Is This the Most Notable (Purple) Wedding Dress Ever Worn?

The brides wore plum-colored silk.

Considered one of them, Anna Murray, was married on Sept. 15, 1838, to Frederick Johnson, who had just lately escaped from slavery. Born Frederick Bailey, he had used the surnames Stanley and Johnson to evade slave catchers, and would later rename himself once more, as Frederick Douglass, earlier than turning into a outstanding abolitionist, statesman and writer.

The marriage befell at 39 Lispenard Avenue, in what’s now the TriBeCa neighborhood of Manhattan, on the residence of the abolitionist David Ruggles. After the swiftly organized ceremony, the newlyweds departed that very same day for New Bedford, Mass., a protected haven for fugitive slaves.

On Sept. 15, 2022, 184 years to the day of that marriage ceremony, the second bride, Cassandra Bromfield, arrived on the similar web site, which is now an outpost of La Colombe Espresso Roasters, in a robe designed to evoke the one worn by Ms. Murray.

However Ms. Bromfield, a 65-year-old dressmaker, was a bride solely in spirit. She had made and worn her gown on the request of Lana Turner, the chair of the Harlem Literary Society e book membership, who had organized a small occasion to honor Ms. Murray and Mr. Douglass on the anniversary of their marriage ceremony. (Ms. Turner shares her identify — and birthday — with the actress Lana Turner, who died in 1995.)

The afternoon gathering, attended by some 50 folks, featured readings in regards to the couple’s historical past and performances by the West Village String Quartet and the vocalist C. Anthony Bryant. Ms. Turner, 72, billed it as a marriage reception and arranged it to focus on Ms. Murray’s pivotal however typically behind-the-scenes position in her husband’s public life.

“Anna Murray Douglass is a determine that will get misplaced within the sauce,” stated Ms. Turner, who lives in Harlem. There’s little point out of Ms. Murray in her husband’s writing, and although Mr. Douglass was essentially the most photographed man of the nineteenth century, there are not any footage of the couple collectively regardless of their 44 years of marriage.

Ms. Turner was impressed to stage the marriage reception after studying “Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom,” the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography by David Blight, and Mr. Douglass’s autobiography, “Narrative of the Lifetime of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave.” The descriptions of Decrease Manhattan within the 1830s in each books spurred her to go to the location of the couple’s marriage ceremony on Lispenard Avenue, she stated. Whereas doing so final summer season, she received the concept for the occasion.

Ms. Murray and Mr. Douglass have been born in Maryland. A free girl, she was working as a housekeeper and laundress once they met in Baltimore, and she or he later financed his escape to New York with cash she had saved from working and from promoting one in all two feather beds she had owned, which have been a luxurious good on the time.

“She couldn’t learn or write herself, however she knew how you can save,” Ms. Turner stated of Ms. Murray, who was believed to be round 25 when she married Mr. Douglass, then 20.

Few particulars of their marriage ceremony have been recorded, however a 1923 article in The Journal of Negro Historical past by the couple’s daughter Rosetta Douglass Sprague, one in all 5 youngsters Ms. Murray and Mr. Douglass had collectively, famous that “a brand new plum coloured silk gown was her marriage ceremony robe.”

With this colourful truth in thoughts, Ms. Turner known as Ms. Bromfield in late July with a query: Would she create a plum silk marriage ceremony gown for an occasion on Ms. Murray’s and Mr. Douglass’s marriage ceremony anniversary in September?

Although Ms. Turner and Ms. Bromfield have been solely social acquaintances, “there was no hesitation,” Ms. Turner stated of Ms. Bromfield’s response, even when Ms. Turner instructed that the designer would additionally mannequin the gown.

Ms. Bromfield shortly started working in her studio within the Williamsburg part of Brooklyn, the place she additionally lives. She started with on-line analysis about silhouettes and dressmaking methods, discovering sure YouTube channels focusing on historic style, specifically American Duchess, particularly useful. Having no description of the garment past its shade and material, she got down to create a gown that hewed carefully to the type of the interval, with a full skirt over petticoats, a corseted waist and an exaggerated gigot sleeve, which puffs out on the prime of the arm however is narrower on the wrist.

Girls of Ms. Murray’s standing, she famous, would have merely worn the nicest gown they owned for his or her marriage ceremony, whatever the shade. The couple’s 1838 marriage ceremony additionally befell earlier than it turned widespread for brides to put on white, a convention that started after Queen Victoria of England wore a white satin robe at her 1840 marriage ceremony to Prince Albert.

For the plum silk material, Ms. Bromfield went with Ms. Turner to Preview Textile Group in Manhattan’s garment district. Earlier than Ms. Bromfield might start establishing the gown, “first I needed to pad the model to be me,” she stated, noting that the unique robe was worn by a lady some 40 years youthful than she is. “After I received the proper match for the sample I made, I started chopping it out of the material,” she stated.

To function a barrier between her physique and the gown’s keep — a corset-like piece that laces on the again — Ms. Bromfield made an below layer often called a chemise. “Everytime you see these interval reveals they usually have corsets subsequent to pores and skin, they’re simply making an attempt to be horny,” she stated. “It wouldn’t be worn subsequent to the pores and skin as a result of it will get too soiled.”

The robe’s gigot, or leg of mutton, sleeves have been notably difficult for the designer. “They have been the factor that stumped me essentially the most,” Ms. Bromfield stated. To take care of the sleeves’ form, she connected dense, pillowlike pads to their insides.

Ms. Bromfield added distinctive touches to her model of the gown, which included quilting and beading the bodice, and embroidering Ms. Murray’s identify contained in the hem of the skirt. She additionally embroidered the phrase “American” contained in the gown utilizing pink, white, blue, black and inexperienced threads in homage to the American and Pan-African flags. Materials in these 5 colours have been used for the skirt as properly.

“I did all of this stuff that might make it me,” Ms. Bromfield stated, including that as she remade the marriage robe, she felt a kinship with Ms. Murray, who was additionally a dressmaker and seamstress. “I needed to really feel like her and I believe she felt glamorous, regardless that they needed to stand up and go.”

Although the brides wore plum, the reception featured a number of outfits in shades of white, together with that of its organizer, Ms. Turner, a frequent topic of the New York Occasions style photographer Invoice Cunningham. She wore a customized gown made with a white harlequin sample upholstery material by the seamstress Eleni Rodas and a parasol hat by the milliner Heidi Lee. (Beyoncé wears a bigger model of Ms. Turner’s hat within the teaser video for “I’m That Lady,” a track on her newest album, “Renaissance.”)

After the occasion, Ms. Bromfield’s gown was returned to her studio. She and Ms. Turner hope to discover a everlasting residence for it at a museum or an educational establishment.

Ms. Turner additionally plans to stage one other marriage ceremony reception subsequent 12 months, with extra music and readings that honor the life and legacy of Ms. Murray.

“I do that as a result of Anna got here and received me,” she stated.