Wedding Blog

I love… you love… we all love… birdcage veils! (Ok, ice cream too, but that’s for another day).

Like many bees before me, I became enchanted with the idea of wearing a birdcage veil very early in my wedding research. I don’t have time to upload my photo inspirations (literally don’t have time… we’re getting married on Monday!) but check out these posts by Mrs Shortcake and Miss Deviled Egg for photos.

I searched high and low for the perfect birdcage but once I’d factored in the low value of the Canadian dollar these days and the exhorbitant shipping rates to us poor Canucks, I soon realized that they were definitely not cheap. Since I already felt guilty for having spent so much on my (admittedly, pretty fabulous) shoes, I decided to make my own birdcage veil. After all, it couldn’t be THAT difficult… right?

Famous last words.

First, I had to find the darned netting, which proved to be almost Mission Impossible. I scoured the Internets and did find a few places that sold it online: Lace & Co, Torb and Reiner, House Fabric and Judith M Supplies. (Tip: search for millinery suppliers i.e. stuff for making hats.) That was all fine and well but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out the difference between French and Russian netting (I’m still not positive, thought I *think* French is a bit softer), so I tried to find somewhere here in Vancouver that sold it. After much calling around, I finally found it at Gala Fabrics. They only had 9″ wide Russian netting but it seemed like it would work so I got it.

Unfortunately, I don’t have a mannequin head to practice wrapping netting around so I had to do my DIY hair trial first. Then, with much excitement, I put the stuff on my head and proceeded to try to figure out how to pin and tuck it just so.

I fully intended to document it so I could share it with all of you, but really, that turned out to be impossible. The how-to would basically read like this: hold netting to head and twist and turn and pose and pin and unpin and sew and pin again, and twist some more and tuck that bit in then unpin and sew some more and repeat until finished. I did that for oh, about THREE HOURS before I got it just the way I wanted it.

Now I know why they charge so much for these freakin’ veils - while the supplies are pretty cheap, it is NOT easy to make that netting do exactly what you want it to do! I think I finally figured it out though.

(the pic above was taken in the mirror so it’s reversed)

As for whether to wear it down over my eyes or just above, I figure I’ll wing it and decide on Monday… our wedding day!

Cost of Miss Sea Breeze’s DIY Birdcage Veil

1 yard of Russian netting: $6.50

1 clear plastic comb: $0.50

White thread and needle I already had: Pennies

Three hours of precious week-before-the-wedding-time and much sanity: Dunno but pretty expensive, I’d say

The feeling you get when you send the photo to your mom and she calls you in a teary voice and says, “oh-honey-now-I-’get’-the-birdcage-thing-you-were-talking-about-it’s-so-beautttyyy-fuullll”: PRICELESS

Are you making your own veil?