Art Garments Bridal Is Marrickville’s New Home for Vintage Wedding Dresses

Vintage curator Grace Corby’s wedding was postponed three times because of the pandemic. An unexpected consequence of this? She had a lot of time to find her perfect vintage bridal outfits. 

“I really wanted something that was completely my own, and that’s what propelled me to check my platforms every single day for new items,” she says. “I became quite fanatical and obsessed with hunting for vintage bridal.”

When her wedding took place in 2022, she had the looks to make up for it. A drop-waist tulle dress, complete with opera gloves, for her bachelorette party. A black and white 1970s Michael Casey silk gown, sourced from Etsy, for her reception. A 1940s champagne silk satin dress, also from Etsy, for her ceremony.

Her fanatical scrolling paid off. Corby has been selling vintage clothes for two decades, through different names and mediums. She’s now settled on Art Garments, an online store selling sourced vintage pieces, predominantly from European and Australian designers from the ’80s to the ’00s.

Finding and curating vintage bridal came easily to her. In April 2024, she released her first bridal drop. It proved to be successful, so she did another, and then another. And now it’s become its own arm, Art Garments Bridal. 

For 18 months or so, Corby was running bridal appointments out of her home studio. This was convenient, as she’d had a baby early last year – but she eventually outgrew the space. “I wanted to have a bit of a street presence because I’ve never had that before. It’s a really big step for me. I’ve operated only online for 20 years, so it’s nerve-wracking.”

Earlier this year, Corby opened up her first brick-and-mortar location on Illawarra Road. There was an instant connection to the premises in a suburb she used to live in. “I walked into the space, and it’s got these four-metre-high ceilings, three-metre-by-three-metre front windows and polished concrete floors, and it just really vibed with me.”

The interior fit-out was mostly done by herself, with the help of her husband and her dad. She wanted to recreate the awe people would experience when entering her previous studio, when they were hit with a sight of white gowns. “I love when people walk through the door and they’re just wowed, [it] kind of takes their breath away.”

One of the most eye-catching features of the store is the four-metre-long custom striped satin curtains that hang in the window, from Mokum Textiles. Corby also had custom racks built and decadent metallic crinkled partition curtains made for the changing rooms. There’s a Fleur Studios table, a Rachel Donath ottoman, a Mulberry silk art rug and a couple of vintage chairs sourced from Facebook Marketplace sprinkled throughout the space.

Among the bridal pieces is a selection of bridal shoes (mostly ’90s satin heels from Prada, Manolo Blahnik, Stuart Weitzman and those made in Italy) and accessories like hats, gloves and earrings. 

After Corby sources her bridal pieces, she sends them all (except if they’re pristine) to her trusty dry cleaner, Premier La Ghia Dry Cleaners, which she searched “high and low” for. “It’s very hard to find one, especially for vintage bridal. You’ve got old silk, you’ve got hard-on stains that have been there for maybe 20 to 40 years, sometimes older. You want someone that’s going to treat it with care, but also, get the job done.” 

Corby will occasionally do slight alterations, like “de-dazzling”, the opposite of bedazzling. “Like you take off embellishments from the ’90s that just had weird rhinestones on them. I’ll carefully modernise it slightly.”

This suits the Art Garment Bridal bride, who often wants a fusion of contemporary and vintage styles for their wedding day – or days. “I think the average Art Garments bride is really creative and really individual, and definitely has her own idea about how she wants to look and her whole aesthetic throughout the whole event process,” she says.

Corby has around 500 unique wedding pieces on rotation, in a range of styles from a range of eras. She says that many brides are looking to be dressed for all the occasions that surround weddings, from bachelorette parties and rehearsal dinners, to the ceremony and reception, to the day-after dress. 

“I love when brides come to me and they’ll select five or six pieces, and they can tell a story through all of those pieces. I love working with those girls; I’ve never had an appointment I didn’t massively enjoy. I love talking weddings with them, anything from ‘Oh, we’re going to a park in Sydney’ to ‘We’re renting out a mansion in Spain’. It’s all really fun.”

Art Garments Bridal
391 Illawarra Road, Marrickville

By appointment

artgarments.com.au 
@artgarmentsbridal