Ask Kimberly Williams what the most important part of her wedding was and she'll describe the white gown with the rose flower accents she wore down the aisle.

The dress meant so much that for months after her July 2001 wedding, Williams hung it in the closet and kept the door open so she could see it every day.

"My husband said when he saw me in it, he never saw me look so beautiful," says Williams, 29, of Livonia, Mich. "Our life just got better with each day, and it all started with the wedding. The dress was a constant reminder of a wonderful memory."

But Williams knew she'd have to get the dress preserved if she really wanted to make the memory last. Keeping it in her closet guaranteed that it would yellow and that stains would become harder to remove.

Yet preservation made her nervous.

What if the dress got ruined? What if she never got it back?

Preservation is a post-wedding woe that most of the country's 2.4 million brides have to think about each year.

"For a lot of brides, the wedding dress is so meaningful to them and such an important part of their history now as a couple that they want to preserve it and they want to do it correctly," says Antonia van der Meer, editor in chief of Modern Bride magazine in New York.

So after months of shopping, fittings and credit card payments to pay off dresses that can cost as little as $100 or as much as a 1-carat solitaire, how do you make sure you're getting it preserved at the best place?

How do you know which cleaner is telling you the truth and which cleaner just wants to make a buck?

Well, there's no one answer. And it takes work on the bride's part to do it right. But like planning a wedding for 200 guests in 12 months, it can be done.

The most important thing, say all the experts, is to shop around and ask questions.

Most brides don't open the phone book and randomly pick a banquet hall for their wedding reception. Instead, they make a list, visit each site, compare prices and ask around about the place.

The same should be done when choosing the dry cleaner to preserve your gown.

"I tell brides, `You're preserving an opportunity,' " says Kathy Thomas, whose shop, Bridal Veils & Shoes Unlimited & More in Sterling Heights, Mich., ships off 400-500 dresses a year for preservation. "This is an heirloom."

So don't just look for the $99 extra-value deal. And don't assume that cleaners that charge $400 know what they're doing.

You should find cleaners that specialize in or are knowledgeable about handling wedding gowns, and be sure to ask specific questions about how they clean and package a dress, says Sally Conant, executive director of the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists in Connecticut.

"A lot of brides don't even think about this. It's like telling them they have to do dishes after dinner," Conant says. "It's not one of the fun things."

Brides shouldn't be afraid to ask the cleaner to explain exactly what cleaning steps the dress will go through and ask about damage waivers, which remove responsibility from the cleaner should something go wrong.

A cleaner that doesn't want to be responsible for damage to the dress is one to think twice about, Conant says.

If you do decide to sign a waiver, be sure the cleaner has fully explained why that waiver is necessary.

For example, beads glued rather than sewn onto a wedding dress likely would fall off when cleaned.

In that case, a cleaner needs to explain the risk to a bride and could provide a waiver for that possibility, says Jane Rising, manager of training and instruction for the International Fabricare Institute in Maryland, an association of professional dry cleaners, wet cleaners and launderers.

The association, which teaches classes on cleaning wedding dresses, also fields preservation questions from brides.

"The point here is that the owner of the garment and the cleaner clearly understand each other," Rising says.

Tom Ryan, who owns Georgetown Cleaners in Ann Arbor, Mich., agrees: Good communication is important.

He says he welcomes and appreciates answering a bride's preservation questions and says brides should be leery of cleaners that won't do the same. "There's a lot of gimmicks out there," he says. "I'd much rather have a conversation with the bride about things like that than if they don't ask any questions at all."

As for Williams and her white gown?

She took it to Elizabeth's Bridal Manor and had the shop handle the preservation through Georgetown Cleaners. She got the dress back about a month ago and wonders if her little sister will want to wear it.

For now, it's back in her closet.

Boxed.

© 2002, Detroit Free Press.
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.