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.
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.
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.
Encore Bridal is an upscale resale and consignment bridal e-boutique (www.encorebridal.com) where brides can find new, sample and "recycled couture" gowns, discounted 30 to 60percentt off retail prices.
The Bill Blass spring 2002 trunk show was in town, with 62 sample dresses, suits and evening gowns, priced from $1,600 to $20,000, hanging on racks.
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.
The original Bush Presidential Library and Museum is at Texas A&M University, where visitors can see a "stunning replica of Barbara's wedding gown," a restored 1947 Studebaker, samples from the museum's collection of more than 1,200 elephants and the family speedboat, Fidelity.
Thereby, 35 of them were sampled in December: 25 gowns in the PRICU and 10 in the NICU.
