This has been a brutal winter in the war I’ve been waging against my natural tendency to dress like a 12-year-old skater boy. Some battles, I won. Others, well, I fell back, retreating into my old routine of jeans and t-shirts.
Still, I feel like I’ve made a little progress here and there…
After the dust settles, when all is said and done, I think I’ll look back at the day I came across the Pieced Column Dress by Bailey 44 ($178) on the Anthropologie website as the turning point in the war — the day I took a major step toward dressing like a 30-something-year-old woman with a quirky sense of style.
It was the reviews that made the difference. So positive, so encouraging. They convinced me that this war could actually be won. People were talking about how the dress made them look taller, slimmer, curvier and cuter. Basically, they made it sound like the fabric equivalent of a minor miracle, so of course I had to try it on.
I drove down to the closest Anthropologie store and tried on the dress in Neutral Motif (it’s also available in Navy).
I was careful not to get my hopes up too high, though, remembering that stripes usually make me look wider and shorter, but I’ll be a monkey’s uncle — I think it had the opposite effect.
Man, I really love this dress. 🙂 Everything about it except the price (and the fact that it’s dry-clean only).
I feel like I look 10 pounds lighter and three inches taller when I have it on, which must have to do with the design, with its stripes that zigzag at different angles. They seem to slim the tummy and highlight curves at the same time.
The gal who was helping me said that she’d seen a whole bunch of women try the dress on, and it looked good on everyone, women of all different body shapes and sizes.
So cool. And it’s even comfortable. Very comfortable. It’s made from rayon and spandex, so it’s soft and stretchy like a pair of yoga pants for your whole body.
I usually dress it down with boots and a denim jacket, but I also like the way it looks jazzed up with heels and a black blazer.
Then, I looked to my right, and Tabs appeared next to me. He was also being carried by beautiful balloons and had the strings tied around his tum. I was worried that his balloons would take him off in a different direction, but he managed to stay next to me, and we floated side by side above the green hills and country villages below.
