Page 3 of Wrapped Up at the Vintage Dress Shop
‘You know there are nitrates in bacon and they’re bad for you,’ she reminded the little dog. ‘Also, you know what happened last time we went to the vet. She tried to body-shame you and while I think you’re perfect, we want that waist snatched.’
Coco didn’t seem to appreciate the little pep talk but then Bea swept into the shop, breathless, her buttery blonde hair in disarray, her cheeks pink. ‘I’msosorry!’
It was all very well Bea being full of apologies with some tale of woe about the bus getting stuck in traffic, but Phoebe remembered a time not so long ago when Bea used to be very diligent. Her right-hand woman. Always happy to follow Phoebe’s requests without any backchat, but now she’d slipped into bad habits. Again, Phoebe blamed Sophy.
Finally, here was Anita. Fifteen minutes late, and there was no excuse because she and Sophy lived in the same houseshare in Hackney and if Sophy could manage to be two minutes early, despite getting her foul-smelling bacon sandwich en route, then Anita could manage it too.
Phoebe didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. Her disapproving look said everything but Anita was increasingly resistant to Phoebe’s disapproving looks. She couldn’t even blame Sophy’s malign influence. Anita had always been difficult.
Now Anita shrugged off a rather lovely boxy 1950s red wool jacket (despite her many faults, Anita was always dressed impeccably) and Phoebe’s condemning stare. ‘All right, all right,’ she said very chippily. ‘I’ll work late to make up for it.’
Anita wouldn’t. She never did. She was always the last to arrive and the first to leave as soon as business was over for the day.
‘You’re on thin ground,’ Phoebe told her as Bea took her place behind the desk. Sophy bustled over to her sorry rail of tragic little rental dresses and the bell tinkled once again to greet their first customer of the day.
Phoebe ran an experienced eye over the woman’s camel trench coat and the camel separates she was wearing underneath with a pair of nude court shoes. Even her hair was beige. She’d find nothing to her liking in The Vintage Dress Shop. Probably she was just killing time before another appointment so Phoebe wasn’t even going to waste a hello and a smile on her.
Anyway, with Bea and Sophyfinallyready to do some work, it meant that Phoebe could slip up the gold spiral staircase at the back of the shop to the atelier.
If downstairs was her safe space then upstairs was her happy place. It was where their best and most beautiful dresses lived.
The salon, as some members of staff would insist on calling it, was an exercise in elegance. Here the sofas were upholstered in a muted chintz fabric with tiny accents of gold. There was the dais and the three perfectly placed mirrored panels so that each woman could see from every angle what she looked like in her dress of dreams. Because the atelier was very much a temple of dreams. It was here that any woman lucky enough to make it past Phoebe’s strict vetting process would select, with Phoebe’s expertassistance of course, the most important dress that she’d ever wear.
Her wedding dress.
Phoebe didn’t think much of love and relationships. Could you ever trust someone with your heart? Your hopes? Your secret wishes for the future? Especially a man?
You could not! But if you were foolish enough to think that you could, then you might as well be wearing a fabulous dress while you pledged your life away.
The rails in the atelier weren’t as colourful as those downstairs. To the untrained eye. But Phoebe’s eye was trained and she could appreciate the subtle differences between white, ivory, cream, champagne, oyster and at least thirty other variations on that theme. Not to mention a small array of silver and gold dresses and their one black wedding dress that had been hanging there for two years or so. Lots of the more daring brides had tried it on but they were always warned off by other members of their bridal party, usually an alarmed MOB, lamenting, ‘Married in black, you’ll wish you were back.’
Phoebe ran a reverent hand over a line of dresses, her skin caressed by silk, satin, whisper-soft chiffon and georgette . . .
Then she walked across the salon and through a little arch to their designer dress room. It was here that they kept their most high-end dresses; they had a Mary Quant in there, a Paco Rabanne 1960s paper dress and a Claire McCardell 1950s blue shirt dress with nipped-in waist, bracelet sleeves and shawl collar, adorned with tiny red polka dots. Beyond that was Cress’s workroom under the eaves; Cress was hurrying up the stairs now, Coco Chanel hot on her heels.
‘Some woman came in and wanted to know if I could take up the hem of her trousers,’ she explained. ‘I had to say that I couldn’t, politely. She really didn’t take it very well.’
‘I knew she was a time-waster!’ Phoebe exclaimed. Spotting time-wasters was one of her superpowers.
Cress disappeared into her workroom where she had a rack of dresses needing her attention, and Phoebe reluctantly went back downstairs to retrieve her appointments book, which she kept in a little drawer under the till.
Sophy was always harping on that it would be more efficient to put the appointments on a digital calendar but Phoebe always ignored her. There was a certain formality, a ceremony, to logging when each atelier customer was scheduled in a black-velvet-covered appointment book.
Running an eye down the page, Phoebe saw that she had a prospective bride arriving at any moment. Right on cue, the door opened, the bell jangled and a young woman, her smile equal parts nervousness and excitement, came into the shop. She was followed by an older woman with the same expectant look on her face. Probably her mother.
Phoebe gave the younger woman a brief but assessing glance. She was of average height, slim build and still with the anxious smile, so unlikely to make trouble or have strong opinions that she couldn’t be talked out of. In short, she was someone Phoebe could work with.
‘Victoria?’ Phoebe stepped out from behind the desk. ‘I’m Phoebe. We’ve emailed.’
‘Oh yes. Thank you for fitting me in. This is my mum. Suzanne.’ Victoria nodded her head eagerly. ‘God, I’ve got actual butterflies in my tummy.’
Yes, Victoria wasn’t going to be a problem. Phoebe gestured at the stairs. ‘Shall we go and find your dream dress?’
‘We’re just looking,’ Suzanne interjected. ‘It has to be unlucky to wear a wedding dress whose original owner is probably dead by now.’
Suzanne, on the other hand, could prove to be a problem. Not that Phoebe was unduly worried. She already had three,no four, dresses in mind that would look wonderful on Victoria and once Victoria had fallen in love with a frock, then her mother would fall in line too.
Phoebe had seen the same scene play out a hundred other times.
