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Bargain Friday’s TPS Report: Madmioselle Dress

Fashion· The Personal Shopper (TPS)· Wear to Work | ·

Our daily TPS reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.
Reader K writes in to recommend this great dress, which garnered her “lots of compliments when I wore it the other day. I changed the red belt it came with to a black patent belt and wore it with black patent heels. Today I’m wearing it with a black, Chanel-like blazer (that I bought on e-bay).” We think the dress is adorable — it’s available at Target for $39 in both regulars and petites. Merona® Collection Women’s Madmioselle Dress – Flamenco Red
Seen a great piece you’d like to recommend? Please e-mail editor@corporette.com with “TPS” in the subject line. (L-2)

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Workwear sales of note for 9.20.23:

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Comments

  1. Legally Brunette

    I love this! Very lady like and classy. The length looks good too. Anyone know if this is more of a cherry red or a darker garnet red?

    • Anon

      Suze, I had the same thought, but I clicked on the Target link to see how they had named the dress and it is indeed Madmioselle :)

  4. AIMS

    It’s a very cute dress but I don’t think I would wear it to work. I’m sure that it could work for some work environments, but I would not feel very professional in it. It’s just a touch too red, too retro, and too girly to work in my workplace.

  5. AEK

    Is it me, or has pretty much the entire Merona line of dresses and skirts from Target been recommended at this point, between posts and comments?

    • Midori

      They’re getting a lot of love here, yes. But hey, props to Target for putting out stuff worth recommending. I checked them out the other day for work clothes since I had been hearing some buzz over here, and ended up with a couple great shirts, a Mossimo sheath dress (herringbone, fully lined, machine wash and dry–I’m in love!), some shoes, that cute skirt that was featured last week, and a cardigan. All for about $150. Sure, it won’t be long term investment stuff, but it gives my wardrobe a nice boost while I settle into my new postpartum sizing!

        • Just been there

          Isn’t it great? How did you style it? I did a black obi belt, black wedges, pearls, and red cardigan. Any other ideas? I want to change it up, since that’s a pretty distinct look and I don’t want to repeat it too often.

          • s-p-s

            Sounds great! Today, with a Chanel-esque dark blue jacket and gemstone earrings in a similar shade. Next time, maybe my dark purple cardigan with a thin black belt and perhaps black patent heels…

  6. Elle

    I usually think Target dresses are cute and I have purchased a few. I will add as a note of caution that the Merona fabrics do tend to fade and lose their color pretty quickly (at least in the black and other darker colors I’ve purchased). They are a great addition for a year or two, but don’t expect it to last much longer than that for a work dress and look pristine. Knowing that, I now look at Merona dresses as a great way to add to my wardrobe a dress with “flare” (at least as much as can be tolerated in a conservative office!) that I’m likely to tire of more quickly or wear less frequently. Then I spend my bigger dollars on the more classic dress shapes/styles/colors elsewhere.

  7. nonA

    I’ve generally had a great experience with Merona Collection and Mossimo Black dresses, which are think are Target’s nicest lines – the quality is easily that of dresses that cost three times as much.

  8. Amy

    Sigh. They’re always cute. But they don’t work for people who are tall/have long torsos. I keep trying them on, but it’s all wishful thinking. (Hey, Target, if you’re reading this, petites are great, but how about making tall sizes?)

    • Missannethrope

      Funny, as a petite, I always think their dresses are way too big and long!

      • Anonymous K

        Yep, it seems that Target dresses are exclusively for “regular” size people. They don’t seem to fit my taller friends and don’t work well for many petites, either.

      • AccountingNerd

        I always thought the same thing, but if you go online they have Petite sizes for some of their dresses!

        Also, if I find a cute dress that doesn’t come in Petites, I just get it tailored to fit me. It usually costs around $15 to get dresses tailored.

    • Midori

      I’m tall-ish, and the Mossimo black dress I just bought works fine–a nice demure skimming the top of the knees, and the waist was undefined enough that I could just throw one of those fabulous wide belts just featured over it. I’ve had less luck with Merona dresses, though. They fit me funny, and a lot of it probably has to do with length-to-width ratio.

    • MJ

      Totally agree. Their dresses seem to hit me just at that “Wow, she really needs a Tall” spot such that I look like I am trying on a shorter friend’s clothes, and looking silly doing it!

    • Anonymous

      This. I’ve tried on umpteen Target dresses in the past several years (both casual and work-appropriate) and every.single.one is too short on me. And I’m not that tall (5-8!). I’d really like to see more designers make “tall” sizes (and would happily pay extra for the extra fabric involved).

      • mbs

        Me too. They aren’t so bad if you never sit down, but show just a little to much thigh when I do sit. I’m 5-8 also, just a tiny bit too tall for Target dresses.

  10. Lizbet

    Is the material shiny? I saw it online and loved the style but worried that if it were shiny, it would look odd at work.

    • MelD

      No- just went to Target today and it wasn’t shiny. I am not sure why it looks like that in the pictures.

  11. Anon

    Nice dress :)

    And…. threadjack!

    I purchased a Tahari (not Elie Tahari, not Tahari by ASL… does that mean it is T Tahari?) pant suit from Loehmann’s the other day and got a great deal (originally $558, and I got it for $100). The pros and cons to the suit are below:
    PROS
    1. It is black, and I have been looking for a black suit forever.
    2. It FITS!!! I wear a petite size and can never find anything that fits right. Even though this suit is not petite, the proportions seem right so all I will need to do is have a tailor hem the pants for me.

    CONS
    1. It has these horrific black gauzy ruffly things (on an otherwise very classic looking suit) coming out of the front seams and in place of buttons on the suit sleeves. I took a close look and think I can rip them out easily (or have a tailor do it) because the ruffle fabric is THAT thin. This is fixable and, therefore, not a big problem.
    2. The fabric has a rougher texture to it. This is the thing that I am most unsure about. I don’t want to look like I am in a cheap suit (although it is originally more expensive). The material is 50% wool, 48% polyester, and 2% rayon. This makes me wonder if the wool was not very good quality… wool blazers are usually softer, polyester pieces are usually smooth… am I over-thinking this? Do materials “soften up” with time? Is this a particular style (the fabric is a bit heavier)? To give you a better idea, in terms of “roughness,” it is a bit rougher than the Ann Taylor sharkskin suit I bough online recently (the texture of that suit even surprised me initially).

    Please let me know your thoughts!! Is fabric feel important?

    • Shayna

      I would expect the material to become softer as it wears – but that’s over a long period of time, not the first or fifth wear. But, if no one can tell that it looks “rough” (at least not without touching it or being waaaay too close to you), then I doubt anyone will think it looks cheap.

      FWIW, I’ve owned a few Tahari suits, and have always loved them for their classic looks, and have found them to be of good quality – they usually last quite a while!

  12. Carrie

    I just ordered this. I figured it was worth a shot at $40. Target is running a free shipping promo on most clothing items on orders over $50. Plus, they are running a special on shoes – buy one pair get the second for 50% off. I used both of these promotions when I picked up this dress and then purchased two cute pairs of boots for my daughter (she’s a four-year-old fashionista who is growing like a weed!)

    • Carrie

      Update on this: I received the dress yesterday and I like it. I’m wearing it today and have already received many compliments. It’s not the nicest piece as far as quality, but for the $40, I think it’s pretty nice. Following the comments online, I ordered up a size. I was worried when I took it out of the package that it would be huge on me, but once I put it on, I realized that it was just right.

  13. Tired of Dresses

    Could we please have a break from dresses for awhile? I can’t be the only one not comfortable with showing my legs at work….

    • mbs

      Lol, I miss the days when long flowing skirts were in style. I had a lot of them.

  14. AN

    Love the dress. I always envy people who can wear belts with dresses though as they don’t work for me!

  16. Sara

    Okay, I ordered this and a few others… boy they have a bunch of seemingly good work dresses right now. Thanks! Will see which ones work in person and take others back. Also got a mini travel hair iron- been meaning to do that to lighten my standard load. Started looking at bedding and realized it was time to log off:)

  18. Parisienne

    To me this dress looks really cheap. I also think that tiny sleeves like that do not flatter most arms – if you are over 25. I also like red dresses only for special occasions and then seldom. (Even though red is my “best color”.)

    I had a civil case trial all this past week in federal court. Outside the weather was pretty hot. Was interested in seeing what the many women wore – femalses were two attorneys, two clerks, court reporter, three jurors, 10 witnesses, eight steady spectators. I wore the only skirt suits. (Black, white,navy). A lot of black pants were seen, and a number of cardigan sweaters. A couple of pants suits were seen. One person looked very good, a clerk who is very young and very blond. One day she wore a tan pencil skirt with a conservative leopard print silk jacket/blouse, and she looked great. I love to see a (conservative) leopard print on a blond. The standard best looking (nonlawyer) outfit I saw this week in court is black pants, a simple black top, and a contrasting jacket with long sleeves and lapels – either in a color, a print, or a tweed.

  19. AccountingNerd

    I got the petite size in this dress. It is cute, but it feels a little flashy for work. I wore it to work and got a few compliments though.

  20. GingerR

    I don’t like to buy dresses at Target because I feel like everybody in the world shops at Target and they”ll all look at me and say, “that’s that dress I saw at Target.”

    That said, I have a dress cut in that style in a heavy knit print and I love the collar. I wear it with a jacket in the summer when the a/c is going and now in the fall I’m wearing it with a v-neck cardi, belted. The collar comes out around the neckline of the cardi and is, I think, very flattering.

  22. Lincoln

    After this week’s Newsweek cover I don’t think I can wear anything red again without thinking “Mama Grizzly.” And well — that’s bad.

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