Friends daughter(16) ruined designer dress

[kidditsonyou]

DSD (22) works around fashion so has a lot of clothes and often gets designer items at good price.

Friend asked if her daughter could borrow a dress for her 16th birthday. I asked DSD who agreed, she often lends clothes to friends and family. Dress chose and borrowed was very expensive and covered in intricate beading, DSD got it heavily reduced but still cost several hundred. DSD says she heavily pushed for daughter to try it on while she was there but she refused, was told it fit perfectly.

Dress returned today and is very damaged.
Zip tape is ripped, Inside lining is ripped and main body is very stretched and warped. Several areas of beading damaged and quite a lot of beads missing. No mention of this when dropped off.

DSD reckons is not repairable / not worth repairing because of the amount of different areas of damage. Previous plan was that DSD would also lend a prom dress.
DSD is very kind and anxious, she is not likely to kick up a fuss or demand anything but is upset. I feel responsible as the initial conversation came through me.

What’s reasonable in this situation? It’s not unreasonable to refuse lending of prom dress and also request at least the price DSD paid for the dress, is it? (Though she wouldn’t be able to get the same dress at that price again)
I know this would be a lot of money for friend

I do agree with this. I feel very sorry for your SD but this does tend to happen to dresses with intricate beading, they often come with spare beading because of this in a tiny bag. Im not sure what's fair really.

This a million times! Then when you get a reaction from your friend you can take it from there . But as a minimum, no prom dress

I would take a harder line than that and would expect it to be replaced. The fact that DSD paid hundreds for it is irrelevant; if it now costs thousands to replace on a like for like basis, then that’s what should happen. Being cynical, I wonder whether that’s a way of stressing to the friend how extreme this situation is. She hasn’t borrowed a pair of M&S socks and returned them looking a bit grubby; she’s taken a really high value item and not taken adequate care of it.

I used to have beautiful clothes and learned early doors not to lend them out, not to anyone, as this is the result.
Your DSD is not going to get any joy here.
Letting such a young girl borrow an expensive, beaded dress is a recipe for disaster.
Tell the girl’s mother how much it cost, that it’s hard to replace, but she owes DSD compensation.
Then it’s a hard no to the room dress. Your friend is a CF for asking.
Your DSD is kind but encourage her not to be so compliant again.
I wouldn’t even lend stuff to my mum after she put a cigarette hole in a beautiful skirt!
I did tell my mum/friends that when I’d finished with things I’d pass them on. No Vinted back then!

I definitely would not be lending her another dress. I would make sure she is aware of that now as she will want time to find something else. I agree with sending photos and explaining how the other dress was returned and this is why your DSD won't be lending her anything else. I am not sure she will offer any money so you might have to just write this off.

I think I would talk to your DSD about keeping her clothes to herself. It sounds like she is being kind sharing some of her outfits with friends. But there is the risk of damage like this happening and not being able to get the item replaced. There is a good chance the friends don't realise the cost of the dresses if she has said she gets them discounted, or maybe the friends believe they are knock offs or faulty hence why she can have them and they aren't sold at full price (not that this should matter, but maybe the true value isn't acknowledged).

Actions have consequences so for me I would send the Mum photos of the dress and say how disappointed you are that the expensive dress was treated like that and make it clear no other dresses would be loaned out.

Absolutely do NOT lend anything else to this friend or her daughter!! It would have been reasonable to refuse in the first place, and certainly to insist on checking that the dress was a fit before lending, but what's done is done.

I don't think there's any hard and fast rule or consensus on what should be offered, but if I were in your friend's position I would feel that it's only fair to either have the dress repaired (if possible) or to offer the amount it would cost your SD to replace the dress, whether with an identical one or the nearest available equivalent. I'd be aware when making the offer that that amount might be considerably higher than what SD originally paid. How the friend works this out with her daughter, who's presumably the one who damaged the dress, is up to her. And yes, as friend was the one who asked for the dress to be lent and who ferried it back and forth, she should have checked that it was cleaned and undamaged before returning it.

I agree with a lot of what you say, but just wanted to point out that it wasn’t DSDs friends who trashed a dress, she seems to have been able to lend stuff to them and have it returned in good condition- probably because they are all doing it on the basis of mutual trust.

In this case DSD naively thought she could extend this same circle of trust to her DSMs friend. That was the mistake.

I work around fashion too and I can tell you this has happened to me many times.
You may be able to get a new lining in the dress and the beading is time consuming but doable. Lots of high streets have tailors again
I've had designer clothes re lined when Ive been too big and split the lining. I've just had a jacket done. It might cost £100 but worth it if a £1000 dress.

I even had two Vax cleaners broken and a massive argument at Christmas as I wouldn't lend our machine. I now ask for a deposit. They don't want to pay!

You could say the item obviously didn't fit because it's damaged. So she's not lending anything again as it will get messy. Hard to do i know but people really don't care especially if they are drinking.
If the prom daughter is skint all the major charity shops have prom rails or she can hire something.
I'm furious for you.

I would be speaking to her mother and pointing out the amount of damage, and I would not be lending out anything else, it obviously didn't fit her but she's squeezed into it anyway - I'm thinking Kim Kardashian and Marilyn's dress

You absolutely need to step up for your daughter. It's lovely that she is a kind person but unfortunately people can and will take the piss. I hope you manage to get this sorted.

Oh this is difficult. Who among us hasn't squeezed into a gorgeous dress that was just a wee bit tight only to realise that it doomed us to an evening of never dancing or eating? The dress might have been just a bit small but the activity of the evening caused the damage, which wouldn't have been necessarily evident on 'trying on', so it's not on the DSD for not seeing that the dress fitted properly.

I think the friend's DD probably won't care or will deny everything or say that the dress was like that when she borrowed it, so trying to get money back won't get you anything other than a lost friendship. But definitely don't let your DSD lend anything to friend's DD again.

Could DSD set up a clothes hire business on the side?

I’m going to have to take the dress round later, it’s black and I can’t get the damage to show up properly on camera.

Also agree it’s easier to have a reasonable conversation in person, harder to lie and make excuses.

Don't lend a dress for the prom and say it's too expensive to be damaged, like the last one. You can't trust that the same thing won't happen again.

Also to be clear I was not boasting DSD got designer clothes for cheap and advertising her lending services or pressuring DSD to give things to my friends.

DSD makes fashion content on social media and shows a lot of her wardrobe. We have similar circles and friend would have heard DSD has a lent out clothes from others. The offer to lend a prom dress happened first which the value of is a lot less, the dress DSD wore to her prom that we bought her and is not something DSD would really wear again anyway. It’s been lent out many times over the years.

Friend asked if DSD had a dress for her dds birthday on the back of prom dress offer. I assumed it would be a cheaper dress (and that friend and her dd would respect and look after the dress) but I agree it was a bad position for me to put DSD in and I should have at least been there.

Oh dear. I am willing to bet a pound to a penny you are about to have a huge argument and the end of a friendship. If your friend knew of the damage, didnt say anything and returned the dress in such a parlous state, it says a lot about her. I do hope I am wrong. I feel so sorry for your DSD. Such a kind and generous thing to do and this is the way she is repaid. A sad and unpleasant lesson for her, that unfortunately some people do not behave well.

You are an understanding mum and your DD sounds lovely too.

The best thing to do in this situation is to take control of the situation for your DD who didn’t ask for any of this difficulty.

Take photos of the damaged areas of the dress and the overall ruined shape.
Also take a photo of any evidence your DD has of what she paid for it.
Send them to your friend with a note saying that due to the state of the dress upon return, you now realise it is ruined and that you have therefore reimbursed your very upset DD the cost of it in full. You hope she will meet you half way by contributing £xxx as the dress is clearly no longer wearable after lending it to her daughter.
Also be brave enough to say that you are surprised and disappointed that she returned the dress in that state without a word to show any responsibility as it was a shock to see so much damage and to realise that her DD had obviously neglected to take any care in borrowing it.
If she pays up, then that’s fine. If she doesn’t, then at least you know she isn’t a good friend.
Obviously your DD won’t be lending her a prom dress.

I think taking it round to your friend is the best solution. The fact she dropped and ran with it suggests she already knows!

Of course the friend knows how damaged it is, wouldn't they have arranged cleaning before returning it where the damage would have come to light.

I can't imagine borrowing and wearing a designer dress and returning it straight off my back.

I think the least your friend can do is to pay for the dress.Obviously too tight by the seems of it.Who borrows a dress like this if obv too small? Life lesson by the seems of it Do not lend money .Anything valuable .anything at all!

It would be polite to dry-clean the dress before dropping it off, at which point the Mum would surely have noticed the issue. (Unless the 16 year old did the dry clean run.) Just dropping it off dirty is a bit rude.

Obviously they should now not get the free prom hire.

If the other family don’t pay, it would be nice for you to pay your sweet step daughter back. You brokered the deal as a favour to your friend, so it was about love in the bank for you really.

Of course, she’s probably learned not to lend the most expensive dress to a 16 year old. But I wouldn’t have her out of pocket for learning this lesson while doing a favour on your behalf.

I think you're doing the right thing by going round in person, showing your friend the dress and being able to see her reaction. Friend has put you in a really difficult situation here. She must have known it was trashed.

I'm another one who would be cancelling any further dress loans to them after this.

Will the prom dress fit? If this dress had been stretched and damaged by the friends dd squeezing into it, it seems to me that she probably is a bigger size or has a different body shape to dsd.

or, as has been mentioned, it was loaned to someone else......

Doesn't matter. I hope the op has withdrawn their offer of lending the prom dress after this.