THRIFT
MY GRAN'S WEDDING DRESS
November 08, 2017I have no idea whether it's a true story or not, but I always believed my paternal grandmother to have carried a bunch of big, dramatic, white November lilies on her wedding day.
I don't know whether she told me that herself, whether's it's family folklore, or it's a story that's just in my head. She died last year and in looking through the few artifacts of her life given to me by my Dad and Aunt, I can see versions of my Gran I never knew. There's the young woman excited to marry her sweetheart, the mother with knitting patterns of practical schoolyard vests and jumpers, the practical home cook and the CWA member. There are, I know, many other versions of the woman my grandmother was, but these are the clues I've found in a couple of photos, drawings of her wedding and bridesmaids gowns and the marked knitting and crochet patterns saved from her home.
These drawings of her wedding dress were made by her cousin, who, the story goes, sat outside Anthony Hordern & Son's in Sydney and drew this from a display in the window. The long sleeves belong to the bride's dress and the shorter ruched sleeves to the bridesmaids. I don't know whether the dress in the window was the "orchid pink" marked on the drawings, or whether my Gran's bridal party wore the colour.
And on the back of one drawing, there's a hint to how young Gran and her cousin were as they planned and plotted her gown: her cousin in Sydney and my Gran in Maitland. "Love is all", it says, alongside a love heart pierced with Cupid's arrow and topped with two stick figures of a man and woman embracing. Another marking is of my Gran's maiden name, Miss Joan Moore and what would be her married name, Mrs Douglas Moore. Yes, by sheer coincidence, my Gran carried the same surname as my Pa.
My Gran and Pa were married on November 11, 1944, The drawings have the date March 3, 1944, and the dresses were decided on and made by my Gran's mother, Ida Moore (nee Greedy), of Maitland, a tailor in the tradition of her own father. The photo of Gran in the gown, it's thought, was taken at Gran's parent's house in Tenambit, a suburb of Maitland, in a fitting before the wedding. The other photo is Pa, in his military uniform with his new wife in her going away outfit.
A handful of precious clues, that I am so honoured to have.
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