Then she bought the winner, an Amsale sample gown, for $699, with $300 in alterations.
Although many independent bridal stores do stock some off-the-rack dresses, the traditional method of buying a wedding dress has required the bride to try on the store's sample gowns and place an order for a new dress, which can take as long as six months to be delivered by the manufacturer and will require alterations at additional cost.
One afternoon, though, she received a call from her sister, a Vogue editor, who advised her to inspect the work of Rogelio Velasco and Annica Andersson, a fledgling design team whose sample gowns happened to be at the magazine's offices.
She perched on a footstool provided so that a bride who isn't Julia Roberts's height can get some idea of what she'll look like when she's in her own gown rather than a sample, and gazed at herself in the wall-size mirrors.
A: Dressing gown and slippers.
And while a journalist searching for sources for a story (or even baseball tickets) might make all the connections they need on Twitter, a designer Tweeting in search of a sample-maker to sew a silk gown (were they ever to do such a thing) would likely meet resounding silence.
But thumbing through the magazine's pages — as represented here by the complete issue of July 2 , 1927 editorials, reviews, profiles, articles and cartoons from others; more than 80 pages of the magazine's astonishing covers; and a sampling of its advertisements for pipes, gowns, Victrolas, sack suits, deodorant — is a bit like having William Powell and Myrna Loy sweep through your living room.
This is Europe's equivalent of New York's Met Ball: a chance for fashion's finest to slip into sample-size gowns and borrow a few carats of bling in a bid to make the Best Dressed Lists.
Nicotine, deprivation - she used thick lettuce leaves instead of bread for sandwiches - and exercise in her apartment mini-gym kept her slender enough to fit into couture samples, discounted at $10,000 a gown.
