I adore this fabric, but it's mismatched. Don't get me wrong — the design lines coordinate with the fabric motifs expertly. (The curved line under the bust is genius, and check out the matching at the shoulders and upper arms.) It's the fabric and the dress itself that are mismatched. A neck tie? All those pleats in the skirt? The cuffs and placket pieced out of the stripey parts? It's done really well, but just because you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD.

I wish I had yards and yards of this fabric. But there's no way I'd make up something this fussy with it!

It's B34/W24, click on the image to go to the eBay auction. The designer of this dress, Helen Rose, also designed Grace Kelly's wedding dress (below), which is part of the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art (and which you can't really see in this picture, but which I place here anyway, for contrast).

I'm enjoying myself immensely imagining Princess Grace politely declining this dress (even though, of course, she'd look great in it). "Helen, dear," she'd say softly. "Maybe something a little … simpler? A bateau neckline, perhaps? Fewer pleats?"