A letter from a reader

At 64, I thought black and white race-day dresses were made for girls who stand still for photographs. So for twenty years I said no to Derby Day

Margo's invitation for this year's Derby Day is on the fridge again, and Graham says if I tell one more person the story of last year's, he is staying home. So I am writing it down once. I am not a writer, and I have never once thought it my place to tell another woman what to put on.

But three different women asked me about a dress at the races last November, and I have told the story so often since that it seemed easier to write it down once and be done with it.

My cousin Margo lives in Moonee Ponds, a short walk from Flemington, and for twenty years she has gone to Derby Day with what she calls her black and white girls. Derby Day is the Saturday before the Cup, and the tradition is that everybody wears black and white. Every single year Margo has rung me in September and asked me to come down. Every single year I have found a reason not to.

The real reason was the dresses. Every black and white race-day outfit I had ever seen was a tight fitted sheath cut above the knee, made for a girl who stands still by the roses while somebody takes her photograph. Derby Day is seven hours on your feet, up and down to the rail, in and out of the crowd, on and off the train. Years ago I tried one on in Myer for a work Christmas do, and I could not get up the step onto the bus in it. That was the end of that. Last September Margo rang as usual, I gave her my usual reason, and she said it.

Dianne, nobody is asking you to stand still.

I did not decide that the races were for younger women. Nobody does. It just creeps up on you, one invitation at a time.

How it happens

When you are young, a fitted dress is just a dress. Then, somewhere in your fifties, you start choosing clothes by a different test. Can I sit down in it? Can I climb a step in it? Can I lift my arms to wave at somebody across a car park without the whole thing riding up?

And when you go looking for something black and white for a day out, the shops give you two choices. A stiff fitted sheath with a seam at the waist that you can only really stand still in. Or a tiny busy print that looks grey from across a room.

So you go home with navy again. I had chosen navy so many times I had forgotten black and white was ever meant to be fun.

Then Helen turned up in a big bold print

What changed my mind was Helen, my oldest friend, who came down from Woy Woy for lunch in Epping in early October last year. She walked in wearing a white shirt dress with great bold black shapes all over it, the sort of print you see on the floor of an old picture palace, sleeves rolled up and her sunglasses hooked in the collar. It was black and white, she had walked up from the station in it, and she looked like she was on holiday.

I asked her, very casually, where it was from. She told me a small Australian boutique called Thompson Sydney. Then she asked me what I was wearing to Derby Day, and I had to admit I had not said yes yet. Helen said, You have run out of reasons, Di. You just have not noticed.

The one I chose is called the Ellie. It is a white shirt dress with a bold black geometric print, big bands and curves and arcs, so it reads as black and white from across a racecourse rather than a muddle of grey. There is a proper collar, buttons down the front, and sleeves you roll up to just below the elbow.

The part that won me over is the shape. It falls loose from the shoulders in an easy swing to the knee. No waistband, no belt, nothing tucked in, nothing done up to the chin. It looks sharp because of the print, not because it is tight. I rang Margo that night and said yes, and she was so surprised she put Bruce on to check it was really me.

What happened at last year's Derby Day

We caught the train from Margo's to the course with her girls, all in black and white, and Graham in his good suit muttering about the price of a beer. I wore the Ellie with plain black shoes I could walk in, a small black clutch, and a little black fascinator with a white feather that Margo lent me.

Three women asked me about the dress before the third race. The first was a woman standing beside me at the rail by the roses, who said she had been looking at it from the other end of the garden. The second was a young girl in the queue for the ladies, who took a photo of the back. The third was Joy.

Joy has gone to Derby Day with Margo for thirty-one years. She marks every outfit on the course out of ten, quietly, and in thirty-one years Margo has never heard her go higher than a six. She looked me up and down by the roses and said, Seven. Then she asked for the name of the shop.

What I noticed more than the compliments was that I forgot about it. We were on our feet for most of the afternoon, up and down to the rail, in and out of the crowd, and I never once tugged at a waistband or did up a button. When Margo sent the photos that night, I was not standing stiffly at the back holding my breath. I was in the middle of it, laughing.

On the Tuesday I wore it again for the Cup lunch at the club bistro back home, with flat shoes this time. Jenny from over the road, who has never said a word about anybody's clothes, asked if I had been somewhere.

Three things I have learned since

One. Black and white was never the problem. The cut was. It was not the colours that kept me home. It was the tight fitted race-day dresses you can only stand still in. One that falls loose from the shoulders is a different thing entirely.

Two. Bold beats busy. A big confident print looks deliberate from a distance. A small fussy one just looks grey. I had spent years choosing the small ones because they felt safer.

Three. Say yes before you run out of years to say it. Margo had asked me twenty times. I wish I had said yes at the tenth.

About the price

I will be honest, the price is what made me suspicious.

The Ellie is $71.95. It was $144.00.

My first thought was that there had to be a catch, because you can spend that on a race-day outfit you wear exactly once and then hang up for good.

There is no catch that I have found. They are a small boutique selling directly, so there is nobody in the middle taking a cut, and they run a spring sale to move the season's stock. I read the reviews before I ordered, the way I imagine you are doing now. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars. Not the suspiciously perfect five you see on some websites, which if anything made me trust it more. One woman from Williamstown had written, “I bought it for one wedding and I have worn it to three lunches since. My daughter has asked to borrow it twice.” That was the one that decided it for me.

Joy, I am told, ordered hers on the train home.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If you and I were sitting on the back verandah with a cuppa and you asked me, this is what I would say.

If there is an invitation you keep turning down because of what is in your wardrobe, a race day, a dinner, a do with a dress code, it is worth ten minutes of an evening to go and have a look.

Not because a dress will change your life. It will not. But there is something about walking into a crowd in something that feels like a celebration, and being able to enjoy the whole day in it, that I had quietly given up on. I would not want you to give up on it too.

Two practical things. The spring sale is on now and the middle sizes go first. And with the Christmas parties about to start, I would not leave it too long.

Twenty years of saying no to Derby Day. Last year I went in black and white, and I did not stand still once.

Dianne