My first favourite thing about owning a bridal shop is the sense of privilege (and satisfaction) that I feel from dressing Brides and Grooms for their big day.  It’s such a rewarding industry and helping Brides with their preparations is a real honour.  I absolutely love seeing the pictures after the big day - I don’t think I could ever tire of this job!  My second favorite thing is the buying!  Selecting styles for our future Brides is lovely, sometimes it’s hard to choose which Designers and which dresses to have on our rails (mainly because I love them all) but again, it’s a really fun aspect of what we do.  This year saw the launch of a new designer wedding dress trade show in London called the ‘White Gallery’ and Kirsty (our shop Manager) and I went to check it out …. I didn’t exactly have to drag her along she too shares in a relentless passion for bridal and loves buying as much as I do. Out of earshot of my husband Rob (Menswear) I plotted with her, ‘look; I know it’s only 45 minutes on the train to London but it’s an excuse to stay in a posh London hotel I’ve found us.  I’ll tell Rob it’s absolutely critical that we stay over and do two days …Oooo and let’s see if we can pop and do a little shopping in Zara whilst we’re there!’ ….  So we got our way and our plan worked, lol!  We packed faaaar to much!!  The Porter who welcomed us had to use a wheelie luggage cage (a frequent side effect of my ‘shoe-bag-itus’).  We checked in early and our rooms were not available so they allowed us to use the spa facilities before we went off to the show.  Within ten minutes of being in the spa I sufferred two hideouesly embarrassing experiences … Firstly I walked into the loo where a lady had omitted to lock the door!!  Oh God, it was awful!!  Self consciously I made a quick exit and proceeded to freshen up, I’d been wearing flip flops across London and decided to wash my feet in the shower cubicle.  So, fully dressed, flip flops off, I selected the switch for the handset I was then holding.  It was the wrong switch!  Instead of the hand held shower head delicately spraying on my feet all three super power body jets hit me in the face!!!  I got drenched, my make up ran and I suffered further humiliation as afore mentioned toilet lady helped me to switch it all off!  She and I agreed it was not a good look, although worryingly I’m not sure if she meant mine or hers!!!!  Anyway.  The show itself was a huge success, we really enjoyed the fashion shows and meeting new Designers.  We took on a new designer called Pepe Botella, new to the UK market, these dresses are dramatic and romantic, gorgeously stylish and I know that our Brides are going to love them.  They’ll be available - from September!

March and September are the months in which we do the bulk of our wedding dress and bridesmaid dressbuying for the coming season, we order gorgeous new dresses and accessories and should see them in-store by January. Last week Rob and I went to Harrogate to meet with our Suppliers at the biggest European trade event where we excitedly watch fashion shows which showcase the latest designs and decide what dresses to order for our Brides to choose from. We have chosen some stunning new bridal gowns and accessories. It was a mega busy few days with lots of walking from stand to stand, my feet survived although I’m not so sure about my liver!! We met up with our favourite friends from the industry (Jo & Richard from the Princess Wardrobe in Pontefract) as well as other fab bridal shop owners and industry contacts. It’s a great time for networking and also a great time to let our hair down. One night we arrived back at our hotel at 3am having danced our socks off in a nightclub! We were the last to leave and both Rob and I agreed that we are getting far too old to party!! Lauren and Kirsty held the forte at the shop on Tuesday which was extremely hectic as usual. All of the wonderful weddings at the weekend went well and we returned to many lovely comments and cards, thank you all especially to Amber & Tony who delivered the most magnificent thank you gift basket of Thornton’s goodies, you are so kind and I am now so fat!!!

March was as usual an exciting and busy month for us at Abigail’s Collection. We received some beautiful new thank you letters and pictures from March’s newlyweds. Congratulations to everyone especially Faye and Joe, we loved your pictures so much we decided to feature one alongside this our first ever blog…. We also launched our fab new website which is proving a real hit with our Customers, one of our Bride’s commented that it is one of the nicest sites she has ever seen, which is saying something – her husband-to-be is a graphic designer! Please let us know what you think, feedback is welcome…. Also in March we enjoyed a staff buying trip, we drove to Harrogate to visit the largest bridal trade exhibition in the world and select new styles for the new season ahead. As usual it was great fun. Despite walking for hours to meet with Suppliers and aquiring sore feet in posh new shoes we still managed to bust a few disco moves in the evening and also aquired sore heads after one or two cocktails!……