Whirling Turban custom wedding dresses

Love this wedding dress, featured in this Wedding Graduate post at (where else?) A Practical Wedding.

just right amount of poofiness and girliness

also love the glamorous hair, makeup, and veil

Her dress was custom designed and made for her by Whirling Turban, who she raves about here. They do seem like they'd be amazing, in their attention to detail and fit through photos and measurements, and they do have the kind of Chinese red brocade fabric I have in mind (for a trim or border, if not the whole thing):

I don't think I really want to inquire into their custom dresses, though, since their ready-made dress are all in the $500 range already. I think I should probably keep my attire under that amount, so although Mama G & co. lean more heavily against trying to make the dress, I've been browsing various department stores' websites and I haven't quite find anything that's the right shape and color of red to be able to then take and modify to what I have in mind right now.

I'd like to take more sewing classes anyway, and I've found a few dressmaking ones that might be good. If I can find a good pattern and make a few practice version for fit, and then use a non-slippery fabric for the main parts and then the slippery, shiny brocade for accents, it might not be too bad. For the bolero, that might be something I could have custom made here in the brocade, since anything with armholes is more difficult, but that probably wouldn't cost quite so much as an entire dress.

When Amy and I went shopping on Saturday, I tried on this cute springy Maggy London dress:

The pleating with the print fabric is really well-done, so now I'm thinking maybe something similar with hidden panels for the red brocade fabric. However, I do still also want the poofy, which most likely means some tulle or a crinoline. And, if there's some way to work in pockets, that would be amazing.

I also really like the neckline, I think it falls under the category of a sweetheart neckline? Abby has offered to ferry questions I've got about dressmaking to her seamstress grandmother, so I might ask about the difficulty of that kind of neckline. The straps on this dress were also of a good width and well-positioned. I'm going to keep an eye on it and if it goes on sale I might buy it both to wear now and to try to pattern off it.

Oh and potential bridesmaids dresses! I think I definitely want my sister to stand up with me. Mama G & co. discussed white sundresses, which would be easy, but with the color scheme maybe also a sunny golden yellow? We'll see, as Mama G said, gotta consider what it would look like in the photos.