Another giraffe dress. This one is perhaps just a little too light-hearted with a Vested Gentress feeling, but is designed by Lori Till for Trillium Fantasy.

It is medium-ish (B38, W up to 28), lightweight cotton. The color is what speaks to me the most. Many pale dames shy away from yellow, but if you remember to wear a blue-based red lipstick it can look thrilling. The stripes remind me of the awnings for Giorgio’s of Beverly Hills. I’d be tempted to wear his namesake fragrance with this one. (But of course I only wear Smells Like Samsara these days.)

The giraffes are super cute here. Maybe too cute. But then I have a shirt with frogs eating strawberries, so who am I to say? Would I Wild Safari it up with elephant hair bracelets and a lion tooth necklace? Or would I theme-park it up with circus accoutrements? Hopefully I’d resist both urges. A novelty print this cute must be approached with caution.

Just look at those sweet giraffe eyes! This print has the feeling of a mural in a child’s room. In short: I would call this a juvenile print.

And now, a few notes on Juvenile Prints. Unless you are doing a full throttle Gothic Lolita thing, juvenile prints are to be used sparingly. If you are a tall, regal-looking muchacha then a juvenile print, confined to a blouse or a skirt, is a nice touch of whimsy. If you are working the obviously tattooed/ pierced/unnatural hair type of look, juvenile prints will look charmingly ironic. But if you are petite tomato who’s often called dollface, a juvenile print might take you to terrifying levels of cuteness. Unless, of course, that’s what you’re going for. Me, I think “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?” is a legitimate fashion option. And as I get longer and longer in the tooth, I hope it simply gets more grotesque, like a porcelain doll recovered from a burning building. (But you are in that chair, Blanche!)

But goslings, the thing to avoid at all costs is looking like you work for a pediatrician. (Warning: This link will take you to horrifyingly bad novelty prints.)