Sloane on the Carrie dress she makes for women who gave up on dressing up.
A Letter From Sloane · Founder of Sloane & Pearl
Brooklyn · July 2026
Sloane on the Carrie dress she makes for women who gave up on dressing up.
If you have been reaching for the same three safe pieces and quietly skipping the events you used to love, I wrote this one for you.
Hi, I'm Sloane. I started Sloane & Pearl in Brooklyn in 2002, and the dress I want to tell you about this week began, honestly, with my own closet. I was the woman standing at it, holding something, putting it back, putting the same black trousers on again. So I had our team make the Carrie, a soft wrap maxi that feels like an old friend the first time you put it on, and I am writing to you, the woman who has quietly stopped expecting to feel like herself in her clothes, because the Anniversary Sale is on and the clearance price is the lowest I have ever set.
I have run a small boutique in Brooklyn since 2002, and I think about who I am really making each piece for before I sketch a single thing. The Carrie came out of a conversation I kept having with readers like you, women who told me they had given up on getting dressed. Not loudly. They had simply settled for less, the same three tops on rotation, the same dark trousers, the same small deflated feeling when they opened the closet door. They didn't hate clothes. They had just stopped expecting them to feel like anything.
I want to tell you honestly what this dress is and what it isn't. It is a soft, sleeveless wrap maxi in a fabric that moves with you, with a wrapped bodice that gives a real waist without pinching and a flowing skirt that makes you feel like you stepped into a slightly kinder afternoon. It is not a remedy, not a fix, not anything medical. It is a dress I am proud of, made for the woman you are today, not the woman you think you are supposed to be. I am going to walk you through the six decisions I insisted on, the kind a small founder gets to make when she is the one answering the phone.
A cloth that actually breathes
I refused a fabric that would cling the second the room warmed up. The Carrie is cut from a soft, airy lightweight cloth that keeps you cool through a long lunch and into the evening, and moves gracefully when you walk instead of sitting stiff around your knees.
"I wore it through a backyard lunch in July and forgot I had it on until a friend touched the sleeve and asked where it was from."
A wrap bodice that flatters without fuss
I did not want the sort of wrap that gapes or needs a safety pin and a prayer. The bodice crosses softly across the front and ties where it should, so the neckline stays put through dinner, through hugging people hello, through leaning over a slice of cake.
"I have a larger chest and I have never had a wrap dress just behave. This one did. I sat through an entire wedding rehearsal dinner adjusting nothing."
A waist you can feel, not a waist that squeezes
I asked for a defined waist that still leaves room to breathe, the kind that gives you a shape without a seam digging in an hour after you sit down. The Carrie draws the eye to your middle and then gets out of the way.
"I ate. I had the bread, and the pasta, and I never thought about my stomach once."
Shoulders that are easy and sun-ready
I picked a sleeveless cut with thin straps because most of my customers tell me they want to feel a breeze on their shoulders in summer, and they don't want to wrestle a sleeve all afternoon. The straps sit gently and stay put, no slipping, no fidgeting under a cardigan.
"I layer a thin linen shirt over it for work and take it off for dinner. Either way, I feel like myself."
A flowing maxi skirt with actual movement
I wanted a skirt that had the kind of sweep you forget you have on. The Carrie's flowing maxi length is generous through the hip and falls into a soft drape, so it walks around your ankles instead of sticking to them. A summer wedding, a school pickup, a Tuesday that turns into a dinner, it carries you.
"My fourteen year old said, 'Mom, you look like yourself tonight,' and then asked to take a photo with me, which has not happened in years."
A dress you can take anywhere, casually
I made the Carrie to do what so-called occasion dresses are terrible at, which is to live a real day in. A flat sandal for the farmer's market, a low heel for a cookout, a small earring for a dinner you forgot you said yes to. It dresses up and it dresses down without ever asking too much of you.
"I wore it to a graduation lunch and then to a church thing the next morning with a cardigan over it. Same dress, totally different look, I didn't have to think."
The Carrie, against the occasion dresses you have been buying
A department store occasion dress at $140 to $220 that you wore twice and felt a little mutsy in
A 'safe' black dress that costs $90 and quietly erases you in every photo
A wrap dress under $40 that gapes at the bust and needs a safety pin by dessert
Endless returns, because nothing feels like the woman you actually are now
A soft, breathable Carrie in your true size for $64.95
A wrapped bodice and defined waist that flatter without squeezing
A flowing maxi you can wear to a wedding, a school pickup, or a quiet Tuesday
Free shipping, 30 days to decide, and a small Brooklyn shop that picks up the phone
I wore it through a July lunch and forgot I had it on, which is the highest thing I can say about a dress.
Why the price is the lowest I have ever set
I will be honest about why this is on sale. We are running our Anniversary Sale, the same one we do once a year around this time, and the Carrie is one of the pieces I am clearing to make room for the next round of small batches we are sewing now. I'd rather sell it to you, a woman who will actually wear it, than let it sit on a hanger for another season waiting for a markdown twice this size.
That is why the price this week is $64.95. Usually the Carrie runs higher than that, and after this Anniversary Sale is over it goes back up. There is no countdown on the page, no fake urgency, I don't believe in that. There is just a small batch, an honest reason, and the lowest price I am willing to set on a dress I am proud of.
I had quietly stopped shopping for myself. I am in my late fifties and I just wore the same three things on repeat. I ordered the Carrie on a Saturday, tried it on Sunday morning, and stood in my hallway a little longer than I meant to. My husband walked by and said, 'Oh, you look like you.' That's all I wanted.
If any of this sounds like the way you have been getting dressed lately, the kind of resigned standing at the closet, the same three pieces on rotation, the quiet skipping of the events you used to love, then the Carrie is the dress I made for you. Not to fix you, not to change you, not to put you back into someone you used to be. Just to make getting dressed feel a little less like a small defeat on a weekday morning.
Sloane & Pearl is a small boutique I run out of Brooklyn with a real team that picks up the phone, a 4.8 rating across 842 reviews from women who sound a lot like you, and a 30 day money-back promise if the dress is not the one. Tap below to see the Carrie in your size, in XS through 3X, while the Anniversary Sale price is on. I'll wrap it with a hand-tied ribbon and a little note.
If this sounded like you, have a look at the Carrie while the Anniversary price is on.
- Carrie Soft Wrap Maxi Dress, currently $64.95 in the Anniversary Sale
- Free shipping to your door, 30 day money-back, no restocking fees
- Sized XS through 3X, made by a small Brooklyn shop with a 4.8 rating across 842 reviews
- Tap below to check your size, your color, and what is still in stock today
The Carrie at $64.95, against the department-store occasion dresses you have been overpaying on for years.
See the Carrie while it's $64.95About the writer. Sloane founded Sloane & Pearl in Brooklyn in 2002. She still picks the fabrics, still writes the notes tucked into the parcels, and still picks up the phone.
Founder's letter is illustrative. Customer quotes are natural-sounding examples written to represent the kinds of experiences our reviewers share; individual results vary. The Carrie Soft Wrap Maxi Dress is currently priced at $64.95 as part of our Anniversary Sale, while supplies last in each size.