Two points of advice for brides considering Clarissa Boutique. First, please manage your expectations before you make an appointment. If a staff person tells you over the phone that you will be able to try on your dress before you try on access...ories, that is not the case. I asked for the opportunity to try on my dress before I tried accessories, and I was turned down. (Even if that was a miscommunication, regardless, I was never invited to try on the dress afterward, which I had been promised over the phone.)
Second, please DO NOT bring your wedding dress to the salon. I did, and I regret it.
Before my appointment, I received my dress new from another bridal salon. The dress was carefully packaged in a garment bag and folded inside a shipping box with tissue paper. Prior, I had only tried on the dress once. It has intricate beading from top to bottom, and it is extremely delicate. Any imperfections caused by improper handling WILL become future costs, paid by me, in alterations. For obvious reasons, I intend to handle my dress with utmost care until my wedding day, and I expected that others would do the same.
Consequently, I was shocked that as soon as I arrived for my appointment, and I turned away to help my mother sit down, a staff person had taken my box, UNPACKED MY DRESS, removed it from the garment bag, and unceremoniously hung it against a wall, without asking my permission or even verbally notifying me that she was doing so.
Then, the same staff person began casually handling my dress as she talked, with no apparent purpose, plucking continuously at the sides and bodice of the dress with her fingers. Her fingers were covered in jewelry just waiting to snag on the material. My breath caught in my throat.
After a minute of this (in which my mother protested at the risk of her jewelry snagging, which the staff person ignored), I finally asked the staff person if she could please not touch my dress needlessly.
She stepped back from the dress. But she then responded by telling me that "it's just a dress," and I "need to learn to relax." She insisted that they handle wedding dresses all the time, and that they knew what they were doing.
That may be true. However, I am not sorry to say that my wedding dress is NOT "just" a dress, it is my one and only wedding dress, which I traveled to another city to find, and purchased at great expense. I cherish it and hope to keep it in the best possible condition until my wedding day, when it can get dirty or damaged as it likes.
This was not an isolated incident. At least one other staff person similarly approached the dress and casually began handling it as she talked, when there was no cause for her to do so. Again, this staff person's hands were also covered in jewelry, just waiting to snag on the beads. I finished that interaction feeling stunned, like a deer in the headlights.
In fairness, after this, we were able to have a productive appointment. The staff were flexible in accommodating my interest in a custom veil; they had good ideas to re-use my mother's wedding gown; and they had a good selection of accessories at better-than-typical prices. However, due to the shock of my initial experience, I would have left immediately, if it weren't for the fact that my elderly mother was with me-- a rare occasion, since her health limits her ability to go out-- and I didn't want to spoil the experience for her.
Be cautious. Relatively good prices may not justify doing business here.