Francesca’s Collections

You can find really quirky, cute things here. Perfect for gifts. Francesca’s is a small boutique-​chain with casual dresses, cheap handbags, and hand-​picked and often one-​of-​a-​kind scarves. First open in 1999 in Houston, they have 450 boutiques in 45 states. Glad there’s one here.

I am glad that someone has finally posted a listing for this place so that I could check into the store. I was lazy and while I have been visiting for months (which probably means 2 times), I did not get to check in until last week.
This place has awesome accessories and dresses for special occasions. The prices are incredible, especially when I compare to other places that I could get dress-​up clothes in Perimeter Mall. The thing about wearing something for a special event is that you usually get photographed at the event and later it becomes unsavory to wear the get-​up again because it would most likely be another event that will have cameras snapping. This is obviously a superficial view but in the times of Instagram and I guess even Facebook still (I have been going through a 9+ month hiatus), most ladies do not want to have photos floating out in the social media sphere of two events but one dress. Because of this, it is useful to find a place that has pretty dresses that are not too expensive.
Francesca’s Collections hits the sweet spot. These dresses aren’t particularly cheap, which I can feel when I pass my hands over the fabric and the stitching, but they aren’t expensive. The dress that I recently got was under $ 60, but it felt and looked so much better than anything I saw at H&M and Forever 21. I stopped by Ann Taylor, Banana Republic, Madewell, Zara, and a few other places (in addition to the two aforementioned retail stores) and could not find just the right thing. I was exasperated by the time I arrived at Franscesca’s and was silently praying to the gods of agnosticism that I would find something at long last. I usually hate trying on things in the store and I’m one of those annoying people who buys stuff only to return it because I tried it on at home and decided it did fit the way I hoped it would. Because this method does consume more petrol and time than is truly efficient, I have tried to try more things on in the store. I had tried on a bunch of dresses and was tired of coming out of my top and jeans over and over but I sucked it up here and after grabbing about 5 dresses, I was really happy with a knee-​length navy blue dress with a tight bodice and a puffy skirt.
I wore the dress that evening and it was comfortable (save for the tulle skirt underneath the exterior layers, which is a necessary evil to maintain the skirt engorged). For future events, I will stop at Francesca’s first, instead of going to 10 stores and ending up here pissy and exhausted.