A letter from a reader

At 62, I had made my peace with shapeless dresses. I never expected one to give me back a waist.

I almost did not write this down, because it is only a dress and I am not the sort of woman who gets excited about that sort of thing any more. But three different women stopped to ask me about it at a birthday lunch in the garden on Saturday, and when that happens at 62 you start to think there might be something in it.

Somewhere in my late fifties I gave up on having a shape. Fitted dresses clung to the bits I would rather they did not, and so I retreated into loose, shapeless things that hid me well enough but made me look like I had rather given up. Every summer it was the same choice, cling or sack, and neither of them was me. I would catch sight of myself in a shop window and not much like what I saw.

I had decided that a dress with a shape and a dress I felt comfortable in were two entirely different dresses.

So I stayed in my shapeless things, and told myself it did not matter at my age.

Then I saw it on a friend

A friend of mine had one on at a coffee morning and I could not get over how lovely her shape looked in it, and then she told me how comfortable it was and I could scarcely believe the two things went together. It is from Nottingham Boutique, a little boutique that has been quietly looking after women our age for a few years, and they had their summer sale on. It is called the Sascha, a cream wildflower midi with a bit of pretty lace at the neck. I ordered mine that same evening before I could talk myself out of it.

What happened at the lunch

I wore it to a birthday lunch in the garden, half braced to spend the day feeling either squeezed or swamped as usual. Instead I felt shapely and comfortable at once, and three separate women came over to ask me where it was from. Three. My friend Sue told me I looked like I had lost weight, which I had not, it is simply the clever shape of it, and I have decided to take it as the compliment it was.

That was the moment it clicked for me. I had spent years believing I had to choose between a shape and comfort, and here was one dress that quietly did both.

Three things I have learned since

One. The waist is the whole secret. There is a soft defined waist that gives me back a proper shape, and then the skirt falls full and easy over everything below. So I get the shape without any of the clinging, and I never once have to breathe in.

Two. It covers what I like covered. The three quarter sleeves cover the tops of my arms, the midi length sits kindly on the leg, and the little flowers run upwards so I look that bit taller and slimmer than I am. Flattering from every angle, without a scrap of effort.

Three. It has pockets. Proper pockets, deep enough for a tissue and my reading glasses, which at my age is a small joy I did not know I was allowed to be so pleased about.

About the price

I will be honest, when I saw the price in the sale I was a bit suspicious. A dress this pretty and this flattering usually costs a great deal more, and it turns out it usually does.

The Sascha is £34.95. It was £70.00.

There was no catch. It arrived quickly, it was every bit as lovely and comfortable as my friend promised, and it looked exactly like the picture, which we all know is not always the way.

I did go and read the reviews before I ordered, because I could hardly believe it. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars. Not the suspiciously perfect five you see on some sites, which if I am honest made me trust it more. One woman had written, "It gave me a waist again, it covers my arms, and it has pockets, I have ordered nothing else all summer." That was the one that decided it for me.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If you and I were sat in the garden and you asked me, this is what I would say.

If you have resigned yourself to shapeless dresses because everything else either swamps you or clings in all the wrong places, then it is worth ten minutes of your evening to go and have a look.

Not because a dress will change your life. It will not. But there is something in catching sight of yourself and seeing a shape you thought had gone for good, and feeling comfortable with it, 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, half of what it was, and the middle sizes go first, which I found out because the size I wanted had nearly sold out by the time I went back to tell a friend. And once the summer stock has sold through, that is it until next year.

I had forgotten I had a waist. It turns out I only needed the right dress to find it.

Caroline