A Life in Stitches: What Laura Ashley Means to Me
If you’d told tweenage me — awkward hair, itchy tights with no lycra and a head full of sewing daydreams — that one day I’d be selling original Laura Ashley wedding dresses to brides all over the world, I’d never have believed you.
But oh, how I loved Laura.
One of the biggest treats on seventies holidays wasn’t ice cream or sunburn — it was a visit to a Laura Ashley shop. I can still remember stepping inside. It was like entering another world. A quieter one. A prettier one.
My first purchase? Not a dress. Not even a cushion. But a pack of precut patchwork squares in those unmistakable prints — the sprigged flowers, regency stripes and full on Edwardiana. I started stitching them together by hand the traditional way: cardboard templates, careful tacking, hours bent over tiny seams. Eventually I gave in and got the sewing machine out — I’ve never been especially patient! And, since visits to Laura Ashley were few and far between (no online shopping back then!), I ended up mixing in bits of fabric I had lying around. Always a sewer, even then.
I still have those quilts. Two of them, in fact. And every so often, I run my hand over the patches and remember exactly where they came from. A blouse. A skirt. My Boots The Chemist uniform blouse, which I never returned after I left my Saturday job (sorry, not sorry). That patchwork is my tweenage life in cotton and thread.
I worked hard for my Saturday pay (I do remember Saturday jobs!). And one trip to London, I spent it on a gathered, ruffled Laura Ashley pinafore dress, with buttons all the way down the back. It made me feel like the heroine in my own romantic novel. I wore it while imagining my future: a scrubbed pine table, a baby in a high chair and me — floating around in a white Edwardian-style cotton lawn gown, complete with high collar and long sleeves. The kind of wedding dress Laura Ashley made better than anyone else.
That dress, that vision… it stayed with me.
Fast forward a few (actually quite a few) decades (and quite a few gowns later), and here I am — still thinking about Laura Ashley. Still hunting down those beautiful original pieces in cotton and lace for brides who feel the same connection I did.
Her wedding dresses were everything I wanted at 13 — soft, strong, romantic, unapologetically feminine. She wasn’t designing for the trendsetters in glossy magazines. She was designing for the girls who read poetry and Wuthering Heights, grew sweet peas and had big imaginations.
And the thing is… she changed fashion history doing it.
Laura Ashley dared to bring back ruffles. She resurrected the high neck. She made Victorian and Edwardian silhouettes relevant again — not just in bridalwear, but in everyday dresses. She made handmade, homespun style aspirational long before “cottagecore” had a name. And she did it all initially from a small kitchen in London with her husband and a dream.
Today, Laura Ashley is everywhere again (other than on the High Street sadly!) — in Pinterest boards, in prairie revival hashtags, in the wardrobes of brides who want something different. Something honest. Something with roots.
And at Tricker Bridal, I’ve made it my quiet mission to find those original Laura Ashley wedding dresses and bring them back to life for a new generation. Cleaned, mended where needed, and ready to make another girl’s daydream come true.
Because for me, Laura Ashley wasn’t just a designer.
She was a feeling.
A vision.
A soft little rebellion in Edwardian lace, pristine pintucks and finished with mother-of-pearl buttons.
Happy 100th birthday, Laura. - You stitched a little romance into the world, and we’re all still wearing it.
