Wedding in Seattle: Outfits

The wedding in Seattle that I have blogged about a while ago is coming up this weekend and I will fly out to Seattle on Friday. I have worked on my outfits in the meanwhile and want to share with you what I have decided to bring.

I have listened to your comments and looked for a cardigan to wear with the watercolor dress (in any case even in NYC it would have been too cold to wear it alone). I don't have a black cashmere crewneck (a no-brainer) and the only option currently available is the featherweight cashmere cardigan that is still full price. After trying different alternatives (including the Jackie in pink frost that is a perfect color match for the dress), I have settled for the Celosia cardigan in black, which goes very well with the style of the dress and also has the advantage of being very thick so that it should keep me warm. I am going to wear this to church, probably:





I think that the black Celosia is a nice option for those of you looking for an evening or dressy cardigan: the ruffles are elegant but not overwhelming. Before buying this one, I sold my other Celosia in cinnamon spice on the JCA Weekly Exchange because I didn't want to have many cardigans in the same style, especially ruffled. I think that I am going to wear the black much more often than the cinnamon spice.

For the evening reception, I have two options and I think that I am going to bring both and decide at the last minute.
The first option is to wear my BR cocktail dress with my BR velvet blazer from last winter and a BR necklace. I hadn't thought about it when I was putting it together, but it's a 100% Banana outfit, which, for me, is kind of unusual as I don't own a lot of Banana:





In pictures the dress is a little bit loose on the top but that's because for the life of me I couldn't zip it up and I didn't want to force and break the zipper just to take pictures of myself (that would have been silly, right?) The necklace is very sparkly IRL and I bought it along with the dress on supersale for something like $18, after seeing it on the adorable Slastena who highly recommended it.

The second option is more elegant in a classic way. It features an old dress by Caterine Malandrino that I had bought years ago at a sample sale and I was simply afraid to try on because I was sure that it wouldn't fit any longer. Well, it looks like I did loose all that baby fat after all, as it fits me again like a glove!
It's made in a double layer of silk chiffon and has a beautiful draping:




I think that it is maybe a little too serious for a friends' wedding but the advantage over the first outfit is that I am very comfortable in this dress and I can dance the night away without worrying about my ladies coming out (which is always a problem with a strapless). What do you think?
The only outfit that I haven't figured out yet is the one for the rehearsal dinner. The invitation says "Dressy Casual" and I interpret it as evening casual without jeans. So I was thinking of a pair of pants or a mini and a nice top, like the ribbon beaded one. Any advice?

If you have something to say speak now or keep silent forever ;-).

Product Review: the Watercolor Poupourri Dress

I have been vaguely considering the Watercolor Poupourri dress (22356) for a wedding that we'll attend in Seattle early May. For some reason I forgot about it when we had our JCA event last Saturday and I tried on the Poplin Bridget dress (22975 ) in soft violet instead, but that dress did nothing for me (not to mention that I already own a one-shoulder dress that I wore for my 40th birthday and was a stunner).
When the price of the poupourri dress dropped from $148 to $79.99 yesterday, all of a sudden it became sort of urgent to purchase it for the wedding, especially when I saw that the one that I had placed in my cart had disappeared after only a few hours (the 0 appears to be sold-out now on the website). So I called the PS at the Rockefeller Center to hold one for me and I went today to pick it up.
As I said, I had never tried it before and that's the reason why I didn't pull the trigger yesterday. This kind of dress can be a hit or miss, but in this case it's a total hit. Not only I love the print, but it fits me "like a glow".
Yesterday when I was trying to figure out if it would fit me and if there were any hidden faults, I tried to find a review of this dress in the blogosphere but didn't find any IRL pic or post about it. I even searched Polyvore for outfit ideas for the wedding, but it appears to be missing from Polyvore (I find a little bit strange that there isn't a single set featuring this dress: if anyone has a set, please let me know). So I thought that it would be useful to post some IRL pics and additional infos in case you are considering this fabulous dress for that fabulous price before it's gone (I don't think it will linger for very long). In the following pics I'm not trying to style it or anything (no time today!) and apologize for being barefoot, I just wanted to have some pics to show you as soon as possible.

This dress fits truly TTS, I don't need any alteration in my regular size. First of all, the lenght is exactly what it's supposed to be (the description says "falls above the knee"), even if I'm not as tall as the model, as you know:



Second, the bodice is very fitted (I was afraid that I wouldn't "fill" it) and the extra band of fabric sewn between the bodice and the skirt is very flattering and gives this dress extra structure (the skirt has darts):



An adhesive strap runs along the top of the bodice and helps it to stay in place. The bodice is lined in cotton as the description says, which makes it more comfortable to wear. The zip is in the back and not on the side. By the way, the fabric is not the same as the mini, which is more textured.
And, it has pockets as a bonus for those who love this feature:


At first I was all excited with the idea of buying a big necklace for the occasion, but I think that I can get away with my 20 bucks pearl necklace, that is just perfect with this dress:



I think that you can't go wrong with this dress if you can do a strapless dress.
Are you considering this dress on sale? What would you pair it with? Do you think that a Jackie cardigan in a yummy color would be OK for a wedding?