Dress: I’ve been pretty resolute over the years that I was not going to buy any explicitly Christmas-themed clothing. Some of this comes from the whole aversion to dress code thing. Some of this comes from the fact that I’m not sure I like Christmas very much, as a holiday concept, let alone as a thing I might want to dress like. When I was a kid, my mother made me a red tartan taffeta ruffled maxi dress with a matching French-smocked pinafore. It was a adorable. I was adorable, swishing around so I could hear that breathy taffeta sound, and curtsying to the Christmas tree as if it were my date to the ball. I grew out of that dress around 1984.
Save a much beloved miniskirt that saw me through my middle school year, I’m pretty sure I have no had anything red plaid since, and certainly nothing full-on Wrapping Paper Plaid. With apologies to the already beleaguered dynasty, Royal Stewart tartan has been fully appropriated by holiday cookie tins and Hot Topic bondage pants. It’s not a thing you just put on and wear out of the house on an ordinary Wednesday unless you work at Olde Worlde Kringlehaus or are a member of Avril Lavigne’s touring band in 2003. Maybe if you’re a professional bagpiper. Maybe.
I certainly have no good excuse for owning this dress. Tartan aside, it also involves tiered-ruffles, a fashion concept I believe was engineered as a soft indoctrination tool for Mormon influencers and trad wives. And yet here we are. What do I blame? Personal weakness and a couple of Bloody Mary’s consumed at last year’s holiday office brunch. Did this dress come from a shop in a hotel lobby? Oh yes it did. Did I also wear this exact same outfit last year on Christmas Eve?
Sweater: I have a real affection for cardigan sweaters. Sometimes this leads people to believe I am more twee than I am, which explains why I have an entire drawer full of whimsical tea accessories and Jane Austen kitsch that people have given me over the years. I bought this extravagant cardigan at an improbable designer boutique, in an improbable edge of the known world resort town, off an even more improbable 90% off sale rack, which likely only existed because the boutique was one of (roughly) four open businesses in town in the off-season. I’d spent the night at one of the others, The Old Edwards Inn, a spa hotel so luxurious I can’t believe they allowed me to set foot on the premises. It was my birthday and I’d just come off of a two-month long panic attack. I felt like I needed irresponsible treatment. So I went up for a massage and some seriously decadent lounging. The Inn delivered. I came out feeling guilty at having been so spoiled, if a little disappointed that I could take the light fixture in my hotel room with me.
We were leaving town when we walked in the store. We were the only customers. The staff, chatty, bored, wore fur vests and clacked on high heeled Gucci snow boots like blonde yetis with Vogue subscriptions. I dug around in the sale rack until I saw glitter. It was Fat Tuesday, so it felt appropriate to walk out with crowns and beads.
Outfit: For the better part of the last two decades, Christmas Eve starts at my house with a visit from my sister’s childhood best friend (and more recently, his husband), Mom’s biscuits and gravy, mimosas, and a lot of adults who should know better screaming and jumping in the driveway when the local fire and rescue sends a ladder truck through the neighborhood with a costumed Santa Claus riding above the cab. The siren squeals and St Nick waves, yelling, “Happy Hannukah! Happy Hannukah!” Everyone else wears their Christmas sweaters. I’m just not a Christmas sweater girl, so this was my solution.
Dress: Ship to Sable, Cloth Boutique, Grove Park Inn, December 2022
Cardigan: Alice+Olivia, Rosenthal’s, Highlands, NC, March 1, 2022
Boots: Dr. Martens, 2022
Earrings: AllSaints, Nordstrom Rack, 2019 (I think)
Tiny Commotions 