Bride honours her grandmother by wearing wedding dress from 1956

Christina Moffett, from Wisconsin, USA, didn’t expect to walk down the aisle in the white fit and flare wedding dress she’d seen her grandmother wearing in black and white photos from her own 1956 nuptials.

“I had seen photos of it on the mantle before but couldn’t really imagine it until I wore it,” she said in an interview with the US TODAY show on Saturday.

But, after a few alterations, the bride-to-be was able to slip into the frock ‘one of her favourite people’ - her grandma Shirley Ekstrand - had worn 63 years ago.

‘Yes’ to the dress

After getting engaged to her former schoolmate Alexander in 2018, Christina began the hunt for the perfect wedding dress but it was her own family who had the perfect solution.

“I’m very nostalgic and love family heirlooms. My grandma, mother and future mother-in-law had all mentioned at one point that it would be fun to have me try on their gowns,” the newlywed said.

As soon as Christina tried on her grandmother’s ‘gorgeous, classy and timeless’ dress from her 1956 wedding, she knew she had found ‘the one’.

“It just worked,” Christina said of the vintage gown that features delicate lace sleeves and overlay.

“I twirled around in the hoop skirt and was beaming. I knew it was the look I wanted for my wedding. It was a very Grace Kelly look. I had seen photos of it on the mantle before but couldn’t really imagine it until I wore it,” she said.

Christina’s choice of gown added ‘deep family love’ to her October 2019 wedding day, while Shirley - known affectionately to the family as “Mite” - said seeing her granddaughter in the dress made her ‘very happy’.

“I was very honoured that she asked me to be part of her wedding,” Mite told TODAY.

“I was so sorry that Bada (Christina’s grandfather) wasn’t with us, but yet he’s in our hearts. I was so happy for both Christina and Alexander because they were meant for each other. And seeing her in the dress made me very happy,” she added.

It seems the couple have found fame online, too, with Christina’s recent post to Reddit - she shared a sweet side by side of her and her grandmother in the dress - quickly gaining more than 71,000 upvotes.

“I can’t believe how much attention this all got. [I’m] absolutely stunned,” Christina said.

“What a crazy way to start our wedding.”

Additional reporting by Elizabeth Di Filippo.

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