I have bought summer dresses for forty years. This is the first one I have written a letter about
I have bought summer dresses for forty years. This is the first one I have written a letter about
Six things the Georgina gets right that the others get wrong, from a customer who checked every one of them.
Maggie Whitfield · Customer · Cheshire · 5 min read
I am Maggie, I am 67, and I want to say at the start that I do not work for anybody and I have never made a dress in my life. What I have done is buy them, for forty years, and be let down by most of them.
The one I am writing about is called the Georgina, from Manchester Boutique, a small British boutique that has been quietly dressing women our age for a few years now. I own it in two colours, women stop me about it at the market, and when the boutique asked if they could put my letter up for others to read, I said yes, on the condition I could be completely honest in it.
Here is what forty years of buying taught me. Summer dresses for women our age come in two piles. The first pile looks lovely on the hanger and clings to your middle the moment the heat finds you. The second pile is comfortable and makes you look like you have given up. Season after season I bought from one pile, regretted it, and bought from the other.
Cool and shapeless, or pretty and clinging. Nobody should still be choosing between those at our age.
The Georgina is the first dress I have owned that refuses both piles, and having studied it like a suspicious woman studies a bargain, I can tell you it comes down to six things.
The morning it arrived. I had my doubts and my tape measure ready.
The pleats fall straight over your middle
Down the front there is a panel of narrow stitched pleats that open up just below the bust and then fall, straight, past everything you would rather a dress did not report on. It is not a trick and it is not a tent. The shape comes from the pleats, so it skims where other dresses grab. I sat through a full lunch in it, stood up for the photographs after, and did not adjust it once.
The stitched pleats that do all the work. This is the whole secret.
It falls straight over the middle I am self-conscious about instead of hugging it. The first dress in years that does.
Linda K., MacclesfieldIt goes on over your head, and you are dressed
No zip, no buttons, nothing to reach round the back for and nobody to ask for help. It stretches just enough to pull on and then settles where it should. Getting dressed takes the length of the kettle starting, and at our age I consider that a feature worth paying for on its own.
On over my head and done. My shoulder does not allow for back zips any more and this dress does not ask.
Barbara H., ChesterThe sleeves cover the tops of your arms
Short sleeves that end exactly where a woman my age wants them to end, over the top of the arm, without adding any warmth underneath. It is such a simple thing and almost nobody does it. Most dresses give you bare shoulders or a sleeve that makes you hotter. These do neither.
The neckline and the sleeve. Covered where you want covering, cool everywhere else.
Finally sleeves that cover the tops of my arms and do not make me warm. I have stopped carrying a cardigan everywhere.
Patricia W., WilmslowThe neckline flatters without oversharing
A soft open scoop that sits properly on a real neck and collarbone. Low enough to be feminine, high enough that you can bend over the raised beds without giving the street a show. I tested that personally, weeding.
The neckline is exactly right. Pretty without being daring, and it does not gape when I lean forward.
Susan D., KnutsfordIt is not see-through in bright sun
I have been caught out by summer dresses before, so I did the test nobody does until it is too late. I stood in the garden at midday and had my husband walk round me. Fully opaque, even with the sun behind. You can wear it out of the house with your mind on other things, which is the whole point of a summer dress.
I have been embarrassed by see-through dresses before. Not this one, not even in full sun on holiday.
Janet R., AltrinchamFour florals that go with what you already own
Red poppies on white, a yellow meadow, a soft painterly blue, and a navy with little white flowers. Every one of them sits happily with the sandals and cardigans already in your wardrobe, which is why the women who buy one tend to go back. I started with the red and went back for the navy. I am watching the yellow.
The four of them together. Choosing one is the hardest part of the whole business.
I started with the blue and went back for the poppies. They go with everything I own.
Maureen T., SaleThe Georgina, against the dresses you have been buying
You can find a summer dress for fifty pounds almost anywhere. I know, because I have bought a great many of them. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.
Cling to the middle the moment the heat comes up
A zip or buttons you need help with
Bare shoulders, or sleeves that add warmth
Go see-through in bright sun
One loud print, or beige
Stitched pleats that fall straight over the middle
On over your head, no closures at all
Sleeves that cover the tops of the arms, no extra heat
Fully opaque, even at midday
Four soft florals that go with what you own
About the price
The Georgina is £26.95 at the moment. It was £50.00.
I will pass on what the boutique told me, which is that they are clearing the summer stock as the season turns, and once it has gone it is gone until next year. Their words, not mine. What I can tell you from my side is that at that price I did not deliberate long over the second colour, and that the popular florals were already thin in the middle sizes when I went back.
I also did what I imagine you are doing now and read the reviews before my first order. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars. Not the suspiciously perfect five you see on some websites, which if I am honest made me trust it rather more. The same six things I have just walked you through come up in them, over and over, in other women’s words.
Folded and ready to go back in the drawer. It has not stayed there long all summer.
If you have ever wanted a summer dress that keeps you cool without clinging, this is the one I would put in your hands myself, while the colours are still in stock.
Maggie
GEORGINA | Elegant Summer Dress
- Stitched front pleats that fall straight over the middle
- Pulls on over your head, no zips or buttons
- Short sleeves that cover the tops of the arms
- Fully opaque, even in bright sun
- Four florals, UK sizes 8 to 20
- Free UK delivery & 30 day returns
Summer stock clearing now. The popular florals go first.