Every girl needs a prom dress and Sudbury Women’s Centre ready to help

Any graduation is a major milestone and for many girls, the prom dress is of the utmost importance for the big night. But in today’s economy, the perfect dress seems out of reach for some.

But for the third year, the Sudbury Women’s Centre is stepping in to help bring the dress dream to life.

“We get a lot of schools that reach out to us wondering if we have prom dresses that have been donated, and we do get a lot of dresses donated, so we thought it would be a great idea to just host an entire event and help out the community,” explained Valerie Cunningham, manager of My Sister’s Closet and volunteer co-ordinator at the SWC.

On a Monday night in April, the Sudbury Women’s Centre will be transformed into a high-end boutique filled with hundreds of garments awaiting eager graduates.

“Over the last few years, we’ve had up to 300 dresses and graduates can come — whether they’re Grade 8 graduates, high school graduates, or university or college graduates — they can come and shop our dresses for $5,” Cunningham said. “Of course, if they don’t have $5, we will gladly give them the dress of their dreams for free. We do have a limit of two dresses per graduate, but it helps the community get dresses for a very low cost. We’ve had great success over the last few years and so we just want to keep doing it.”

(Grade 8 graduates will need to be accompanied by a parent or caregiver).

This year’s event takes place on April 13 from 6-8 p.m. at the SWC HQ, located at 174 Douglas St.

So far this year, the women’s centre has amassed about 70 dresses, though Cunningham said they hope to collect about 300. What is not distributed in April will be stored for next year’s celebrations.

Cunningham said dresses range in style — and era — from “vintage, puffy sleeves to ball gowns, to just a simple silk layover and just a very regular, almost like a business casual dress. We have a lot of options and a lot of different sizes.”

While they are not completely size-inclusive, Cunningham said generally the dresses range from size small to a 3x (although the organization would love donations of larger sizes).

“When we put our post out, we say for all sizes, and it’s whatever we get on donation, of course, but over the last few years, we’ve been very lucky to have all of the sizes from really tiny to 3x,” she noted. “I do find even with our regular clothing, we don’t get a lot of sizing over 3x.”

She said on April 13, the women’s centre will be “exactly like a boutique.” However, there will no room for an entourage, since the evening can get quite busy.

“I have six rolling racks that I roll out with all the dresses on them, sized and in colour,” she said. “There’s lots of room to shop, but we do only have the one changing room, which gets very busy.”

Cunningham encourages patrons to arrive in leggings and a tight tank top to facilitate the shopping experience. She said the atmosphere on prom night generally resembles that of a pop-up wedding dress salon.

“There’s no change rooms and you just get what you can, try it on,” she said. “It’s set up kind of like that just because we don’t have the space.”

The skyrocketing cost of living is a near-daily headline. Families are cutting corners and trying to stretch their dollars. An increasing number of people are turning to non-profit groups like the Sudbury Women’s Centre.

Cunningham said since April 1, 2025, the SWC has had more than 300 new intakes.

“It is great that we’re here, but it’s sad on how high demand we are,” she commented.

The economy is changing the demographics of the people accessing My Sister’s Closet, one of the flagship programs at the SWC that provides women, girls, trans and non-binary individuals with clothing, accessories, undergarments and hygiene products at no cost.

“That’s where we’ve had to put the limit on dresses,” Cunningham said. “We have seen, unfortunately, in the past, girls coming and just grabbing lots of dresses and then selling them online. So that’s where our limit of two has come in. We just hope everybody uses the service fairly and just grabs what they need.”

Cunningham said clients of the women’s centre run the gamut of demographics.

“It’s pretty even across the board — single moms, single ladies, older people,” she said. “Because I work in (My Sister’s) Closet, I see all of our clients, and it’s pretty even across the board. You just have to be 16 to be a client.”

But, “you don’t have to be a client to come to prom night,” she added. “That’s open for everyone.”

She said the SWC sees a lot of new grads who want to donate a dress they may have gotten from the organization the previous year.

“It’s kind of like paying it forward, right? You got it here, and then you give it back — that is so great,” Cunningham commented.