was super warm and I would have had no use for the jacket but the day before the weather changed and it became much chillier. We had to change some plans because of this but for my husband it was much better because he really can’t stand the heat.
Gorgeous! Beautifully done!
Thank you!