NEW YORK BRIDAL FASHION WEEK

This post is written by Gretchen.

​Well, it has been WAY too long my friends!  This past month has been hectic, crazy, and fun for Lourdes and me.  I finally have a moment to breath and share it with you.

So what has happened in the past month you ask?  Let me tell you!

New York Market Prep: The Photoshoot

We had the photoshoot for our second collection at the gorgeous Governor Thomas Bennett House in Charleston.  Having been built in 1825, this location is beautifully historical.   It has the most gorgeous rooms, façade, and gardens - and we used every inch of it that we could.  The day started early for us with hair and makeup. Our two models and photographer were lovely to work with as we moved from dress to dress and room to room. We can't thank Mackenzie from The Click Chick Photography enough for the gorgeous photos.

New York Market Prep: The Nitty Gritty

Getting ourselves ready is what kept us so busy in between... well, everything.  We had to figure out the look of our booth aka how we wanted buyers to think of us with one glance.  This was the fun albeit frustrating part because we are two very different designers! We went with a gold on white herringbone wallpaper to give our booth a fun, yet sophisticated background.

Then it was time to reach out to stores.  This included mailing "Save the Date" cards, and phone calls to individual stores.  All this in hopes of getting the boutique buyers to make an appointment.

After reaching out to stores, we had to make sure all the dresses were ready to perfection.  This was an easy task since pretty much everything was done, but it still was very important to do.   And, of course, there were still little things to be done here and there. Enough to drive any person crazy.  I.e. paperwork, printing business cards, creating fabric swatches for buyers, etc.

New York Bridal Fashion Week

New York Bridal Fashion Week is the culmination of all the hard work.  And it's over in three days! What a crazy three days they were. I drove the 12 hours to NYC with my mom as my co-pilot, and Lourdes flew in. We met on Friday where we immediately ran into some challenges. After a trip to Staples and a hardware store, we were back on the ground running. We put up the wallpaper, ironed and steamed all the dresses, figuring out the booth set up, and made sure everything was in place.

The next three days were such a blur.  We both took a moment the first day to figure out where we would stand, how we would greet, and how we would ...err... "wrangle" buyers into coming in. I took the front as greeter/enticer, and Lourdes stood inside the booth as information keeper/closer.  As the time ticked by, we became a very smooth operation and started having fun with it. There was great people watching (great fashion in New York of course!) and lots of buyers were very nice and complimentary of our work.

​When there was a moment to spare, Lourdes and I walked around the rest of the show to see what other booths carried.  We also took note of how others designed their booths. It was like being a kid in a candy store! We met such wonderful people, and gained lots of insider deets about the show workings.   We are already making lists for our booth next year. Being in such an amazing environment makes you want to do it all!

Packing up our booth at the end of the weekend was bittersweet.  We wished there was more time to show buyers what we have to offer, but we were thankful it was over.  At that point, we wanted nothing more than to get foot massages from standing for four days straight. We tore down our booth in about 1/5 of the time it took to put it all up, and each headed home.

​All in all, we are in agreement that market was something that is important to our budding brand.  It's a way to gain lots of new information about the world of bridal, a great way to network, and so much more.  We're already looking forward to next year!!!

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