Page 52 of The Wedding Dress Repair Shop
‘Great idea!’
‘And since people always love true crime stories, we’ll dedicate the furthest room to that angle.’
‘Have we got enough crime-related dresses for that?’ I asked, startled.
‘Two or three,’ she said vaguely, and I thought I’d better skim through the catalogue as soon as Derek sent it over, to see which she meant.
‘It’s all a lot further advanced than I expected – practicallydown to finishing touches,’ I said. ‘I’ll need to order the display mannequins as soon as I’ve measured the dresses, so we’ll have to decide what type to have.’
‘I’ll leave that to you, Garland, and I’m sure George will advise you.’
‘Some costume museums favour the clear plastic kind, but I like the solid black ones because the costumes stand out so much better, like those in the Rosa-May Garland exhibition at the V&A.’
‘That’s good, because I forgot to tell you that I’m purchasing those from the V&A as well as the information boards they had specially made. George arranged that, and it seemed sensible. I mean, they can’t reuse the boards, and probably not the mannequins either, because Rosa-May had an unusually small and slight figure.’
‘Tell me about it,’ I said, because my size had made buying clothes off the rack difficult all my adult life.
‘We should keep a few stock sizes of mannequins in, too,’ I suggested. ‘And I suppose we’ll need all kinds of small stands for displaying accessories.’
‘Just email me lists of what you need as you work through all the material, and I’ll get Derek to put in the orders.’
We were back downstairs now and crossed to the door opposite the staff room.
‘You have to imagine the brass plaque saying “The Rosa-May Garland Collection” because I’ve only just ordered it,’ said Honey, opening the door to reveal a square room a little smaller than any of the others, but still spacious enough to take three tall glass display cabinets, their positions outlined in red tape on the floor.
‘I thought the biggest cabinet, to the right, would be perfect for the Titania costume and the evening dress,’ Honey said.‘Then the narrower one next to it could display your wedding dress, so the visitors can compare it with the original.’ She turned. ‘And over there, we can display the two silk dominoes we found in the trunks.’
The dominoes were loose robes that were often worn over evening dresses for masked balls, or other entertainments, although I didn’t suppose Rosa-May had had any more use for those than for the lovely Titania costume, once she was transported from London to the depths of the Lancashire moors.
‘Perhaps eventually I could make evening dresses to go under the dominoes and they could be left open at the front to display them,’ I suggested. ‘There are lots of Regency fashion plates to inspire me and it would be fun.’
‘Good idea,’ said Honey. ‘It’s a pity we don’t have the dress and pelisse Rosa-May wore for her wedding, but she describes them in her journal, so perhaps you could try to re-create those later, too?’
‘I must make an effort to read more of the journal, but I’ve been so busy and her handwriting is awful!’
‘You sort of get your eye in for it, after a while, so it’s easier.’
She gestured to a space outlined in yellow tape on the far wall. ‘I’ll have a glass-topped table with the journal open inside it over there, and a few odds and ends from the trunks … and then, that big rectangle of yellow tape in the middle of the room is another glass case, just tall enough to take both trunks, perhaps displayed open with a few Regency-style props showing.’
‘That’s an odd size for a showcase – I wonder what was in it originally?’ I said.
‘Oh, most of the cabinets are coming from an ecclesiastical museum and I think that one had those tall hats in it, that looksort of like origami – mitres? Or am I thinking of something else?’
‘No idea. I’m not big on ecclesiastical vestments, but I know what you mean.’
‘When everything comes back from the V&A, all we’ll really need is an information board aboutyourdress, Garland, describing how we discovered the family connection – the visitors will love that – and how you came to make a replica of Rosa-May’s dress. But you can say as much or as little as you want about why you never wore it as your wedding dress.’
‘I think I’ll simply say it was never worn because the engagement was broken off,’ I said, ‘but I’m glad all my work on it wasn’t entirely wasted!’
‘I’m going to put my own wedding dress in that true crime room upstairs at the back,’ Honey said with a grin. ‘Not, as it turned out, that any crime had been committed, but it all looked a bit dodgy at the time with the dress covered in bloodstains. I’m thinking of calling that area the “Bloody Brides” room,’ she added.
I stared at her, uncertain if she was joking or not, but she was now fishing a bunch of keys out of one pocket and handing them to me.
‘These are your set of keys to the museum, so you can come and go as you like. I’ve got one, and Derek will have a set too, and Ella and Kay, the two volunteers. We’ll keep spares in the staff room.’
‘Unless there’s a burglar alarm, I’ll probably often work late and wander around,’ I said.
‘I didn’t think it would be worth having an alarm, because there’s nothing much burglars would want in here, and we’ll only keep a small amount of money in the office at night, for the float.’
