Illawarra women say yes to (a rented) designer dress as growing trend marks sign of the times

A decade after starting Get Dressed Hire with just 12 dresses in her spare room at home, business owner Michelle Taylor has witnessed a surge in women turning to dress rentals.

Operating from a Shellharbour Village boutique shopfront nowadays, Michelle credits the rise in popularity of dress hiring to a growing awareness of sustainable fashion and the impact of the cost-of-living crisis.

“It started because my husband told me to stop buying dresses,” Michelle said, laughing.

“I come from a big European family, so we go to a lot of events, we dress up a lot anyway and so he was like, ‘That’s enough’.

“I thought about this [business], and literally we started out of my spare room at home.

“I had this little rack with 12 dresses on it, and I was working full-time at the time, and it just really blew up from there.”

She said when she started 10 years ago, there were few dress hire businesses operating, especially in the Illawarra.

“It certainly has grown, as a lot of people are doing it now and there’s a lot more awareness about it in the community,” she said.

“I am seeing that where it used to be early 20s, early 30s people, we’re now dressing people in their 50s and 60s and mother of the groom and mother of the bride.

“So it’s a different demographic, and it’s just a wider audience now that have accepted it and are willing to try it, so that’s been really nice to see.”

The reality is, suit hiring for men has been around for decades, and celebrities have long hired dresses for the red carpet, but it’s not been commonplace for the everyday woman.

“I think because it was such a new concept, people were a bit reluctant to try it,” she said.

“Women also think we only stock smaller sizes, so they’re a bit worried about coming in and not finding anything.

“One of the things we’ve learned over the years was to increase the size range and to increase the styles so that we could dress all women.”

She said there were varying reasons why women chose to hire, rather than buy, a designer dress.

“You do have the people that are conscious of the environment and the fast fashion and the impact that it does have on landfill,” she said.

“I am finding, especially now with the cost of living, people don’t want to be spending hundreds of dollars on a dress.

“It just makes sense to hire it, so they get the latest design or fashion, a bigger variety of things to choose from and it’s just becoming that little bit more socially acceptable as well to be hiring a dress.”

Michelle said much of the demand now was coming from spring weddings, but the upcoming spring racing season was often their busiest time of year.

She said throughout the year they dressed for black-tie events, funerals where customers didn’t want to wear black, birthday parties, christenings, engagement parties and hen’s parties.

To hire a dress, customers can visit without needing a booking and try on dresses until they find one they love, after which they have a four-night hire period – often picking up on a Thursday and returning it on a Monday.

It’s then Michelle and her team who take care of the cleaning.

She also shipped around the country, with online orders receiving a return postal satchel for ease.

“Our most popular brands are Shona Joy, Bec + Bridge and Alamais is very popular at the moment as well, so a lot of mainly Australian designers,” she said.

“When you pay that little bit extra for a designer item, they really do have that extra bit of quality over these fast fashion brands.”

So how does Michelle go when it comes to dressing herself with all that choice?

“The problem for me is often I’ll be going to the same events as everyone else,” she said, laughing.

“I have to take what’s left. I often find a dress and somebody else will book it.”

She said a “beautiful community” had formed around the boutique, with Saturday mornings often buzzing with customers who had become friends with each other.

“A lot of customers have been super loyal, and I’ve been dressing them for many years,” she said.

“We just like to give the community access to high-end pieces that they might not be able to afford otherwise, and experience that feeling of wearing a beautiful dress and getting complimented and just feeling special.”

With a growing team, including now being joined by her 14-year-old daughter, it was still the only shopfront dress hire business in the Illawarra, with people travelling from Sydney to Vincentia.

Get Dressed Hire also stocks earrings, handbags, crowns for Melbourne Cup and tape to keep everything in place.