Wednesday’s Workwear Report: Soft Fit & Flare Shirtdress
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Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.
The print on this this shirtdress from Talbots is one of my favorites of the season. The colors are lovely, and the paisley pattern is gorgeous.
Normally, I’d swap out the tie belt for something more substantial, but this one is so nice, I think I’d keep it.
The dress is $179 at Talbots and comes in sizes 2-18.
I have a dress with a smocked waist. I’m pear shaped. When wearing the dress, the waist walks up and wants to be over my ribs. This makes for an excessive of fabric in the chest area that is really unattractive. Can I use a seam ripper to snip out parts of the smocking or otherwise relax it so it doesn’t ride up? Or maybe make the dress a skirt? I like the print and the fabric and the skirt has pockets. But it also drives me nuts. Is there a sewing or alterations fix for this?
I would select a section along each side seam (perhaps an inch stretched to start; you can go larger later if needed but it is hard to put the smocking back if you start too wide). Secure the smocking on either edge of this section (hand stitch, or even just knot the elastic if you can keep track of it), then snip the smocking within this section. You will likely need to press it flat. See if that gives you enough room to stop the creep.
Yes you can undo smocking with a seam ripper fairly really but you need to have good attention to detail to not damage the fabric.
where do you like the waist to sit best, setting aside the puffing-out side effect? It might be possible to remove some of the fabric above the smocking (below chest) if you actually like it at your waist otherwise.
Also pear-shaped, also had the same problem with a smocked waist riding up. I snipped threads here and there (I think judiciously on every other row) to loosen it up. The threads were dark and the fabric was a dark pattern, so it didn’t show.
Sounds like it’s just too small.
A smocked or elasticized dress waist is always going to migrate to the narrowest point of your torso. If that’s your ribcage, that’s where the smocking will sit. I’d shorten the part of the dress above the smocking.
Does anyone have a great vegan baking book? Like Snacking Cakes but vegan, or a go to egg replacement so I can adapt recipes I always like. Beyond SK Olive Oil cake, I always feel like I’m making it up on the fly, and the results are never as good.
I have found flax seed substitutes nicely for egg in baked goods.
Cookie and Kate has instructions for making “flax eggs.”
The Korean Vegan blog has a lot of baking recipes.
SK’s “these happen to be vegan” cake recipes are really good and foolproof! There’s a confetti cake one and a chocolate one that are always crowd pleasers.
I haven’t found a super great vegan baking book but will 1000% vouch for the Smitten Kitchen accidentally vegan confetti cupcakes. I make it all the time (usually as a cake, not cupcakes) and it’s so good and gets rave reviews! And assume you mean the SK olive oil chocolate cake but if you mean a different one, I def recommend that recipe, too. Deb never misses! I have a bunch of recipes saved from “Nora Cooks” too but haven’t tried those yet. If you find one, please come back and share!
Deb is so good. Made the olive oil chocolate cake with raspberries for my son’s birthday. But most kids find it way too rich? Will try the accidentally vegan confetti.
Anything by Isa Chandra Moskowitz is solid. Specific to baking there is Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, Vegan Cookies, and Vegan Pie in the Sky. The general cookbooks also have some baking recipes. Veganomicon is an absolutely solid compendium that covers pretty much everything. There are a number of baking recipes on her website for Post Punk Kitchen, theppk.com
Not a cookbook, but the couple times I have done vegan baking I used Noracooks.
I like School Night Vegan and his cookbook “Anything You Can Cook, I Can Cook Vegan.” His real name is Richard Makin (and I think he’s UK based!)
I’m a long time vegan, seconding the recommendation for school night vegan, Richard is one of the best recipe creators in my opinion. His olive oil cookies in that book are great.
That said I’d strongly suggest getting some soy lecithin for baking, it binds oil and water and has upped my game from competent home cook to better than a bakery. Flax, banana, chia etc just don’t work nearly as well. I get my soy lecithin at a local bulk shop it’s very cheap but I realize it’s less available some places.
Favorite ‘girl dinner’?
The Malt O’ Meal generic Lucky Charms in the big plastic bag. Am I an adult woman in my 40s who gets way too much joy out of kids’ cereal? You bet ha. Especially when you see that the nutrition facts are the same as some of the Special K varieties…
a little not fancy plate of: sliced cheese or cheese spread on triscuits, green olives or pickles, pistachios, m&ms. maybe add a sausage stick cut into pieces
alternative: a frozen tombstone pepperoni pizza. it has to be tombstone.
A plate of pickles, hearts of palm, cheese, boiled egg, olives, potato chips.
a lean cuisine pizza and popcorn. #balanced
Apple, peanut butter, some toast.
For the current season? watermelon and a microwaved corn on the cob. Throw in some berries if I’ve got ’em, and then something like a slice of ham or some cheese to get protein/fat, and that’s a complete meal.
Girl dinner is always most appealing to me in the summer, I like to curl up with some soup and bread in the colder months.
Granola, berries, and milk
Cheese & crackers, baby cukes, cherry tomatoes
PB&J
Microwave baked potato with a fried egg and sprinkle of cheddar
Did anyone see the “I’m Begging You, Never Write with AI” op-ed in the NYT? I liked and agreed with it. We’re having so much trouble at my work with people substituting AI for normal brain function – it’s caused a few issues with clients (which is the ultimate bad situation in our industry) and a lot of internal strife.
Gift link: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/04/opinion/artificial-intelligence-ai-writing.html?unlocked_article_code=1.21A.8Sib.-4LnH5MdjL7s&smid=url-share
I agree with it and I’m glad that people are talking about how it will affect us long term.
One of my other problems with writing via LLM is that it is done by averages: it predicts the next word based on an enormous amount of training data. Anything worth writing should be filled with sharp, insightful, and unique points; those are exactly the kinds of things sanded off by the LLM’s programming towards averages.
As an attorney, I’ve received more new pro se/self-representation lawsuits this summer where the complaint was drafted by AI. It’s insanity and it’s clogging the legal system.
I have also noticed an uptick in pro se’s using AI. It’s going to be a problem.
I don’t disagree and I try to be cautious in how I use it particularly for writing. The fluff I see in other people’s AI-generated content that sounds nice but has no logical structure or concise storytelling drives me nuts. I say all that as a disclaimer before I assert a bit of an academic reaction to the specific argument of the article.
The crux of this article is that it is important to do the work of thinking through the pieces for the sake of that in itself. Many of us were taught multiplication, long division, how to extract square roots by hand, or methods of numerical analysis or manual problem solving algorithms. After the initial instruction, no one seemed to have any problem with us using calculators, graphing calculators, and then computers to solve those same problems. And that has come with some detriment. As one example, when I was in business school, I had a classroom full of classmates where about 90% of them couldn’t recognize a real-world manufacturing problem as being a set of linear equations – and thus relatively easy to solve. I suspect that’s fairly representative, or even more generous, than the general population’s comfort with translating mathematical concepts to real life. Surely, we’d all be sharper if we still did all the mechanical work mentally – better at doing the work itself and identifying the patterns that help us know what work should be done. But civilization has happily accepted some tradeoffs in the past for expediency vs. mental fitness. So, who are we to say where the line falls here? And isn’t it hubris to think that we have that wisdom now, when we can see in plenty of past examples around computational skill sets that we have not slowed the use of new tech that has interfered with mental acuity?
(Of course, plenty of other reasons to not like AI – not limited to mental declines – especially concerns about unnecessary computing power usage. But since that’s not what the author focused on, I’m not factoring that in to my reaction here).
I think many corporations agree with your argument and are happy to stop thinking of writing as a real skill. But trust and reputation matter. It’s a risk to use AI to write everything, especially things that are not just marketing copy. I read an article the other day that said 70% of clients of professional services firms would not trust a report if they knew it was written by AI. You will lose business if people lose trust in you. People who are paying a lot of money for services do not want to buy crap.
Calculators do not hallucinate. AI does all the time. AI is also biased.
Thanks for sharing a gift link. I actually appreciate it now when emails sent from corporate leadership are not perfectly polished, because it shows the person took the time to write the email and didn’t use AI. It gives me a feeling of relief. I want true thought from people, not just a bunch of empty jargon. I work for a well-known company, and we appeared in a news article accusing us of publishing AI-written content that was riddled with hallucinations. The internal reaction was to fact-check and review everything more thoroughly. No one dared to say, “Don’t use AI to write.”
I normally agonize over buying clothes until the sale ends and then I’m unwilling to pay full price…but today I bought all the clothing to the point that my credit card emailed me a fraud alert.
What did you get??
Haha, nothing shames me faster than a fraud alert—“surely you didn’t do this, RIGHT??!”
Any recommendations for a sweater or poncho-like wrap that I can use in my over air-conditioned office? My office is business wear; I usually wear blue or black slacks and a blouse. I’m thinking a camel or cream color is most versatile.
For those of you who work in a client-facing role, what behavior do you think crosses the line into a hostile work environment? My boss knows the client can be difficult. But I’m not sure whether this is a suck it up situation or it’s time to press the issue.
Are you asking what would make me, as a supervisor/client facing role, speak to the client about treatment/potentially terminate a relationship, or are you asking what constitutes a hostile work environment? I ask because the second question is a legal term of art, and the first speaks more to company culture (and could warrant discussions long before something is legally actionable).
are you talking about the legal definition of hostile work environment, or just someone who is rude, pushy, jerk behavior?