Real stories · Florals without the curtains

I avoided florals for twenty years for fear of looking like the curtains — this one changed my mind

A floral dress that a stranger complimented — me, the woman who has dodged flowers since the nineties. I'm 67, and my objection was never to florals themselves; it was to what they usually do to women my age. One wrong print and you're suddenly upholstered: the curtains, the sofa, the B&B bedspread. Safer, I decided decades ago, to stay in plain colours forever.

What I wanted — secretly — was flowers that didn't come with slipcovers.

Then I found the Floravine from a British label called York Boutique — a midi dress in a bold, modern floral: big painterly flowers in red and pink with strokes of yellow and green on deep navy, with long sleeves and a flowy cut. One glorious print, and that's the one I have.

The print is the difference. It's painted, not repeated — more gallery than garden fete — which is why it reads arty rather than chintzy — and the flowy cut moves beautifully with every step, light and breathable, skimming rather than clinging. With flats it's a coffee morning; with the good shoes it's a birthday lunch.

A bold, modern print — more gallery than garden fete — on a flowy cut that moves beautifully — which is why it reads arty rather than chintzy, and why a complete stranger asked where it was from.

It was £29.95, half the usual £60 — about what I spend on actual flowers in a fortnight, and unlike those, this doesn't wilt. A fortnight to send it back and free delivery, though it was never in danger.

It has since done a garden-centre coffee, one birthday lunch and a Sunday amble, and at the garden centre a woman I have never met in my life crossed the café to ask where the dress was from. Twenty years of dodging florals, undone by one stranger with good taste.

If you've also been dodging flowers since the nineties, do have a look. The Floravine is rated 4.6 out of 5 by more than 200 women, it comes in this one bold print, in UK sizes 8/10 all the way to 22/24 — and at half price it goes quickly.