Solid grass green from the neckline all the way past your hip — and then,
somewhere down the skirt, it detonates. Great outlined blooms in turquoise,
chartreuse and white, graphic bands running between them, and a deep plum border
grounding the whole thing at the floor.

Look at where the colour starts. That's the design. The green runs unbroken from
the striped band at your neckline down over the waist and the hip — one long
column — and the print doesn't begin until the skirt has already swung well clear
of you. So all that colour happens out in the air, on cloth that's moving. Never
against you.

Matte linen is what makes that work. Close and seamed through the bodice and
ribs, then away into a skirt with real body and a very full sweep — it skims
rather than clings, which is the entire argument for linen over anything with a
shine to it. The back is smocked, so it grips across your ribs and holds the fine
straps exactly where you set them. Adhesive cups underneath and you're done.

As for the colour — green, turquoise and plum happen to be three of the loudest
things in fashion this year, and if you've ever been told to play it safer after
fifty, the women who dress women for a living now say the opposite: head-to-toe
neutral is the riskier choice. The dress grounds itself with that plum hem.
Everything else you wear stays quiet. Let it lead.

Linen · fine shoulder straps · straight neckline with contrast striped band · fitted seamed bodice with smocked back · very full A-line maxi skirt · engineered placement print — solid through the bodice and upper skirt, large-scale floral across the lower skirt, solid band at the hem · close through the bodice and ribs, full and away through the skirt · saturated grounds read fully opaque · size to your bust; the smocked back gives across the ribs · model is 5'7" and wears a size M · in Wildflower Meadow · machine wash cold, gentle cycle, hang to dry, warm iron while damp