Did you know that silk parachutes were often given by WWII soldiers to their sweethearts to make a wedding dress? While I was researching for my historical novella, Where Sunflowers Grow, I came across how servicemen would save their parachute and how women made the most amazing wedding dresses from the silk during a time when material wasn’t readily available. You can see some of the simple, elegant designs on the Dusty Old Thing website. There are more fabulous examples on Google Images too.
I knew I had to include a parachute silk wedding dress in Where Sunflowers Grow. My maternal grandmother told me about parachute wedding dresses years ago. I think she referred to them as sky dresses or a gift from the sky. And in one of those things in life, I promptly forgot about it until I read about them during my research. The whole idea is very romantic, don’t you think?