Stephanie picked up this 80’s gem as a freebie in her building. It had a lot of potential, but there was no denying how 80’s it was. What I like to do on pieces like these is take the 80’s and trim it down to the 40’s. Let’s take a moment to reflect on how 80s this dress was:

Immediately I removed the GIANT shoulder pads. We decided to remove the sleeves to make the dress all-season-appropriate (just layer it up in the cold months). Next I drastically reshaped the shoulders/arm holes/chest since there were no longer 1/2″ tall+ shoulder pads to fill it out. Stephanie was on the fence about the collar, and decided she would like to ditch the points and round the edges to more of a shawl collar. I did just that and added a hook to keep the collar closed and a little less boobalicious for work.

There you have it! This 80’s dress is modernized and ready for a stylish Mad-Men-ish day at work, or a fun night out for cocktails.

Do you have a dated dress that needs some modernizing? Email me about it at kristen@rethinktailoring.com and I can help brainstorm what to do.