A letter from a reader

At 48, I worked out that half my wardrobe is only allowed out for four months of the year.

You should picture me writing this at the kitchen table with a cup of tea going cold beside me, because that is exactly how slowly it has come. I am not a writer, and how another woman gets through a winter has never been any of my business.

But three different women have asked me about this dress since the weather turned, two of them at the same school gate, and I have now explained it enough times that it seemed easier to write it all down properly.

It started with Don, who had been sent up to the roof space for the Christmas tree and came down with one of those big zip-up bags instead. He put it on the bed and asked what it was. I said it was the summer things. He asked, perfectly reasonably, how long they were up there for. I said about seven months. He looked at the bag, and then at me, and said it.

So you own two wardrobes and you are only ever allowed into one of them.

I laughed, and then I unzipped the bag and started going through it, and he was right. Everything in there was a dress. Every single one of them had been bought for a hot day and was unwearable the moment it was not one, and so between about March and October they live in a bag in the roof and I live in trousers.

I did not set out to buy two wardrobes and use one at a time. That is the part I want to be clear about. Nobody decides that. It happens quietly, one summer dress at a time, until your husband is standing over a zip-up bag doing the arithmetic out loud.

How it happens

When I actually worked out why none of them survived a cool morning, I understood what I had been buying.

A summer dress is built to be worn with nothing. Nothing over it, nothing under it, nothing on the legs. The moment the weather changes, every one of those nothings becomes a problem, because the dress was never designed to have anything else involved.

Summer or trousers. That was the whole wardrobe. Nobody seemed to think a woman might want a dress that takes a pair of leggings and a boot and simply becomes a different thing.

And once that is all there is, you stop expecting anything else. You pack the dresses away in March. You get them down in October. And you assume that is simply how a year works.

What I had wrong

Here is the bit I got most wrong, and I suspect I am not alone.

I thought my problem was that I needed warmer dresses. I bought a couple of heavy ones. They were too hot by eleven in the morning and they are in the bag as well now, which is the worst of both.

It turns out it was never about how warm the dress was.

It is about whether the shape will take something underneath it. An A-line that falls away from the body has room under it, so leggings or thick tights go on and nothing pulls or shows a line. The length is above the knee, which is exactly where a boot wants to meet it. And because the fabric is light, you are not hot when you take the leggings off again in November. One dress stops being a season and becomes a year.

It took me until 48, and a bag in the roof space, to work that out.

The dress is called the Oriella

It is from Perth Boutique, a small Australian boutique that has been quietly dressing women our age for a few years now. My sister Carol found them, which she reminds me of regularly.

The dress is called the Oriella. A soft, lightweight A-line with delicate ruffle detail, cut above the knee, which is the measurement this whole letter turns on. It comes in one colour, which is convenient, because I have now worn it in two seasons and nobody has noticed it is the same dress.

The room underneath is the part that matters. Because it is A-line and falls away rather than following the leg, leggings and thick tights go on without a line showing and without anything pulling anywhere. The hem is above the knee, so a tall boot meets it properly instead of leaving an awkward gap at the shin. And the fabric is light, which means the same dress is bare and cool in February and layered and warm in July without being wrong in either.

That is really all there is to it. It is not complicated. It is a dress that will take a pair of leggings.

What happened at the school gate

The first proper outing was the school gate on a cold Tuesday morning, with black leggings and the boots.

Three women asked me about it before the bell. Sarah started it, because she said she had been looking for something she could do exactly that with.

The third was Lorraine, who I have known for twenty years and who has never once commented on anything I wear. She asked whether it was new. It was not new. I had worn it to a barbecue in January and she had seen it. I have decided to take that as a compliment.

What I noticed more than the questions, though, was that I had put on a dress in July. I had not done that in about fifteen years. It was not a special occasion and it was not warm, and I was not cold, and it did not feel like a statement, which I had not realised a dress in winter would have felt like until it did not.

The next morning I wore it again with the leggings off and a cardigan instead, because it had gone mild. Completely myself.

Three things I have learned since

One. I did not need warmer dresses. I needed one that takes a layer. The heavy ones I bought to solve this are in the bag with everything else, too hot by eleven and not warm enough at eight.

Two. Above the knee is a boot length. That is the only reason this works. A longer one and the boot has nothing to meet; a shorter one and the leggings are doing all the work on their own.

Three. Nobody notices it is the same dress. Bare legs and sandals in February, leggings and boots in July. Lorraine has seen it twice and asked if it was new the second time.

About the price

I want to be straightforward about this, because it was the thing that made me suspicious.

The Oriella is $89.99. It was $299.00.

My first thought, honestly, was that there had to be a catch at seventy per cent off, because I have paid more than that for a dress that is allowed out of the roof for four months a year.

There is no catch that I have found. They are a small boutique selling directly, so there is no middleman taking a cut, and they have their end of season sale on at the moment, which on this one is seventy per cent off, with free shipping Australia wide.

I did what I imagine you are doing now and had a proper look before I ordered. It comes in the one colour, which saved me a decision I would otherwise have spent a week on, and the sizes run from an XS to a 2XL at the same price.

Then I ordered a second one, and I have started going through the zip-up bag with a view to it getting considerably smaller.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If you and I were sat in the kitchen with the teapot between us and you asked me, this is what I would say.

If you have a bag in the roof or the back of a cupboard that comes down in October and goes up again in March, and you have never once questioned that arrangement, then it is worth ten minutes of your evening to go and look.

Not because a dress will change your life. It will not. But there is something in putting on a dress in July without it being an occasion that I had quietly given up on, and I would rather you did not give up on it too.

Two practical things. The sale is on at the moment, and the free shipping goes with it. And it is the middle sizes that go first, which I found out because Carol had to wait a week for hers.

I have not been up to the roof space since.

Maggie