Vintage Wedding Dresses Made Into Bridal Clutches and Ring Pillows

This is a project I completed in January and was a custom job for a special church friend.  She gave me three vintage wedding dresses from her family (her own dress, her mother's, and her mother in law's) and asked me to make bridal clutches and ring pillows for the grandchildren to use in their future weddings.  The oldest grandchild is in high school, I believe, so these will be used in the next few decades and should be sweet reminders of grandmothers and great grandmothers on those special occasions. 

I am kicking myself for not taking photos of the original dresses before I started.  Alas, I didn't, so all I have to share are photos of the completed clutches and ring pillows.  There are seven granddaughters and six grandsons so a total of thirteen projects (plus I made two little keepsake pillows for the friend and her sister - those were a bonus).

For seven of them (all on one side of the family) I used pieces of all three dresses. 

The other six (the other side of the family) were all from one dress. 

Overall I am happy with how everything turned out.  The satin was definitely tricky to work with and with one dress in particular it was very easy to leave scorch marks when pressing, even with a press cloth.  Ack!  Getting crisp corners/seams was hard with fabric that didn't like the iron and would bounce right back and not hold the press anyway.  I tried different techniques along the way, saving my favorite vintage pieces for last so I had as much practice as possible by the last few clutches.  If I ever do this sort of project again I'll look into metal purse frames - I've never used them before but that might be a better way to go than sewing things right sides together and then expecting a crisp finish when you turn it right sides out. 

My favorite part was definitely the designing of the clutches.  I used the same basic size/shape for each one but tailored them individually to whatever lace or button plackets or ribbon pieces I wanted to use. 

For example, this one is made from a very cool gathered bodice piece on one of the older dresses...

and this pillow is a round pillow to accommodate the round lace collar on another dress.  

My sewing area looked like a bridal tornado had gone through it while I worked on these... satin, lace, and white thread everywhere.  

I enjoyed making them and was honored to be the seamstress for this particular family heirloom project.