Post # 1

Member
2625 posts
Sugar bee
Howdy Bees!
Check out my bridesmaids dresses:
They are WToo Dresses in Blush/Buff (pictured)

My Hostess Dresses are Bill LevKoff, they will be in a lavender shade of purple, unlike the plum color pictured below.

Post # 3

Member
4439 posts
Honey bee
- Wedding: January 2013 - Harbourfront Grand Hall
@lina010: This may be a stupid question but what is a hostess dress?
Post # 4

Member
2625 posts
Sugar bee
@mchitt329: I told my hostesses they could wear a dress of their choice, it didn’t have to be from a bridal shop but they both liked that one. Hostesses are also known as attendants/greeters/ushers, really important because they are first people you encounter when you enter for a ceremony. It’s popular in the South. They help with greeting, seating, programs, directing people to their seating assignments for the reception assist people with walkers/wheelchairs etc.
Post # 5

Member
4439 posts
Honey bee
- Wedding: January 2013 - Harbourfront Grand Hall
@lina010: Oooooh, thanks! I thought it might be similar to a mistress of ceremonies, usher makes sense too!
Post # 5

Member
432 posts
Helper bee
mchitt329:
It’s not a stupid question as there actually is such a thing as a hostess dress. It has nothing to do with weddings, and everything to do with hosting dinners in the privacy and comfort of one’s house. The tradition of the hostess dress goes back to the 19th century when upper-class ladies wore what was then called wrappers. These were flowing frocks that did not require the obligatory corsets and allowed movement. They were worn early in the morning and also in the late afternoon before ladies dressed for dinner.
The term hostess dress, however, did not become popular until the late 1920s/early 1930s. A hostess dress is essentially a long flowing dress, often without a defined waist, or as one designer called it a mix between a bathrobe and an evening dress — a nod to the elegance of the occasion and a nod to being able to lounge on one’s own sofa. Their heyday was from the mid-1930s to the 1970s, but they are far from extinct as I will be wearing one this Saturday to a dinner that I am hosting “chez moi”.
Here are some examples of vintage hostess dresses:
http://bctreasuretrove.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/11192-3.jpg
http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/c0/74/59/c07459ad544c166388b86d651c86e237.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-j9Qsj66AkdQ/U5hiOGA1ycI/AAAAAAAASAg/aqXPahMuFo8/s1600/61014_010_large.jpg
http://img1.etsystatic.com/019/1/5968851/il_570xN.475722165_eq4s.jpg
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This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by
Persephone.