Chapter 18
Eighteen
“Iknow this might come as a huge shock to you, but if anyone can do it, I believe you can.” Clarissa takes a deep breath.
“Paddy and I have been engaged for a long time. We’ve postponed getting married so we could try and accommodate his mother and my mama and baba, but enough is enough.
We haven’t been able to do what we want.
It’s beyond time to start our lives together. ”
“I hadn’t realized it had gotten to this point.” Sonya shoots her a look of sympathy. “But six weeks? That’s a quick turnaround.”
“It would’ve been sooner, except that was the first available date we could book at Town Hall for the civil ceremony. I would’ve preferred us to elope, but Paddy talked me out of it.”
“Your mama and baba would’ve been beyond upset. Have you told them about the change of plans?”
“Not exactly.” Clarissa’s cheeks color. “We haven’t told anyone. Paddy and I agreed we’ll give our parents a week of warning. That way, we’ll be able to minimize the chaos.”
“Uh-huh. What about your relatives? Won’t there be some coming from Hong Kong?”
Clarissa rubs her temple. “My plan is to hold our traditional Western wedding with the civil ceremony and do a Chinese wedding sometime in summer. Mama and Baba will probably push for the eighth of August.”
“That’s an oddly specific date,” Sonya says.
“Eight is an auspicious, lucky number in Chinese culture.”
“Oh. That makes sense. And actually, that sounds like a fair compromise. You can keep your first ceremony small and intimate and let your parents go to town on the later one. What about Paddy’s mum?”
“We’ve thought about that too. She can have full rein over the reception. Lady Lucy is low-key and hasn’t been the one who’s put up much fuss.”
“Except for getting on with the ceremony,” Sonya says.
“Yes. She’s not-so-subtly hinted she wants grandchildren.” Clarissa sighs.
I sympathize with her. Coming from a multiethnic family, when Cam got married, there were a lot of relatives who wanted a say in the big day. I wasn’t around much, but I do remember him and my sister-in-law Judy being stressed to the max over the details.
I clear my throat. Sitting on the sidelines is one thing, but being responsible for the big-ticket item—the dress—is another. “Um, I’m sorry to interrupt, but would you be expecting more than one dress within that time frame?”
I can craft a garment within a week, but to do it to a standard that would be fit for someone like Clarissa would take me at least four or five weeks. She’s alluded to wanting more than one dress, but exactly how many does she have in mind?
“Minerva, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore you!” she apologizes. “Let’s see, if I’m doing my math correctly, five dresses?”
“Five?” I sputter.
“Oh, you’re right, I didn’t think about Sonya and the bridesmaids. Eight looks in total?”
“Minerva, Clarissa wouldn’t need all eight looks at once,” Sonya quickly adds.
“Oh no! Not at all. I’d like to have this sweet tea-length dress for the civil ceremony and one longer dress for the church service. Sonya would need a maid of honor look too. Everything else could be pushed off until summer.”
“Three looks. I think I can pull that off.”
“You’ll have help. Once you decide on the silhouette, your team can take on the patterning, and assist with creating the mockup and the real dress. Your job will be to supervise, which is a lot harder than it looks.” Clarissa winks.
My eyes widen. “Super . . . supervise? My own team? Like a real designer?”
The women both nod.
“You are a real designer,” Clarissa emphasizes.
“Clarissa faced a tight time crunch when Clara—I mean, the Duchess of Leeds—approached her about a wedding dress,” Sonya says. “She had four months to have two wedding dresses and four bridesmaid gowns made up.”
“I tried to do everything myself and it was the most stressful time of my life. Ask Paddy. I learned the hard way that for projects like this one, delegating is the only way something of this magnitude could get done.”
I slowly absorb what they’re telling me. Six weeks will be the fastest I’ve ever thrown a small collection together, but if I have a team of experts to help me, maybe, just maybe, this can be done.
“What’s the average turnaround time for your team when someone orders a custom dress from you?”
In the back of my head, I know for anyone else it would be about five to six months. Even in the world of bespoke men’s suits, where the patterns rarely change too much, their time of completion from the measurements to the final fitting is three months.
“Off-the-rack customizations and alterations are done within a week. A full custom order for someone like the duchess, we have gotten down to about three weeks.”
My mouth drops open. “How?”
“Trade secret,” Clarissa jokes.
I continue to stare.
Sonya rolls her eyes. “What she means is that we’ve invested heavily in a custom computer-automated design program that can draft the pattern from the measurements inputted into it in a matter of minutes. Couture and full custom patterns, however, are still done entirely by hand, of course.”
That’s clever. “Like a men’s made-to-measure suit?”
“Exactly.” Sonya grins. “Menswear has been doing it for years, so why not women’s wear too?”
We’ve used a few CAD programs, but our teachers never wanted us to become reliant on them.
They wanted us to have the ability to do things old school, since a lot of the fashion industry still does things by hand too.
But I’ll admit, I’m itching to see and play around with the program the atelier uses.
“So are we convincing you?” Sonya interrupts my thoughts. “Will you say yes to working on Clarissa’s dress?”
“Um . . .” I don’t really see a downside to this. I mean, I came prepared to say yes if I were offered the job. Now the tables have turned, and they’re pitching me. Is this really happening?
“I should mention that your budget for this project would be unlimited, and for your time, we’ll pay you the going rate the Clarissa Lee Atelier has with our higher-profile clients for special-occasion evening wear—twenty thousand pounds per dress.”
“Wow,” I stagger backward into the wall. “That’s unbelievable.”
“Believe it,” Clarissa urges.
I spend the remainder of my presentation floating through the second look, a sleeveless dress in blush pink.
It contains a lace bodice with an illusion neckline, a satin bow at the waist, and flares out to the ground.
For this specific look, I mention that I’ve played around with the idea of having the three-quarter lace bolero be made up of tiny seahorses.
Clarissa loves the color and the concept. It’s another win.
When it comes time for Sonya’s dress, she gives me a free pass to do whatever I want so long as the color is a shade of pink.
I assure her that’s what I had planned. I decide not to show her my existing sketches.
She has a longer torso than I’d imagined, and I want to take the time to ensure my design has the right proportions.
The day may have started off as a complete disaster, but at least it’s ending on a high note.
Liz
Well?
Min
I got it.
Liz
Well done, you! Ring me right now!
My fingers fumble as I tap on the video request. It takes a moment for my phone to connect. When Liz picks up, she’s in the cutting room with a long table. A measuring tape is draped around her neck.
“I am so proud of you! I knew you could do it, Min,” she gushes.
“Thanks.” I grin. “What about you? When is your pitch to Lord Renbrook?”
“Oh, it was this morning,”
“What?” I sputter. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because your meeting was much more important. I didn’t want to distract you.” Unbelievable. Of course I’d want to know. Liz knows that. “Well? Don’t leave me in suspense. How did it go?”
“I’ve been commissioned for the bespoke morning suit.”
I clap a hand against my forearm and she bows. “Way to go Liz! You know, the funny thing is, I can’t picture Lord Renbrook in normal clothing.”
“Neither can I. He admitted to being a clothing snob. He’s an interesting chap.”
“He is.”
“Liz? Are you in here? You have your eleven o’clock here for you,” a male voice calls in the background.
“Ah bollocks, I forgot Mr. Newton was on the books for today. I hate to run, but what if we celebrate later tonight? Dinner is on me since the commission is your doing.”
“It’s a date!”
When I finish with Liz, I finally have a chance to open Sam’s text from this morning.
Sam
Fashion Guru, I’m thinking about you. Wishing you the best of luck. Not that you need it. Ring me anytime.
My insides warm like an ooey gooey piece of caramel chocolate. I pull up Sam’s name from the Favorites tab in my contacts and wait for his face to appear on the screen.
“Min! Good morning—er, afternoon.” He scratches his head. It’s dark and hard to see his face. “Give me just a second.” I hear the sound of curtains being drawn. Light floods the room.
“Hey, Sam I Am. I’m sorry. I should’ve texted you. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“It’s fine. I need to be up anyway. I only meant to have a twenty-minute power nap. I need to grab lunch and get ready for a meeting with Yates at half one.” He rubs his eyes. “Is it official?”
I bob my head up and down. “Indeed it is. You wouldn’t believe how crazy my morning was.” I give him the shortened version of being late thanks to the power cut on the train. “I was so nervous, but the ladies couldn’t have been any kinder.”
“It’s all karma, Min. You do one good deed and your act of kindness is returned tenfold.”
I study Sam. His eyes are red-rimmed and tired. His normally clean-cut face is coated with a layer of stubble. I doubt he’s shaved today. “How are you’re boots coming along?”
“They’re nearly done. Another two hours should do the trick.”
“Will you be able to get any sleep tonight?”