- The salon
- About the rail
Every gown on our rail is cut by an emerging designer we can name.
SPINA Bride is a bridal boutique in Chelsea that stocks emerging designer wedding dresses and nothing else. Small ateliers from Europe, the Mediterranean, Latin America and East Asia. Ask who cut the gown you are wearing and the stylist will tell you, and where the workroom is.
02Who runs this
A small salon on 10th Avenue
SPINA Bride is the trading name of Spinabride, which runs this site at spinabride.us and the bridal salon at 132 10th Ave, New York, New York 10011, United States. It is a shop with a fitting room, not a marketplace and not an agent. The gowns hang in West Chelsea, and you try them on there.
The stylists run the floor themselves. Nobody hands you over to a junior after the first ten minutes, and there is no sales desk between you and the person pinning the sample. A seamstress works in the back room, on the same premises, so the person who will take in the bodice has usually seen you in it.
That is the whole operation. We keep it small on purpose. A bigger floor would mean two brides at once, and we do not do that.
03What we do, and how a label gets on the rail
Designer wedding dresses NYC has not had in a fitting room yet
We sell wedding dresses and bridal gowns, by appointment, from designers early in their careers who work outside the big bridal houses. You book a 90-minute visit, try real samples on your own body, and order a gown cut to your measurements. Then come the fittings, the alterations and the finishing with a veil. No cart, no checkout. Prices are quoted in the salon once we know the designer, the fabric and the construction.
Choosing a designer takes longer than choosing a dress. Before a label gets a hanger, it has to clear these.
The inside of the gown. We turn it out first. A corset base with real boning, seams finished so they do not scratch, a lining cut on its own pattern rather than a copy of the shell. Silk tulle over a flimsy mesh bodice goes back in the box. A pretty hanger shot tells you nothing about how a bodice holds after four hours of dancing.
How it fits a real body. A sample goes on more than one of us, and on brides who agree to try it, before we commit. We want to see the waist sit where the designer says it sits, and a crepe column fall without pulling across the hip. Most gowns we turn down photograph beautifully. They fail on the second try-on.
Whether the atelier can deliver. Most of our designers cut to order. We need them to confirm a cut date in writing, answer a measurement question within the week and ship to New York without a customs surprise. A brilliant designer who goes silent for a month is not someone we can put in front of a bride with a date.
What survives is a narrow edit: one sample per silhouette per designer, chosen for fit. Tulle A-lines and ball gowns, silk crepe columns, re-embroidered lace fit-and-flare, and separates for City Hall. The silhouette index on the home page carries each one with its fabric and its price basis.
Most gowns we turn down photograph beautifully. They fail on the second try-on.The stylists, on the edit
Every sample is steamed before it is shown. Tulle goes flat in a garment bag within a day, and a bride should see the skirt the designer intended, not the one that came off the truck.
04Not on the rail
What we refuse to stock, and the reason
Short list. Each one is a thing we have been asked for more than once.
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Big-label gowns
You can try those at every department-store salon in Manhattan. If a label already has a flagship, it does not need our hanger, and you do not need our appointment to see it.
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Copies of runway gowns
Polyester satin cut to look like somebody else's collection. We will not stock them, and we will not help you track one down.
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Gowns we cannot alter here
If the construction means our seamstress cannot take it in, let it out or shorten the hem without unpicking the whole skirt, it stays off the rail. A gown you cannot alter is a gown that has to fit on delivery, and very few do.
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Designers who will not confirm a cut date
We do not promise a delivery date before the designer confirms the cut, so a designer who will not give us one never gets a bride's order.
05Samples policy
We will not sell you a sample as new
If it has been tried on, we tell you. That is the rule, and it has no exceptions for a rush date or a nice customer.
Samples are how you try a gown before you order one. They are cut in a standard sample size, pinned and clipped onto bodies of every shape, and worn for twenty minutes at a time by a lot of brides. After a season on the rail, a tulle skirt has been stepped on. Lace has snagged at the hip. Makeup has touched a neckline, however careful everyone was. None of that is a scandal. It is simply not new, and we will not charge you for new.
Now and then a designer retires a silhouette and the sample comes off the rail. When that happens we may offer it to a bride who has already tried it and wants it. We say it is a sample, we show you every mark in daylight at the window, and the price is set on that basis, in the salon, in writing. You can walk away. Plenty do.
A gown you order is a different thing. It is cut for you by the atelier, and it arrives in its bag with the designer's tag. Plan on 16 to 24 weeks from order to the first fitting, and ask us before you set a wedding date that is closer.
06The workroom
The seamstress works in the back room, not across town
Most salons send alterations out. We do not. Our seamstress works on the premises, which means the hem is pinned by the person who will sew it, and a question about a bustle gets answered while you are still standing on the platform.
She sees every gown at the first fitting. That fitting is booked for eight weeks before the wedding. The most common mistake is booking it three weeks out, which leaves no room if the atelier has cut the waist a centimetre high or the lace needs moving at the shoulder. The final fitting is two weeks out, with your shoes, and that is when veils, belts and hair pieces are placed.
Silk crepe shows every seam, so we fit it twice before anyone touches the hem. Tulle skirts are shortened layer by layer, never all at once with one cut, because the layers fall at different lengths on purpose. Re-embroidered lace is lifted and re-stitched by hand when a seam has to move, so the motif still runs across it.
- 01Alterations are quoted after the first fitting. Not before. Until the gown is on you, any number would be a guess.
- 02Bustles are sewn to the dance floor you have. Tell us whether the reception is on wood, stone or carpet.
- 03We only alter what we sold. Gowns bought elsewhere are not taken into the workroom.
- 04The hem is the last cut. It waits until your shoes are confirmed, because a half-inch heel change moves it.
07Reach a person
The phone is answered by a stylist
There is no call centre. Ring +1 646-630-7052 and it rings in the salon. If nobody picks up, a stylist is mid-fitting with a bride, and we do not put a bride on hold for the phone. Leave your name and number and we call back once the appointment is over, the same day where we can.
Email goes to [email protected] and is read by the same people. That address also handles questions about your data. Letters and deliveries go to the salon at 132 10th Ave, New York, New York 10011.
Visits are by appointment only. Walk in without one and you may find the door locked because a bride is in her underwear on the platform.
- +1 646-630-7052
- [email protected]
- 132 10th Ave, New York, New York 10011
- By appointment only
08Next
Try the gowns on. Ninety minutes, your own room.
Bring two people whose opinion you actually want. Three at most. The sofa seats three. Most brides know by minute 50.