Cinderella’s Closet has been turning fashion dreams into reality for women across Ireland for over a decade now, from beautiful bridal gowns to the perfect Debs dress, their offerings are all curated under founder Claire Dilworth’s watchful eye.
Based in a sprawling 3,000sq ft showroom in North Point House on the New Mallow Road, the boutique is known for its impeccable line up of designers, its community spirit, its talented team of stylists and its commitment to consideration when it comes to the needs of its clients. A family run business, Claire’s showroom of gowns began in 2010, and has grown to become one of Ireland’s most recognisable names in occasion wear.
While the doors of Cinderella’s Closet swung open in 2010, Claire’s fashion endeavours began with a simple idea – dress rental. “Claire’s Dresses” sparked her foray into occasion wear, and translated itself into the boutique we know and love today. “That was a long time ago, it must have been 20 odd years ago! I got Debs and bridesmaid dresses and I started hiring them out from my box room. It was a very busy business, once I started, my phone started ringing instantly.” Due to the quality control issues that come with renting dresses – sometimes they would come back damaged, she moved away from rental. “I was having to ring somebody who had an event in three weeks time and say, ‘I’m so sorry, your dress has been damaged. It’s not fit to be worn,’ and that broke their heart. That’s when I decided that hiring wasn’t the best option, but my phone used to be ringing all the time, asking if I sold wedding dresses. And that’s when I decided I need to do something about that.”
Like the vast majority of businesses, the finances were the biggest leap of faith Claire took to get the doors of her bridal boutique open. Luckily, and thanks to her hard work, it paid off, and 15 years later, Cinderella’s Closet is still uniting brides, debutants and more with their perfect dresses. Her roster of designers includes Justin Alexander, Enzoani, Dando London, Sophia Tolli, Enchanting, Tiffany’s Bridal, Martin Thornburg , and Casablanca.
“We know our designers are top designers, their collections are out of this world, and it takes a long time for a world renowned designer to agree to bring their collection into one boutique that’s going to represent them, so you have to build up a rapport with designers, and we work with them, they work with us, so everything runs smoothly,” says Claire.
Aside from their premium collections, in recent years, Cinderella’s Closet has continued to earn top industry recognition, winning RSVP’s “Best Wedding Dress Selection” Award in 2023, achieving the title of “Ireland’s Top Bridal Boutique” at the Excellence in Business Awards, and receiving the “Best Bridal Boutique of the Year Ireland” award at the 2019 Corporate Excellence Awards. Claire credits her team’s authentic customer service for their industry and client recognition: “Your customer needs to trust you and you need to get to know your brides, your communion children and your Debs attendees. You spark up a relationship with them because you’re going to be meeting them several times as part of a huge day in their life. You need to show you genuinely care, which we do. Our customers know that everyone working here is genuine and that they have an actual passion for it, because it is a lovely industry to work in. You’re meeting fabulous people at a very happy stage in their life. We have a great reputation so they know they’re in safe hands.”
These relationships with designers and customers are key, but Claire’s personal relationships are a core element of her family-run business. Originally she set up and co-founded Cinderella’s Closet with her sister Annette, with Annette taking her career in her own direction after a few years. Now, Claire has a team of 10 including five family members, and her daughter Shauna and sister Mairead are essential member of the team.
Claire says that while some people may advise that working with family does not always work out well, they have been lucky that it has. In fact, she and Shauna are extremely close, enjoying how they share the work. ”My daughter is working here now over 12 years, and she is a massive part of this business. We are just so close when it comes to business and our personal lives, but we have a huge common interest. We are never struggling for anything to talk about. She has the passion that I have. We get to go on amazing buying trips around the world, and it has just been an amazing experience for both of us.”
“It means everything” to Claire to be able to say her business is family owned and operated: “We all love it. And to be able to have a family work together and make dreams happen and run a business is amazing. It is people you can trust and we share an equal love between us all for this business. Those relationships are so important,” she adds, recalling how lovely it is to have her nieces working for her over the years to help support themselves through their studies.
She credits the community across Cork and the country as a whole for their loyalty in supporting Irish businesses, and her customers for coming back to her boutique time and time again. Claire is humble when asked about her generosity and the incredible ways in which she has given back to her locality. The boutique has never publicised their acts of kindness, but grateful customers have spoken out about them: “It is the customers who have spread the word. We do it because we’re all moms. If we see a case where we find that it’s so touching, and that if we can possibly help this family, it’s a no brainer for me. It just is something that I am blessed to be able to do. It raises all of our spirits, and particularly the person that we’re helping,” Claire explains.
No day looks exactly the same for the businesswoman. Working across the three consultation suites, she could be manning the reception, answering plenty of calls and emails, handling stock orders or planning social media posts. Her favourite thing is the face to face work, providing consultations with customers. She highlights the joy she feels getting the opportunity to be part of someone’s special moment, where they say yes to their dress. With the demands of the business, it can be hard to be there as much as she would like, but it’s something she does whenever she can :”I am behind the scenes running the business, so I’m probably not meeting as many customers as I would like. I still get to meet a lot, which is great, and it keeps me fresh and it keeps me current in the business,” she adds.
Alongside their busy schedule, with the boutique open from 10AM to 6PM Monday to Friday, and 9.30AM to 5PM on Saturday, they also open Sunday, but by appointment only. These appointments are to be considerate of people who may require additional support when finding their dream dress. “We offer private appointments on Sunday where if somebody has additional needs and might find that they would rather have the shop to themselves rather than coming in when it is busy,” the entrepreneur explains. “I encourage people to contact me and I will arrange a private consultation. We have had amazing feedback from this, with people thinking that finding a dress would be something that they would dread and that they felt that it would end in tears and something they wouldn’t enjoy,” she adds, reflecting on the positive impact this private and quiet experience is for those who need it.
Cinderella’s Closet is a social media hit, starting out with just Facebook back in 2010 when they began, moving on to Instagram as that platform grew in popularity, and now on Tiktok where they have found virality. Claire reflects that social media has changed so much, and is an ever shifting landscape, but it has been an incredible journey adapting to it along the way.
“When we opened, it was only Facebook. We have 25,000 followers on Facebook that we’re so grateful for. Then it moved on to Instagram and now TikTok is huge. My sister Mairead Dilworth handles the social media content and she spends a lot of time exploring what works there. She is videoing all of the behind the scenes aspects and allowing our customers to get a feel for the business, so the customers almost know you before they come into the shop.”
“When it comes to running a business, with social media you really, really need to be on top of it and good at it, and sometimes be a little bit cheeky. Sometimes we will put up a video on TikTok and it will just go absolutely viral. We put up a joke a couple of years ago on TikTok and it hit over six million views. It went all over the world. There were people from Australia commenting and it was fantastic to see that!”
Looking to the future, Claire says her business will always strive to improve and build on the incredible reputation they already have. “I think we’ve got it right and our customers are happy. Working on staying current and just welcoming all our new collections in really is the future.”
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