---
title: "Lace for a wedding dress: guipure, Chantilly, embroidery - FREYA atelier"
description: "Kinds of lace for a wedding dress: Chantilly, guipure, three-dimensional flowers, hand embroidery. How to choose lace for your silhouette and fabric. Made to order in St Petersburg."
url: https://en.freyawedding.ru/blog/tkani/kruzhevo-v-svadebnom-plate-gipyur-shantili-ruchnaya-vyshivka
date: 2026-07-14
section: Ткани
tags: кружево, гипюр, шантильи, вышивка, ткани
---

# Lace on a wedding dress: guipure, Chantilly, hand embroidery - what the difference is

A look at the kinds of lace used on a wedding dress, from French Chantilly to raised guipure, and how to work out which one suits your design.

Category: [Ткани](https://en.freyawedding.ru/blog/tkani)

Lace is the detail that makes a wedding dress recognisable and unmistakably yours. But the word lace covers dozens of different fabrics, from airy Chantilly to dense guipure, and each behaves differently in the cut. Here are the main kinds.

## Chantilly

A fine French lace with a characteristic floral or botanical pattern on a light net ground. Semi-sheer and delicate, it is most often used on sleeves, on inserts at the neckline and as an overlay on a denser bodice fabric. It rarely carries a whole dress on its own because of how fragile it is.

## Guipure

A dense, raised lace with no net ground - the pattern looks cut out and holds its own shape. It works both as the fabric of the whole bodice and as trim along the hem and the corset. More graphic and more structured than Chantilly, it suits anyone who wants decoration that is noticeable without being overloaded.

## Lace with three-dimensional flowers

Raised flowers, embroidered or sewn on over net - the most decorative option. It is usually used to accent particular areas: a shoulder, the neckline, the train. A whole dress in this lace is rare and calls for a restrained silhouette with no other decoration, or the look becomes too much.

## Lace appliqué on net

Individual lace motifs are sewn onto a sheer net ground, giving the effect of flowers floating on the skin. A popular solution for illusion panels on the back and sleeves.

## Hand embroidery

Not quite lace, but it often comes paired with it: beads, sequins, silk threads and pearls are sewn on by hand along the outline of the lace pattern, or make a pattern of their own. This is the most labour-intensive part of the work on a dress, and most often what determines the final price and the time it takes.

## How to choose lace for your dress

- **Body type and where the accent goes** - large-patterned lace draws the eye, so it should cover the area you want to emphasise rather than conceal.
- **Density against airiness** - Chantilly and appliqué on net give lightness and delicacy, guipure gives structure and graphic definition.
- **How it sits with the base fabric** - satin and mikado contrast with sheer lace, while silk works more softly and blends more smoothly. We covered fabrics in detail [in a separate article](/blog/tkani/tkani-dlya-svadebnogo-platya).
- **Season** - dense lace with a lining is warmer than light net if the wedding is in winter.

## Lace and price

Premium lace (French, hand-finished) costs noticeably more than basic guipure, and hand embroidery is priced separately for the labour it takes - this is not a brand mark-up but hours of painstaking hand work. How the decoration affects the price of your particular design is something we work out at the consultation.

## How to choose it in person

Lace has to be seen and touched in both daylight and evening light - on a phone screen the texture and transparency distort far more than they do with ordinary fabric. At a [consultation](/#booking) at the atelier we show samples of lace and embroidery and find the one that will work on your silhouette.

## In brief: common questions

**Can a dress be made entirely of Chantilly?**
Technically yes, but it is more often used as an accent - being fragile and semi-sheer, such a dress needs a dense lining.

**Which is cheaper, guipure or Chantilly?**
Usually guipure: it is simpler to produce and does not need the delicate hand work that French lace does.

**How do I tell whether lace will age the look?**
Look at the density of the pattern and the scale of the motif: a small, delicate pattern reads as more modern and lighter than a large dense old-style ornament.