Custom sizing is one of two sizing options available for customers ordering bridal, bridesmaid, mother of the bride, and junior dresses. It is a great alternative for customers who are in between sizing or find that they are a bit too tall for our standard sizing option, but keep in mind, it is nonreturnable for any reason including wedding cancellations or changes.
What makes custom sizing unique is that we make the dresses to your exact bust, waist, hips, height, and hollow to floor measurements. This helps to provide a closer fit than a standard size, but the dress will still likely require alterations for an even better fit since we're only able to accept 5 basic measurements.
It also costs the same and takes the same amount of time to make as our standard size dresses.
Is it a perfect fit?
With custom sizing, we're only taking a total of 5 measurements and that isn't enough information for a perfect fit. These measurements don't tell us important information about your proportions or body shape so you should expect to make some adjustments.
For example, strap length isn't affected by the 5 requested measurements so we make them on the long side to accommodate a range of body types. So these do generally need to be adjusted.
To help with this, we do offer some alteration reimbursements up to $30 depending on the dress ordered. These costs will help but not entirely cover the cost of alterations and Chicsew is not responsible for additional fees associated with alterations.
Is it returnable?
We understand that sometimes circumstances can change and a custom dress may no longer be needed for some unexpected reason. Please keep in mind that because custom-sized dresses are made to personal measurements, we are unable to take them back for any reason, including, but not limited to wedding cancelations, incorrect ordering, or sizing changes.
How do I measure?
Be sure to measure yourself according to our guidelines with a soft measuring tape (not a ruler or construction measuring tape), found on our Size Chart page(here for US customers and here for CA customers).
We recommend that you add 0.25 to 0.5 inches to your bust, waist, and hip measurements just to give yourself some room for comfort. We do not recommend decreasing your measurements if you are planning to lose weight.
Because we are making the dress to your measurements and it is non-returnable, we never recommend ordering a custom size using the measurements of a standard size dress.
This is because standard sizing has some ease built in for comfort while custom sizing is made exactly as ordered. Further, since we’re asking for your height and hollow to floor measurements, the overall fit and proportions of the dress will change. This means the waistline, bustline, and hemline may be higher or lower depending on the measurements.
Additional Helpful Information:
As custom sizing is basic, we cannot change the proportions of the dress. If you are concerned about where the waistline will hit on your torso, styles with empire waistlines may be safer as they are fitted at the under bust instead of the waist.
You don’t need to be professionally measured but if you would like to, be sure to have them read our guidelines as seamstresses are trained to take measurements a bit differently.
Custom sizing is not the same as custom design. If you need a dress to be shorter or longer than advertised, unfortunately this just isn't something we can do. That means, we can't make a floor-length dress into a knee-length or make a knee-length dress into a floor-length design.
Never change your height and hollow to floor if you think this will simply make your dress a bit shorter or longer. The height and hollow to floor are used to determine where the hemline, neckline, and waistline should fall and changing either of these can end up moving the waistline of your dress up below your neck.
Please convert your height measurement to inches at checkout. For example, if you are 5'6" you will put your height as 66 inches and NOT 56 inches.