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 The
Wedding Counselor
Let’s say (hypothetically speaking, of course) that
you are a bona fide wedding-phobe who somehow finds
herself in need of a gown. So you visit the usual
department stores and you check out a few mega-bridal
websites, and you become so overwhelmed by the
process that you refuse to look at wedding dresses
at all – until suddenly it becomes apparent that if
you don’t select one very, very soon, you’ll be
walking down the aisle in your best pair of jeans,
flip-flops, and a white t-shirt.
Enter Julia Elena George, the proud owner of Casa
Mauricio, a bridal boutique right outside of
Washington, D.C. that boasts thousands of clients in
the nation’s capital and worldwide. In addition to
making and selling elegant, simple, and affordable
gowns, Julia Elena also offers service that is so
personalized it borders on therapeutic.
Whenever a customer makes an appointment at Casa
Mauricio, Julia Elena sits down with her for at
least an hour. After going through the usual
questions about the time, tone, and theme of the
wedding, Julia Elena delves into the bride’s psyche,
asking about her personality, her taste, and even
about her insecurities and fears.
Julia Elena’s approach may be unique, but it’s not
surprising. As a little girl in Arequipa, Peru
during the 1960s, she wanted to be a psychologist,
but she had also inherited her mother’s knack for
sewing. When it came time to enroll in college, she
was a mere two exam points shy of the requirement
for a psychology program. Although she was initially
depressed, her father – an accomplished furniture-maker
– prompted her to consider an alternative course of
study. “[He] said, ‘I know what you can do – there
is a college that teaches sewing, drafting, and
designing that would be perfect for you,’” she
recalls.
Julia Elena’s college, the Bien del Hogar Academy,
turned out to be a wonderful place for her. “My
training prepared me to work in the fashion industry,
in manufacturing, in teaching, or in small business,”
she recalls. “I took courses in sewing, cutting,
textiles, and drafting. I also studied accounting,
classical music and Spanish and English grammar. I
even studied psychology!” After she graduated at the
top of her class, her father – who had taken a
second job to help pay the tuition – was “the
happiest man in the world.”
After her graduation at the top of her class, family
obligations took Julia Elena to Germany. “I was at
home most days, and I didn’t know the language,” she
recalls. So she began to study German, bought a
small sewing machine and started making her own
clothes. Before long, other women began noticing her
beautiful dresses and asking her to design some for
them. “That was the beginning of everything,” she
says. “It was all word of mouth - I didn’t advertise,
but there were so many [clients].”
 That
word of mouth would eventually serve Julia Elena
well when she decided to move to Washington, D.C. a
few years later, in 1978. However, it took her a
while to launch her own business. As an immigrant,
it was hard for her to find work as a professional
fashion designer. “At first, I was employed as a
seamstress and making minimum wage,” she recalls.
But her training and her talents won out when she
was eventually recruited to work in the couture
salon at Neiman Marcus, an upscale department store.
It was there that she got her big break.
“One day, [my boss] called to say we needed a fitter
for a lady who was buying eight expensive dresses,”
she recounted. “When I got in the dressing-room and
saw the woman, I wanted to tell her that the dresses
were not the right print or style for her. Then, she
asked me what I thought about them, saying, ‘You
seem honest. Tell me the truth: do you like this
dress on me?’” Following her best instincts, Julia
Elena talked the woman out of buying the dresses. It
was only afterwards that she found out that her
client was none other than Barbara Bush, then the
vice-president’s wife.
“When [Mrs. Bush] came back for her fitting, I told
myself to be calm,” she laughs. “And then she asked
me if I could take charge of fixing her clothes!”
Shortly afterwards, Julia Elena decided to open her
own studio. With startup capital from her husband,
she bought an industrial sewing machine, an iron,
and a table on which to cut the dresses. After that,
it was only a matter of time before Julia Elena had
built up a clientele among the city’s power elite.
By the early eighties, she was altering clothes for
Nancy Reagan and U.S. Treasurer Catherine Davalos
Ortega, in addition to selling cocktail suits and
evening gowns of her own design.
It was then that she branched into the bridal
industry. “I continued doing my own business, but
here and there I made a wedding dress, and I thought
they were really special,” she recalls. Eventually,
demand for the bridal wear grew to the point that
she decided to complement her designs by selling
bridesmaid’s dresses from Watters and Watters.
“Their dresses most reflected my own ideology –
feminine and elegant, with simple lines,” she
explains. When the company began making bridal gowns,
she began selling them as well.
Today, Julia Elena’s store, which brings in about
$150,000 per year, is located slightly outside of
Washington, D.C., in downtown Silver Spring,
Maryland. She also maintains a website,
www.casamauricio.com, that attracts clients
worldwide. Like most Latina businesswomen, Julia
Elena has big plans for the future. “I’m hoping that
soon my annual revenue will triple or double. I have
el conocimiento, la fuerza, la voluntad, y la fe,”
she asserts.
The store’s success is a great source of
satisfaction for Julia Elena. But one of the most
rewarding things about her career has been seeing
the response of her father, now 86 years old. “Casa
Mauricio is named after him, and he is so happy and
proud to see his name all over the world,” she says.
She is also grateful to her husband and her three
sons, whose constant support contributed to the
survival and success of her business.
 Today,
Casa Mauricio is a full-service bridal salon, where
Julia Elena and Salome, her Argentine compañera,
business associate, and tango buddy, offer jewelry,
accessories, undergarments, gifts, antiques, and
even crystal vases in addition to custom-made
dresses and Watters gowns. “It has a vintage
atmosphere – I didn’t want to have just a regular
store,” she smiles. “I wanted to maintain the
personalized service that I created at the beginning
of my career.”
And that’s just what she has done. She admits that
working with brides can sometimes be challenging,
but she certainly knows how to handle them. “We all
have different personalities, and sometimes they
come in with tempers – they might be really paranoid
because they can’t find a dress, or because they
think they know exactly what they want,” she
explains. “So I ‘prepare the land’ by making them
feel comfortable enough to forget they came in a bad
mood!”
So, for all the nervous brides out there – whether
hypothetical or not – Julia Elena offers just the
right mix of confidence and reassurance. Perhaps she
puts it best: “I’m not only in the business of
weddings. I’m in the marriage business as well!”
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