The Dress Room: Part 1
Long before I started collecting dresses, I had a dream of finding a tiny cottage in the woods. It was a quaint house with blue paint, and large windows, all engulfed in flowers as tall as the roof. In my bare feet, I would venture in, wandering until I stumbled across a room overflowing with vintage dresses. The room had a nostalgic air, somewhere between dress up at grandmas during childhood and a fairies closet- a little dusty but all kinds of wonderful. That cottage and room stole a little piece of my dreaming heart. I mean what better dream is there than spending an entire afternoon in the company of lace gowns and floral crowns? When I woke up I’d scribble about in my journal and always hope for a place like that in real life. As the years went on I started falling in love with vintage dresses and costumes. I used them for my photoshoots, dressing up anyone that I could. Like all collections, the more you bring into a tiny cabin the less space you have. Soon I was up to my nose in them, feeling a little overwhelmed and uncertain about just what to do. But life went on as it always seems to do. I got busy going about my life dreaming, rather than doing anything about my dress problem.
It was this past winter that I no longer could keep doing what I was doing. This dream had been scratched in every new year’s resolution list since 2017. That kind of project that was looming in the shadows of my thoughts. I needed a solution for my disorganization, a place for the poofy skirts hanging in the hall or tossed about my rug. I decided that I needed a room that was totally dedicated to dresses or at least an area where I could gather them all. It sounds a little insane now that I’m typing that out, but it been a long haul, and I’m thankful for: a dad who is skilled and patient, the essential oil tea tree oil and eucalyptus for keeping my lungs alive down in a dusty basement and for every Skype call Liz made where all I was doing was hanging dresses and on the verge of having a Kylo-Ren meltdown. At the end of the day, it isn’t like the room from my dream. I might not ever get something so wonderful as that. The fluorescent lighting is most definitely not nostalgic, and there are no pretty windows. But I am all kinds of thrilled and proud. Although this project is in the earlier stages and nothing is quite finished yet, I wanted to show you all and keep a little journal entry so I could always remember.
This dress journey all began in my closet a few years ago. I started storing my collection in my own closet. I think I ditched my personal clothes in drawers just so everything could fit. Eventually, I broke the whole closet bar! Even though I had only a couple of dresses hanging there, they were too heavy for that poor little metal bar. This led to me eventually adopting the unfinished basement room downstairs. You know the one; everyone has one. It always seems to be creepily lit with freezing concrete floors and a sink in the corner with loose insulation hanging from the ceilings. It wasn’t ideal but it was all I had to work with. I have wanted to finish this room for about three years or maybe even four. I can’t really think of why I didn’t do it, but this year things got overwhelming and suddenly my excuses couldn’t beat the need to be organized. Bin and pile life wasn’t working anymore. I’d rush in from the backyard to take a quick self-portrait and would spend way too long searching for a dress I knew I had, but could not find. Talk about frustrating! I knew I had to do something.
All winter I have been down in what I now call ‘the pit’. The dark basement was something I always avoided; there’s nothing good down there besides our reptiles and storage. Now I was spending my days off working with my dad on making the room not so scary. Cleaning it, a lot, holding up drywall ceiling until my arms nearly snapped off and going on mouse hunts for sport. It was one of those dad-daughter projects that would either make our relationship better or worse. Being down there was like being in a movie theater in the middle of the day. The film finishes and you don’t know the time or what your own name is. I would emerge every now and then confused that it was already late in the afternoon. I tried to understand why I never started this project, despite it being on every list and the root of many of my problems. Finishing the room was a lot of work but it felt great! Why didn’t I do this sooner? Then it came to the dresses.
The mountain of lace, poofy skirts and years of collecting. The Mount Everest of my goal list. It dawned on me why I kept dreaming rather than doing. There was so much work, too much work. It was a mountain that couldn't possibly be conquered. Normally, I am a force of nature kind of worker. Highly motivated, I start and can’t stop until the project is done. That might be why I was so frustrated; this was something I couldn’t possibly do in a day or a week or even a month. But I decided to work a little at a time, and after a month of work, it was too late to turn back. I had gone far enough that no excuse could really keep my stubborn self from continuing. Even when it felt like I had a hundred bins left, battling creatures and allergies and so many more obstacles I never prepared for. I kept telling myself it would be worth it. I kept picturing what it would look like once I was done, what it would feel like to just waltz downstairs, pick out a dress and take self-portraits in the fog.
This poor room isn’t even close to being pretty, it looks more like an overstuffed box of vintage that could fall on me any minute. I am still up to my nose in the organizing part and trying to just get everything hung up! When it does get to be a magical little room sometime in life, I hope that I can look back and remember what it took to get there. It also has inspired other projects that I am planning for this year! In the end, everything is still is stressful, but knowing that I’ve started this seemingly impossible task….well the other big to-dos on my list don’t seem so scary now.
Part two of this blog will be answering all these fun questions you all have been sending me about my dress hoard. If you have any questions that are dress related please leave them below in the comments!
