Redhead74

Are we talking USD or AUD?

My friend spent £5000 ($8400 US) on her wedding dress. It was a beautiful dress on her, but not £5k nice...although maybe it's just that I can't wrap my head around spending that amount on a single dress

Same diff. $A is hovering around the $US mark.

The reality is that when we make them the cost of labour and overheads on the retail/production facilities sends the cost of the product through the roof. A lot of people don't understand that as you can buy a much cheaper dress that is made in china and it can still be a beautiful dress. Their workmanship there is outstanding but they tend to use cheap and nasty fabric and the fact for most people is that if you want it to fit (and a strapless dress has to fit properly) you can't get the same result unless its made locally where the fittings can be done throughout the making process as opposed to altering a ready made dress. You never get the same result. It doesn't matter if you have perfect measurements to the manufacturer, but most people don't.

So are you saying the major markup is in the cost of the materials...or the production, or both?

Not being a dick, I'm just genuinely confused

The mark up is in the labour and operational costs of running a retail and production facility. Labour is always the biggest cost factor in any manufacturing business in the western world. The fact that the Chinese use shit fabrics is just an unfortunate side issue that detracts from the product itself.

Are we talking USD or AUD?

My friend spent £5000 ($8400 US) on her wedding dress. It was a beautiful dress on her, but not £5k nice...although maybe it's just that I can't wrap my head around spending that amount on a single dress

Same diff. $A is hovering around the $US mark.

The reality is that when we make them the cost of labour and overheads on the retail/production facilities sends the cost of the product through the roof. A lot of people don't understand that as you can buy a much cheaper dress that is made in china and it can still be a beautiful dress. Their workmanship there is outstanding but they tend to use cheap and nasty fabric and the fact for most people is that if you want it to fit (and a strapless dress has to fit properly) you can't get the same result unless its made locally where the fittings can be done throughout the making process as opposed to altering a ready made dress. You never get the same result. It doesn't matter if you have perfect measurements to the manufacturer, but most people don't.

Yeah but you make them so it'd cost you fuck all = pat yourself on the back. You win life Red.

$150 in fabric was the cost of my niece's dress.

lol "boning"

And it's really stiff too.

You can see how erect its stands in that second pic I posted.

Carolina Herrera

Diamond Swirl Print Gown

$4,990.00

WHAT THE ACTUALY FUCK?

5 thousand bucks for a dress?

(yes, i'm fully awaere, that 1 million dollar dresses exist too)

$1 million dresses are incredibly rare. Not even a couture Dior gown will set you back that much and that's about the height of heights. But $5K is not that much. That's average even for a well made ready to wear gown. Couture gowns cost more than that. Unfortunately. Not to say that it's normal, it's soooooo fucking not normal to spend that on a single garment. But if you want something that is highly constructed and isn't made in china, that's pretty much what things cost nowadays. Couture dresses where I work (and that's not even world renowned) are between $5K and $11K. It's total nonsense but the weird thing is that people actually buy them. It's actually staggering. I wouldn't, but people do. I'm not complaining, it keeps me in a job.

A question to everyone here.. If you were this guy was you neighbor or you knew him for some other reason and saw this video, him telling his gonna kill a bunch of people, would you go and do something about it?

I would as well. But I wouldn't go to the police. I'd contact his family and ask them to take these threats and behaviour seriously. Before a crime was committed and the police become involved.

Just argued with a couple of stupid feminist bitches on facebook about this and i got so mad i was dripping sweat. never arguing with one of those again.

They were saying it's only a mysogony issue, and when I said that reading the manifesto makes it clear that the guy was insane, they called me...ableist.

Exactly. The guy was quite insane. With all due respect to the misogynists in this world, very few of them resort to murder.

I dated someone whose mother was a raving misandrist. There was one time, and only one time, when the mother really wanted me to watch a movie with her.

The movie was Nick Cage's "Wicker Man".

Should I have warned the police about her?

By the way, I noticed here "Misogynist" is considered a word by spellcheck but "Misandrist" is not. Hmmm ... wonder what gender the person is who wrote the program?

No, you shouldn't have warned the police because they can't actually do ANYTHING until an actual offence has been committed. Could you have told her daughter that her mum was in serious need of some assistance and that she was the perfect person to do so? Yes.

Oh, and 'misogynist' is acknowledged by spell check because there are so many more of them in existence (hence the word is used so much more often) than there are 'misandrist's'.

That dress is gorgeous Kim, your niece is very very lucky to have you for an auntie. I like the tulle as well, it looks more whimsical and girly rather than lots of heavy satin. The tulle will move nicely when she's dancing.

Kim, I have a question. It's likely that you have to dress the bigger bride from time to time. (This especially applies to women who are erm, cuddlier than me). Regardless of whether it suits them, I'm sure many are determined to wear a strapless bodice. How do you/they keep their boobs in the right place? I've tried strapless bras (and good, expensive ones at that) and they just keep sliding down (the bra, not my boobs!). Do you just corset them in really tight so they can't move?

Aaaah, this is my favourite aspect of my job. There's nothing more satisfying than making a dress to fit a big bust perfectly. A strapless dress is all about boning. Regardless of whether it's for a big bust or a small one. I absolutely hate strapless bras and our customers at work do not wear a bra with their dress regardless of how big their bust is. The boning provides all the support. Obviously the bigger the bust the more boning is required to offer the necessary support. Most of the customers allocated to me are D, DD, E or F cups. I've even occasionally get the odd G or J cup.

For the boning itself we use modern polyester boning. You can stitch it directly onto the bodice, which we make out of a type of canvas. On top of that the silk is draped in the required design or lace is moulded over the canvas. I actually took the below pic a few weeks ago because we are a bit unhappy at the moment with the quality of the canvas we are getting. It's losing its rigidness in between the boning after steaming and as a result I took this pic as evidence to show our supplier. But this is the basic internals of a strapless dress.

The canvas forms the main structure of the bodice and onto that we stitch the boning. If you have design lines that interrupt the continuation of the boning you have to stitch it by hand onto the next section. This is probably better shown by some of the pics I made for my niece when I was making her dress. The boning was machine stitched onto the midriff section with enough extension to hand stitch onto the bust section (again sorry for the sideways pic, I'm on my iPad and can't correct it easily):

Then I made the bust section separately:

Then attached the bust to the midriff and finally was able to attach the boning to the bust seams (so that you don't see any of the stitching on the outside silk).

That's the front. I did the same to the back. Boning goes all the way around front and back. My niece is not big busted so she only needed 4 pieces of boning on the front, plus 1 at each side seam and 6 on the back. 12 pieces in total. But a larger busted girl would have 8 pieces on the front, 1 at each side seam and 6 on the back. 16 in total.

That's how a strapless dress stays up.

If there's anything else you want to know let me know and I'll take appropriate pics when I'm at work of what you want. It's so much easier to understand with pics, words alone are just confusing.

PS, and thank you kindly for the compliments.

Thanks guys. Much appreciated.

She looks great in that dress Gracii. It's kind of similar to the dress I made for my niece for her deb. My niece insisted on a tulle skirt though. They ALL had tulle skirts! Every single one of them, it was quite hilarious. Must be a 16 yo thing.

Sorry for the sideways pic, I don't have time to fix that.

But you have time to comment on nearly every thread in AG?

Lovely dress, not my personal taste but it looks great on her. The whole 'debut' thing is a mystery to me though.

I do? I'm pretty sure I only post in:

- general chat

- mccoys thread

- love/sex occasionally

- male fashion

- shoes

And recently the one about Elliot Rodger

That's 5 that I can think of. What are the other posts I'm supposedly making?

She looks great in that dress Gracii. It's kind of similar to the dress I made for my niece for her deb. My niece insisted on a tulle skirt though. They ALL had tulle skirts! Every single one of them, it was quite hilarious. Must be a 16 yo thing.

Sorry for the sideways pic, I don't have time to fix that.

Just argued with a couple of stupid feminist bitches on facebook about this and i got so mad i was dripping sweat. never arguing with one of those again.

They were saying it's only a mysogony issue, and when I said that reading the manifesto makes it clear that the guy was insane, they called me...ableist.

Exactly. The guy was quite insane. With all due respect to the misogynists in this world, very few of them resort to murder.

my friend went to Farnham art school with him, said "he swallowed a lot of cum on campus." that quote always made difficult to watch the tv show.

You only have to watch a few episodes to know that he happily swallows.

And as a result of his humour and celebrity the tables are now turned. That's what working hard gets you.

I like him but after fuckin' like...decades in the spotlight he's sort of taking on like, Bruce Forsyth/Terry Wogan levels of like...y'know...samey-ness.

I find it very formulaic as well. Loved him in the beginning but can't really watch him now.

I bought shoes. I can hardly walk on them though, but they are so pretty.

Will need my husband for support or make sure I can sit a lot.

All this taking about heels, made me wanted to try it again.

and Wedges!

I like them. Think they are cute under my new Gstar jeans.

I found this brand and I liked almost every shoe they are selling! That's so annoying, cause now I want all.

They're absolutely awesome! You'll get used to them if you wear them enough! I wear shoes now with mega platforms and high heels all day and when I go back to shoes that used to be a pain I'm surprised how easy they are to wear in comparison to the shoes I wear now.

So I checked out the website for that brand and I'm totally loving and wanting these ones below. I love the red but the hot pink is absolutely sublime and I have about 4 pairs of red heels so maybe I should go for the hot pink?

My new Sperrys are giving me blisters.

New shoes often do that. You have to tough it out for a few days and the leather will stretch and soon enough they'll be fine. The best thing though is to wear them for a few days straight with band aids (don't know what you call them where you live, thats a brand name here in Oz, i mean those plasters you put on a cut) on your blisters. If you stop wearing them before they're broken in you have to go through the pain all over again later. Several times. Do it all in one go and you'll be good to go.

I disagree, many troubled and suicidal people feel more comfortable talking openly to strangers online than they do to people they know in the real world therefore there are definitely times when forum members do have some responsibility to offer advice or guidance that could help prevent a suicide or some other violent act. It's not uncommon for people to express themselves better in writing than verbally, in fact I am one of those who fall into that category. And sometimes if I want an honest, unbiased opinion I will seek it from a trusted internet friend rather than a relative or real world friend.

Also a common trait of narcissists is absolutely having to tell people every detail about their lives, thoughts, etc and since they can't tell people in the real world when they are planning to do something harmful to themselves or others they'll often tell people anonymously over the internet because there's no way for those people to stop them (other than trying to talk them out of it).

Now don't get me wrong, I completely agree that friends/relatives/coworkers in the real world should do whatever they can to prevent something bad from happening. I've had a situation myself where I removed every knife in the house because I was concerned about a girlfriend's well being. But like I said, there's just only so much you can do. You can't watch them 24/7, you can't run home from work every time they call telling you they are going to harm themselves, you can't notify the police every time they are pissed off at people and every time they threaten revenge against non-specific people. Blaming family members who did the best they can just ain't right.

But I'm not talking about someone who is aware of their problem and ASKS for help. Most people who are mentally unstable are deluded that they are actually OK. I'm talking about family and friends recognising a genuine problem when the person at hand is in denial, and stepping in to help.

What you did in removing knives from the house is exactly what more people need to do. Be it knives, car keys, guns, drugs, alcohol, any kind of weapon. You did that because you recognised a problem and you cared enough to do that.

When a family is not very financially well off it poses a problem because yes, people have to work and they can't drop everything or quit a job because their son, daughter, brother or sister needs some serious help. I get that. But in THIS case, the family was well off. Very well off and someone in the family would have been able to dedicate the required time to make sure their son/brother/whoever was temporarily taken care of. And lets just emphasise that, these things are often TEMPORARY. They can be fixed. But you can't just throw money at it. It's not about money and alerting the 'authorities', it's about actually CARING. If someone in his family genuinely cared they wouldn't be where they are now. Because they can afford to get the required treatment and can afford to take time off to help. But the problem is they didn't CARE enough. And so 6 innocent people are now dead.

Yet again another nut with guns.

It's just scary to know that there are so many crazy people out there who can just go off at any given time.

I guess the police can't monitor everyone's blogs or twitter accounts online because most of these nuts like to write about what they will do or what they want to do.

Nor is it their job to. The mental well being of those around us does not fall under the jurisdiction of the police. We as members of a community and members of families have a moral responsibility to do that.

Still wrong. I'm not defending the actions of the killer, nor am I being sarcastic about anything.

All I'm saying is that now that we have such an in-depth, comprehensive "manifesto" of this kid's life, down to what he ate for breakfast every morning, we now have a seemingly unlimited bank of things that we can call "risky behavior" because one person who ended up killing people once wrote about it in his diary.

Fair enough. I don't interpret any of that stuff though as anything other than a classic case of 'serial narcissism'. Perhaps that might be a forerunner to a serial killer, I don't know?

Wonderful, now that we have such a deep and intimate look into this kid's life, every bit of it will immediately be associated with "dangerous, serial killer behavior". There's no such thing as "the weird kid" anymore. Just the future serial killer.

I'm pretty certain you go from being a weird kid to a killer when you kill 6 innocent people. Sounds logical to me

You couldn't have misunderstood my post any harder.

OK my bad. I actually didn't detect an ounce of sarcasm there.

Wonderful, now that we have such a deep and intimate look into this kid's life, every bit of it will immediately be associated with "dangerous, serial killer behavior". There's no such thing as "the weird kid" anymore. Just the future serial killer.

I'm pretty certain you go from being a weird kid to a killer when you kill 6 innocent people. Sounds logical to me

He was starved for that first bond of love and he could never He spent a lot of time taking all those video's expressing his loneliness. Seriously, if anyone you knew, your friends, your children, your friends children, posted video's like that, would you be in their face talking to them and not going away? Yes, yes you would. I would;

He posted this three weeks ago:

"I temporarily took all of my Vlog's down due to the alarm it caused with some people in my family."

So obviously talking to him didn't help, and neither did the multiple therapists who were treating him.

And honestly, how different is he from several members who have posted here over the years? Craving attention, completely absorbed with social media, frequently online throughout the day, posting tons of pictures of themselves, constantly talking about their loneliness and failures, etc. We've had some people post some very disturbing shit here ... so what are we supposed to do? Should the mods report it to the police every time? Fact is, 99.99% of the people who say and do disturbing things aren't going to kill anybody. They could be fantasizing, they could be trolling, they could be venting, or they could just be seeking attention with no intention of actually doing anything violent. Therefore acting on every situation isn't a reasonable option.

A random stranger on a forum has no responsibility whatsoever to someone behaving the way you described above. They are in no position whatsoever to make that person change that behaviour. A family member does. A family member has the right to step in and make sure that person is safe from harm. And yes, fantasising and trolling aren't grounds for intervention, but when someone behaves erratically and threatens to harm others, or themselves, you kinda have to take it seriously to some extent.

I'm not talking out them in a straight jacket, lock them in a room and never let them out. But be mindful of the things they have in their possession that could cause harm and gently and respectfully remove them. Get them the help they need with genuine love and care. Play an active role in that treatment, not just palm it off to someone else. I think the fact that therapists and the police are 'professionals' is very convenient as an excuse for not being more actively involved in the health and well being of those around us. Genuine love, care and support goes a long way.

FAMILY OF ISLA VISTA GUNMAN SAYS THEY WARNED THE AUTHORITIES

(Saturday 05-24-14 at 11 AM)

ABC News is reporting that the attorney for the family of 22-year-old Elliot Rodger has confirmed he was the gunman who killed six people in Isla Vista Friday night before being killed.

The ABC News report quotes family attorney Alan Shifman as saying that either the family or a social worker who was seeing their son alerted the authorities at least a week ago about concerns and that a police agency actually investigated and interviewed Rodger.

Shifman says the family is devastated by what happened and offers their deepest condolences to the families of this extreme tragedy.

The ABC News report goes on to say that Elliot Rodger had what's believes to have been a highly functional form of Asperger's Syndrome and was being treated by multiple therapists and the social worker who was the one who called the authorities and alerted them.

Shifman says in the ABC News report that Rodger had been bullied in the past.

The family can be devastated all they like but at what point is it not also THEIR responsibility to ensure he is not a danger to himself, let alone anyone else? It's one thing to report to authorities about his mental instability but you can't just notify some government body and thereby relinquish yourself of all responsibility. I know the guy was 22 and therefore a grown adult, but when someone is that unstable and is clearly being vocal about it (ie, meaning its visible to everyone he comes in contact with) he shouldn't be in possession of car keys, or obviously a gun. That's a simple step that could have been taken that MIGHT have prevented the deaths of 6 innocent people.

For one, if he was my son (or even my brother) and was posing that much of a threat to himself and others that I felt it necessary to report it to the police I wouldn't allow him to be alone, I wouldn't allow him to get near a car and I wouldn't allow him the opportunity to have access alcohol or drugs.

Families need to be more involved in the health and well being of their loved ones. Not just palm it off onto 'authorities'. I suppose that's the easiest thing to do though right, when you're a Hollywood hotshot? Too many more important things to do than take control of your son's mental health.

While I don't think it was the parent's fault at all. It is true that a family only needs a couple of doctor's to testify before a judge and you can have someone committed to a lock down hospital. That is if you do have the mental illness history showing they are a danger to themselves and/or others to back it - or - if you have the money to pay the doctor's to say it's there. They did this to a couple of high profile child actor's lately. One was Amanda Bynes. They took away all of Britney Spears rights to her money. They definitely could have taken his car.

I didn't say it was the parents fault either. The blame falls entirely on the individual as HE was the one behind the wheel, just like you can't blame anyone for the death of someone by firearms, except the person who pulls the trigger. But this person was mentally unstable. His family knew it, the police knew it, his therapists knew it. And a mentally unstable person will most certainly at some point (especially when they're very young) behave erratically and will need some measure of external control. It's just not OK to say "oh, it's his fault, what could we do? He was 100% responsible for his own actions and geez what a shame 6 innocent people are dead". Hitler was mentally unstable too.

The fact is someone had to step in to make sure he was not a danger to himself and more importantly to others. The police have played their role sufficiently by doing what they were within the law to do (which is basically fuck all because he hadnt actually done anything at the point they were warned that could warrant legal action) and the therapists had fulfilled their responsibility. The family, however could have removed ANY possessions that could be used for harm and that includes a car as well as the obvious items like guns, alcohol, drugs, etc. it's just basic common sense IMO and the only people able to do that are his family. He should have been brought home and kept in a safe environment until further help could be obtained. Most likely a doctor with experience in mental conditions. It's what I would do if someone in my family was behaving the way that kid was. I couldn't live with myself otherwise.

You can't just go "oh we tried" when all you did was ring a therapist and ring the police. That's just lame.

I think it's a similar situation to when someone commits suicide and afterwards it comes out that they were suffering something really traumatic and those closest around them KNEW but decided it was OK for them to be left alone. Fashion designer Alexander McQueen hung himself the night before his mother's funeral. Everyone who knew him knew that his mother was the most important person in his life and he was beyond devastated that she was gone. Yet not one of his friends stopped to think that leaving him home alone the evening before her funeral might be a bad idea.

It just dumbfounds me that those closest to these people don't act on signs that are clearly there. Everyone is just too 'busy' these days and absorbed in their own lives to look around and act when someone really needs help.

I know that feeling! It's a classic laugh when they're screaming at a mechanical device that is signalled by a satellite and they're STILL saying its the wrong way! Having said that though I have encountered glitches in the satnav from time to time but even though they don't always take you the most direct route it still manages to GET YOU THERE!

FAMILY OF ISLA VISTA GUNMAN SAYS THEY WARNED THE AUTHORITIES

(Saturday 05-24-14 at 11 AM)

ABC News is reporting that the attorney for the family of 22-year-old Elliot Rodger has confirmed he was the gunman who killed six people in Isla Vista Friday night before being killed.

The ABC News report quotes family attorney Alan Shifman as saying that either the family or a social worker who was seeing their son alerted the authorities at least a week ago about concerns and that a police agency actually investigated and interviewed Rodger.

Shifman says the family is devastated by what happened and offers their deepest condolences to the families of this extreme tragedy.

The ABC News report goes on to say that Elliot Rodger had what's believes to have been a highly functional form of Asperger's Syndrome and was being treated by multiple therapists and the social worker who was the one who called the authorities and alerted them.

Shifman says in the ABC News report that Rodger had been bullied in the past.

The family can be devastated all they like but at what point is it not also THEIR responsibility to ensure he is not a danger to himself, let alone anyone else? It's one thing to report to authorities about his mental instability but you can't just notify some government body and thereby relinquish yourself of all responsibility. I know the guy was 22 and therefore a grown adult, but when someone is that unstable and is clearly being vocal about it (ie, meaning its visible to everyone he comes in contact with) he shouldn't be in possession of car keys, or obviously a gun. That's a simple step that could have been taken that MIGHT have prevented the deaths of 6 innocent people.

For one, if he was my son (or even my brother) and was posing that much of a threat to himself and others that I felt it necessary to report it to the police I wouldn't allow him to be alone, I wouldn't allow him to get near a car and I wouldn't allow him the opportunity to have access alcohol or drugs.

Families need to be more involved in the health and well being of their loved ones. Not just palm it off onto 'authorities'. I suppose that's the easiest thing to do though right, when you're a Hollywood hotshot? Too many more important things to do than take control of your son's mental health.

There are some, but it's just not a job that many males seem to like doing or apply for. It requires a level of attention to detail and organisational skills that a lot of guys generally lack.

There's also the female greeting factor when clients/customers visit.

I've helped with the recruitment process for an office manager (glorified receptionist). There were something like 150 female appliancants, less than were 10 male.

I totally agree with that. I think it comes down to the organisational skills essentially. In an advertising agency there are certain positions that will always be filled by women, traffic manager being one of them. It's a job that requires so much organisation and essentially keeps the agency ticking along as efficiently as possible and it's generally accepted that women are far better at that. On the other hand there are very few female creative directors. Not to say its unheard of and there are generally a lot of women who are copywriters or art directors but for some reason they rarely reach the head creative position.

The fact is that men's and women's brains function differently and as a result they are good at some jobs and not at others. Its also why there are very few female engineers. They generally don't have the ability for spatial thought processes that engineering requires.

I am a much better map reader as well. The problem is he never listens and in the end he still blames me

Why am I not surprised! So typical.

Ironically I'm much better at reading maps than my other half is. And he knows it. My greatest pride in map reading and navigation was managing to guide us from the outskirts of Rome to our hotel in the centre, with nothing but the tiny map in our paperback travel guide book.

And then there was the time that I was driving in Spain with him and his parents and they all said I was guiding them the wrong way. So I said "fine. You guys do it. :shrugs:" Half an hour later we are totally lost (well they were, I wasn't but we were definitely going the wrong way by now) and they all admitted they had no fucking idea where we were. At that point I said "right, well would you look like me to take over again?" "Yes" they replied. Within 10 minutes we were back on track and they never questioned my navigation ever again.

I agree with Jackie about wanting a hot girl as the first greeting point for clients and customers. Most women are fine with being greeted by another female but I suspect that most men prefer to be greeted by an attractive female than by another guy. That's not to say that all receptionists are young. I've seen many middle aged female receptionists as well. I think it's about the way men interact with women (regardless of age) as opposed to men with men.

And hey, let's face it. Women are known to be much better at doing more than one thing at a time and if you spend half an hour watching a receptionist at work you'll see that she will get periods of time where everything is happening at once. A lot of guys just don't cope with it well.

A good receptionist is often something that most companies will hold onto. A shit receptionist can make so much unnecessary internal chaos.