I used to think halter necks were a summer holiday thing, one wear in Corfu and back in the drawer by September. Wrong opinion, held for about four years, and I’m addressing it properly now: I’m sorry, halter neck, I underestimated you completely.
What a good black halter dress actually does is sort out your shoulders and your bra situation in one go, which sounds like a small thing until you’re stood in a changing room at 6pm trying to work out why every other neckline makes you look like you’re wearing someone else’s coat. The tie at the back does the shaping, so the rest of the dress can just get on with being black and simple and slightly serious, which is the whole point. I look for a decent weight of fabric, something with a bit of structure at the bodice, because the thin slippy ones move about all night and you end up doing the tug every twenty minutes. My colleague Priya calls it “the readjust”, she does it with her eyes closed like she’s praying, and honestly if I catch myself doing that within an hour of putting a dress on, it’s going straight to the pile for the charity shop on the corner.
Styling wise, this is not a dress that needs help, so don’t overdress it. A blazer thrown over the top for the walk from the tube, off the second you’re inside. Gold jewellery reads a bit more done up, silver reads a bit more like you just decided to go out, both correct depending on the night.
Flat sandals if you actually want to enjoy yourself and remember it, heels if the occasion demands a bit of drama and you’ve pre booked the taxi home. I wore mine to a leaving do in a pub garden in March once, froze the entire time, learned my lesson about checking the weather before committing to bare shoulders.
Where it properly earns its place is anything with a bit of ceremony to it, a dinner, a party, a date where you want to look like you tried without looking like you tried for three hours. One dress, endless different nights out of it, and that’s not nothing.
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