Every girl used to have a bottom drawer. People even gave you presents for it
In it went the things you would need once you were safely carried over the threshold in the arms or your groom into the home of your own
Well not everything. Not furniture or toasters or a best china teaset, probably just household linens plus lingerie. Much of it lovingly stitched by your own fair hand. Lingerie with exquisitely rolled & hand-stitched hems. Embroidered tray cloths, chair backs & runners, plus table cloths of the kind which sell for astonishing sums in specialist shops today. Towels. Sheets for the bed.
My wedding present from one grandmother was a pair of linen sheets which she had smuggled from Ireland, wrapped around her diminutive form under her top coat, in the days of post war austerity. They had spent the intervening years carefully stored away. Unfortunately they did not long survive the rigours of regular washing – they had already begun to rot slightly along the folded creases
The content of the bottom drawer of todays unmarried woman is destined for an even shorter life
One in five single women already saving for their dream wedding before they have even found Mr Right according to a new survey, but it all goes on the big day & the honeymoon
