Faq's

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Frequently Asked Questions

Elegance Preserved is a wedding dress preservation company located in San Francisco, San Mateo and Los Angeles California. We also offer nationwide services to customers through our shipping program.  We offer home pickup /delivery  services in select regions of the Bay Area and Southern California.

Elegance Preserved cleans and preserves your wedding gown to be saved and stored for years to come. As preservationists, we will perform small repairs on gowns but we do not offer tailoring / alterations services. Please refer to our “Services-Page” for more information about what we offer at Elegance Preserved.

Elegance Preserved has two (2) bridal shops (San Francisco, and San Mateo) in the bay area, and a (10 bridal shop in Los Angeles. We offer free home route pickup/delivery services to create your quote. We also have a nationwide shipping service that assists brides all over the country.

Your quote generally takes a few days to create after pickup by our account managers. The master cleaners will create your quotes. Repair quotes may take a few extra days based on scheduling with our seamstress.   All pricing is approved by our Master Dry Cleaners and their teams for every dress. For quality control reasons, we perform all cleaning services under their watchful eye and coordinate return delivery to brides. Please refer to our “Services-Page” for more information about what we offer at Elegance Preserved.

For a clean only service, we can perform the service in under a week when needed!  The standard turn around time for cleaning only service is typically 6 weeks and for cleaning & preservation service is normally 12 weeks. Having said that, we can work with your requirements. For brides looking to resell we are aware of the more time sensitive nature of your cleaning need. Please reach out and we will meet your turnaround needs.

We can clean a gown in under 5 days when necessary in urgency! In special circumstances, we are able clean a gown in under 2 weeks as a rush service. Rush services are accommodated on a first come, first serve basis. Be sure to let us know if you need your gown completed at a specific time and we will do our best to accommodate your cleaning.

We require an in-house review of your wedding gown to create a quote for wedding dress services.

Please TEXT us at 800-539-9092 to schedule your home pickup on our routes to create your quote. For more information, visit us: HERE.  OR we can coordinate through our National shipping service that we provide to brides who are not local to our boutiques. We are not able to provide a quote by phone or email.

Pricing is generally split into two categories: “Wedding Dress Cleaning” and “Wedding Dress Preservation”. Our pricing is listed on our dedicated pricing page titled, “how we price“.

Do keep in mind that certain fabric types, level of soiling and repairs, design / construction of a gown can affect the average range of your cleaning and preservation pricing. Fabric type and soiling level are the 2 main factors.

It is important to Elegance Preserved to provide seamless service to both our local brides and to bridal customers across the country. We currently provide 2 options for brides to send their wedding gown to Elegance Preserved:

– Local + Designated City Pickup Service – Elegance Preserved does offer a free pick up service from your home. Link: HERE. At this time this service only applies to specific areas within the Bay Area and Southern California. Our pick up service must be scheduled via phone with our Elegance Preserved team – 800-539-9092. Please call us to see if your area is located in one of our designated pickup/delivery outlets.

– *Nationwide Shipping – This is the perfect option for our brides located across the country. Our shipping service is coordinated through our Elegance Preserved office.

To request your Shipping Kit, please sign up on our website “Link-Here” and we will provide you with a wedding gown transport box and necessary packaging materials so you can send your gown in to us for your in-house review and quote.

You may either request a direct shipping pick up from at your home or office, or take your wedding gown transport box directly to your local shipping center. A FED-EX shipping label is included with our Shipping Kit so pick up + delivery should be painless and smooth!

If you choose our National Shipping method, we recommend shipping your gown in its original garment bag (this is typically provided by the boutique that you purchased your gown from). After your gown’s in-house review and quote creation, we will notify you of completion and offer you the opportunity to either move forward with our Elegance Preserved services or have your gown returned to you. All gowns ship back from Elegance Preserved using the “Direct Signature” method.

*FREE SHIPPING SERVICES are only valid for wedding dress cleaning or wedding dress cleaning/preservation orders. It is only available in the continental United States. It is only available at the original quote submission to our clients. If a client would like to add return shipping on an order, after the original quote inclusive of both shipping to our bridal shop/and return shipping, then there may be an extra fee. We have greatly reduced shipping rates and we would pass that savings along to our clients with a small fee for shipping materials and time to package up the dress. Please call us with any questions related to these requirements. We have a great many brides that ship their dresses some time after our services to other family members for storage. We are happy to assist you with a reduced rate label that we can email to you. Please call us to learn more about that process and how it works. We are here to assist!

Our brides hosting a destination wedding primarily use our nationwide Concierge Program. This program was designed for brides to schedule pick up of their wedding gown prior to them either returning home or leaving for their Honeymoon.

This relieves the stress of transporting your gown home either by you, the bride, or a trusted family member.

Since every Concierge request is different for each perspective bride, we ask for you to contact our offices to learn more about our Concierge Program and if it would be a good fit for you in regards to delivering your gown to Elegance Preserved for your cleaning and preservation needs.

We are happy to lend some TLC to your wedding gown before the Big Day.

However, pre-ceremony pressing appointments are available on a first come, first serve basis and are required to be booked at least 2 weeks prior to your wedding date. A complete pricing list can be found – Here.

When cleaning your wedding gown, our first step is to inspect the gown for any types of damage. This includes (and not limited to): soiled and ripped hems, loose beading, loose applique, stains from perspiration and spray tans, and of course, accidental spills.

Because every gown is the not the same, some fabrics are more delicate than others. We always run fabric tests to determine how effectively certain fabrics will release stains and spotting. All of our cleaning techniques are done by careful handwork and with the upmost care and attention to detail.

Our wedding dress cleaning services are normally finished with gentle gown rinsing (based on fabric type) and pressing the gown back to its natural form keeping in mind its original drape and design.

If you want to save your wedding gown for years to come, we always suggest to proceed with “Wedding Dress Preservation” after your gown has been cleaned. See below for details in regards to our Preservation process.

Absolutely! We completely understand the need to see the progress being made on such an important item.

In order to view your gown before “wedding dress preservation” begins, you must make a note about an early review when Elegance Preserved sends your quote for services. Most of our brides view their gowns via FaceTime or Skype. Do keep in mind that scheduling a review can slow down or extend your wedding gown’s completion date.

We have noticed that there are a lot of specialty preservation boxes out on the market, which can be quite overwhelming and confusing for prospective customers.

Since Elegance Preserved is a member of the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists, it is our responsibility to commit to preservation excellence by using only the finest preservation products.

Our MuseumCare™ Elegance Preserved Wedding Chest is of museum quality and is entirely acid-free and lignin-free (Lignin is a derivative of the pulp process). All interior tissue used is also acid-free and lignin-free. Our Wedding Chest was designed for the gown to “breathe” while still maintaining the gown’s fabric integrity. Elegance Preserved MuseumCare™ Wedding Chest is not available to the general public.

Elegance Preserved offers four standard Wedding Chest sizes for preservation. Once your gown has been reviewed in-house for cleaning + preservation services, we are able to determine the appropriate size Chest for your gown. Unfortunately, we cannot reduce nor enlarge the size of the Wedding Chest based on customer preference, as it is based on the needs of the gown.

Our Wedding Chest does not have a viewing window. Many plastic viewing windows have been known to “off-gas” and scorch fibers. As a control measure, Elegance Preserved only works with proven preservation products.

However, all Elegance Preserved brides are encouraged to open their Wedding Chests and unwrap portions of the tissue to view their gown. White gloves are provided with every Elegance Preserved Wedding Chest for this specific reason.

Absolutely! We often receive requests for a bride’s veil to be preserved alongside their wedding gown. Headpieces, petticoats, garters, and handkerchiefs are also common preservation requests.

All items are reviewed for compatibility with the overall fabric composition of the gown it will be potentially stored with. Ultimately we want to avoid any cross-contamination due to material composition.

Since our preservation goal is to always protect the longevity of your wedding gown’s life, we offer the opportunity for items to be preserved and packed in separate Wedding Chests.

The answer to this question is a resounding “YES!” Brides often worry that by opening their preservation box this will ruin the preservation of their gown.

Not the case! We provide all of our customers with white gloves upon completion of preservation and instructions so they can properly handle their gown after Elegance Preserved services have been completed.

Should you happen to accidentally unwrap the tissue paper or remove your gown completely from the Wedding Chest and repacking would be difficult, simply return to our Elegance Preserved office with the gown (and Bridal Memory Box) and will “re-preserve” your gown at no extra charge.

Not located in San Francisco, CA? No worries! There will be a small shipment fee but we will be more than happy to re-preserve your gown at no extra charge and ship your gown back to you.

The Elegance Preserved process is characterized by an intense focus on proper preservation materials, a passion for stain removal and a focus on communication.

We are discerning in our selection of materials. Our staff is highly trained to work on the most difficult of fabrics and we work diligently with our customers to be communicative of expectation with updates during the entire process.

Our goal is to make this service, which is a once in a lifetime event, simple, convenient, and stress free for our brides. Our passion is to restore your dress, as close as possible, to its pre-ceremony condition. (For a more thorough write-up, please visit our dedicated wedding dress preservation page, found Here).

Yes. We have a $25/month storage fee policy for dresses that remain with us 1 month past the completion date at our shop. This is the date completed which is different from the official completion date. At completion, we send a final email to our brides confirming that the dress or wedding items are ready for local pickup at the bridal shop. If we have a dress that has been with us for longer than a month, you may receive an email notification regarding the application of the storage fee charge to your quote.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding this policy, please contact our coordinators to assist. Thank you so very much for your timely pickup!

Elegance Preserved is the only San Francisco member of the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists. We are also active in our local community with involvement in the Princess Project – SF and we purchase carbon-offset credits thru the Carbonfund.org for our preservation work.

We actively network with designers in New York and Chicago to review the latest industry trends in design and constantly review and update our processes and techniques.

Elegance Preserved is often referred by all high-end bridal boutiques in the Bay Area as well as well as Southern California and New York. We are privileged to work for wonderful boutiques such as Kinsley JamesSarah SevenJanene’s Bridal and Jin Wang.

At Elegance Preserved, we 100% guarantee that your preserved gown will not caramelize over time. This guarantee is for a lifetime and extends past the life of our own company.

At any time in the future, if a past customer of ours has a gown that requires re-cleaning, we will clean and preserve the gown at no charge.

As a member of the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists, should our company not be able to assist in re-cleaning and preservation, our Association would manage the re-cleaning and preservation needs at no cost to the customer.

Our Elegance Preserved guarantee is based not only on the strength and reliability of our company, but by a large National and International Association of committed wedding gown preservation companies.

"At Elegance Preserved, we 100% guarantee that your preserved gown will not caramelize over time. This guarantee is for a lifetime and extends past the life of our own company."

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