UPDATE:
My first opportunity to shoot with Karen and her daughter, Cassidy, was for dress shopping. At this point, I had no idea who Cassidy was or if she'd be right for my film. What I did know, was that I wanted to get shots of a deb, any deb really, shopping for her dress, and if I got really lucky, she'd be right for the film and would agree to participate. In the end, I got really lucky.
The day started out with an early breakfast at Bruegger's Bagel Bakery where I filmed Cassidy and her mom discussing their plan for the day over breakfast. Their first stop would be the H & H Shoe store because the selection of appropriate shoes was very slim and they wanted to make sure to find a dress to go with the shoes. The Cary Debutante Society lays out very specific requirements for the shoes because the the girls need to be able to dance in the shoes at the ball and without specific requirements, the debs will come back with pretty shoes that may be pretty, but are impossible to dance in. The other benefit to having the shoes beforehand, is that they would know immediately if a dress need to be altered and that additional cost could be calculated in before purchase.
After buying quite possibly the ugliest shoes ever made, we moved on to dress shopping. First, we went to David's Bridal where they refused to let me use the video camera. This was annoying for two reasons.
1. I called the store a few days before and they told me I could film in the store, no problem. Additionally, Cassidy and Karen went to the store earlier that week and talked to the manager about filming, who said it wouldn't be a problem. However, when I got there, the very same women that Cassidy and Karen say they talked to previously, told us that David's Bridal as very strict rules about cameras and that permission to shoot video must be approved by corporate headquarters. Thankfully, she told me that I could use a still camera, which I just happen to have with me that day. Annoyingly enough, had I known this was the case, I could have brought a nicer still camera, but I decided to make due with the point-and-shoot digital camera that I had with me.
The trick to finding a debutante dress was to look at bridal stores, since it had to be a white dress, but to find a dress that wasn't too "wedding-y." Something simple, and not TOO expensive, but pretty and wearable for a whole night of dancing. Cassidy admitted that she had no intention of using this dress as her wedding dress, but that she MIGHT have the occasion to wear it again sometime in college.
Cassidy tried on about 15 to 20 dresses priced somewhere between $200 and $2000 before finding one she liked. Before agreeing to buy it, Karen asked the salesperson if there was a way to find out if any other Cary Debs bought that dress already. Low and behold, they did have that kind of list and we discovered that one of the other debs had, in fact, already bought that very same dress. Cassidy decided to keep looking.
The next store we went to was The Bridal Gallery. The dresses there were much more elegant and far more expensive on a whole than those at David's. She tried on an additional 10 to 15 dresses and found one that fit the bill. The strapless dress would require some alterations; debutante dresses cannot be strapless, so straps had to be added, as well as some hemming to remove a short train. Cassidy wanted to get her father's opinion before committing to the dress. So the three of us went to a coffee shop around the corner to wait for her dad to come to the shop and see the dress.
After he approved, they bought the dress.
