Yahoo Lifestyle Woman Who Preserved Her Wedding Dress Nearly 20 Years Ago Is Shocked When She Opens the Box
Kandace Keys-Randell was told not to open the box or it would ruin the preservation process
A woman in Chicago got an unexpected surprise when she opened the box that was supposed to hold her preserved wedding dress — and found something else.
Kandace Keys-Randell told local ABC affiliate WLS-TV that she opted to preserve her wedding dress nearly 20 years ago at a dry cleaner in South Holland, Illinois, and was told not to “open the box” containing the dress because it would let air in and ruin the preservation process.
"They said, 'You'll put it in the box and it'll last forever,' " Keys-Randell recalled to the outlet.
However, when the time came around for her daughter’s debut in the cotillion, the mom and daughter decided to repurpose Keys-Randell’s wedding dress as a ballgown for the event.
"To see her wear the dress I wore 20 years ago would be amazing,” Keys-Randell said she remembered thinking. However, when the mother and daughter finally opened the box to try the dress on, they got a surprise.
"[I] open the box and see that it's not my dress," Keys-Randell said while tearing up. "What do you do?"
"The last time I wore that dress, my dad was alive, and now he's not. He's not here," she continued. "I wanted to see her with her dad wear the same dress that I wore with my dad."
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This prompted Keys-Randell to seek help in locating the person who has her dress, since the company that she paid to preserve her gown has since gone “out of business.”
Prestige Preservation, a company that works to preserve wedding dresses and was listed on the box, told WIS-TV that the dry cleaner may have accidentally mixed up her wedding dress with someone else’s and gave the wrong box to the wrong client.
They said in a statement to WLS-TV: "We truly wish we could reunite your client with their dress, but without access to the necessary records, we're unable to perform this type of search."
The company also noted to the outlet that their “packaging has a viewing window” that allows its customers to check the dress without opening the box. Though, Keys-Randell claimed that the box was wrapped in plastic, making it difficult to open, and she followed the instructions given to her not to open it.
PEOPLE has reached out to Prestige Preservation for comment.
However, there may have been a clue left behind on the dress as to who it belonged to, as she noted that one of the tags has a name, “Taylor.”
"I would hope that anybody who went to that cleaners in August of 2005 will open up their box to see if maybe they have my dress, because I definitely [have] someone else's dress," Keys-Randell said.
Read the original article on People
