A fuchsia-colored, cascading tiered gown with an intricately beaded bodice was brought to a Faribault church last Saturday. The gown came with its original $480 price tags on a custom-made hanger with a name.
In an emotional exchange, a mother told Hope Grambart that her daughter never had a chance to wear the dress last year. Her daughter died before prom.
“We’ve never had a story quite like this,” said Hope. “This one’s a real tearjerker.”
Hope said the grieving mother, who asked not to be identified in this story, waited a year to donate the dress to Cinderella’s Closet at Hope.
“The mother saw our Facebook post and said she wanted another girl to live out her daughter’s dream,” Hope said.
Hope, Heather and Holly Grambart — the sisters who run Cinderella’s Closet at Hope prom dress giveaway — send out flyers each year to the counselors of area schools in Faribault, Northfield, Denison, Nerstrand and Kenyon. They also post some of the dresses on a Facebook page.
The sisters wiped away the tears as they prepared for their first distribution of 2024. Holly covered one of the four mannequins in the church hallway with the dress, tucking the price tags underneath the fabric.
A few hours later, Taylor Smith walked into the church with her mother, Sarah. The pair started looking through the racks, selecting five or six dresses for Taylor to try on. Taylor modeled each gown for her mother and the Grambart sisters, who offered comments on the fit, color, fabric and more.
None were quite right. The first few dresses were too light in color and seemed to wash out Taylor’s pale skin. Then Taylor mentioned the fuchsia dress worn by one of the hallway mannequins. Holly quickly fetched the dress off the mannequin.
Taylor came out of the dressing room with a huge grin on her face. All three Grambarts nodded and offered their compliments. And Taylor said “yes” to the dress.
And then “yes” to shoes, a handbag and jewelry.
Hope then shared the story behind Taylor chosen dress. Taylor, a junior at Northfield Area Learning Center, and Sarah, an educational assistant at Greenvale Park Elementary in Northfield, wiped tears from their eyes. So did Holly and Heather.
The Grambart sisters have shed tears together in the decade plus of operating the prom dress giveaway, but more often, they have shared peals of laughter.
The sisters came up with the giveaway concept after meeting a couple of teens at Hope Church who couldn’t afford to buy a prom dress. The Faribault Methodist church has been hosting the charitable event since the prom dress giveaway launched.
So, the idea was hatched of starting an ongoing mission that not only helped girls afford a prom dress, but also helped them enjoy a prom experience “of their dreams.”
When the Grambart sisters reached out to their friends in 2013, they collected 50 donated dresses that first year.
Since that first year, the sisters estimated they have given away more than 1,600 dresses. Most of the dresses are donated, while others were purchased at minimal cost from area Goodwill stores and others bought from Facebook Marketplace.
Not only are the dresses worn during high school junior-senior proms, they also have been worn to area military functions, Special Olympics events, county fair dinners and even a few weddings.
“We don’t care where the dresses are worn, as long as the wearer is happy,” said Heather.
For the last four years, a donor from South Dakota has brought a carload of dresses. This year, the sisters received about 80 dresses, representing the latest in prom dress trends. Holly said the trends in today’s prom dresses seems to be two-piece gowns, gowns with heavy beading and gowns with pockets for cellphones and keys.
Shopping spree
Four mannequins greet visitors as they walk in the middle doors from the Hope Church parking lot. A rack of vintage gowns stands in the coat closet off the main hallway. Upon entering the church sanctuary, shoppers find rows and rows of tall dress racks placed on either side of a center aisle.
At the top of each rack is a clearly marked dress size. “We always tell the girls to try on dresses around their true size because all the styles fit differently and every body shape is different,” Hope said.
Heather said the sisters enjoy picking out dresses as much as the girls do.
“We have a lot of fun and laugh a lot,” she said. “The most rewarding thing is seeing a girl get so excited when she finds the perfect dress.”
Holly nodded in agreement and said seeing a girl’s face “light up” is nearly as worthwhile as all the hugs the sisters’ receive from happy teens, mothers, grandmothers and aunts.
“What’s really adorable are the single dads,” she said. “They’re usually shy and often uncomfortable, but ever so grateful for our help with their daughters. Especially when we step into the dressing room to zip them up.”
A three-way mirror stands in front of the church’s altar. On either side are the dressing rooms fashioned into a horseshoe shape from room dividers.
Today, the sisters estimate they have around 2,000 gowns in their inventory, which ranges in size from petite to plus sizes. The styles range from short to long, puffy to sleek, elegant to folksy, patterned to plain, all in a rainbow of colors.
“If you want an opinion that is not your mother’s, we are here for you,” Hope said.
“The dress may not look good on the hanger, that’s why we want the girls to try everything on,” said Holly.
The teen shoppers come from St. Paul, Cambridge, Red Wing, but also from Iowa, North Dakota, Texas and Wisconsin, said Heather. “We even had a foreign exchange student at Shattuck-St. Mary’s who was from Australia or maybe it was New Zealand.”
“We like to tell the juniors to choose a boring design so that when they’re seniors they can go big and go bling,” said Hope.
When Taylor and her mom left the church last Saturday afternoon, they repeatedly said thank you as Taylor carried her new formal gown that had been carefully zipped into a long, white dress bag, as if they were leaving Macy’s, or Bloomingdales and not a church on the outskirts of Faribault.
“Today was truly a combination of fate and faith,” Heather said as she watched the pair walk to the parking lot.
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