I picked four dresses that maintain neatness for the Chuseok holiday without tiring out the body. They are THREE TO EIGHTY's Ruched Snap Panel Dress in Medium Grey and Black, and LOW CLASSIC's Shirring Cotton Dress in Navy and Off White. In both, shirring creates natural gathers to give you a properly dressed-up look for the occasion, yet the cut doesn't constrict your body, so it stays comfortable even when sitting for long periods.
The snap fastener placed along the hem of the THREE TO EIGHTY garment is an item invented in 1885 by Heribert Bauer of Germany to fasten and unfasten trousers in an instant. After the Prym company improved the loose, rust-prone early design in 1903 with a double S-shaped spring structure, it began to spread in earnest. Thanks to the speed of saving the effort of pushing buttons through holes, it came to be used everywhere from cowboy shirts to paratroopers' military gear where every second counted.
For holiday clothes, picking materials and silhouettes that look formal without restricting your movement keeps things comfortable all the way through. THREE TO EIGHTY lets you tidy up the lines with snap panels, and LOW CLASSIC highlights the clean, understated texture inherent to cotton material. Shall we narrow the list down a bit further by length or styling method?
↳ Long length only
To match the long length, I picked THREE TO EIGHTY's Ruched Snap Panel Dress in two colors: Melange Grey and Black. It's a garment where you can adjust the panel lines with shirring and snap buttons to freely transform the long silhouette without losing its shape. The long dresses filling lists these days tend toward creating natural volume through panel gathers and overlapping rather than tightly constricting the body.
While Western tailoring carved out fabric along curves and left scrap fabric behind, traditional Eastern and Western clothing took the approach of delicately joining rectangular panels that made full use of the entire fabric width. Just like hanbok or kimono, rectangular fabric pieces were joined together and small gussets were added for ease of movement to secure extra room. It created a three-dimensional sense of space between garment and human body through surface divisions and gathers without cutting into the fabric.
This dress can also branch out in various ways depending on how the snapped panel is fastened, ranging from a neat long dress to a breezy layered skirt. Shall we look at the Black color first, or the Grey color? Or would you prefer to look over how to style it as a skirt first?
![[2nd] RUCHED SNAP PANEL DRESS M.GREY](https://img.hmmm.pub/brands/threetoeighty/products/799d205b-a887-46ca-a69d-1b19bae56c11/0-320.jpg)
![[2nd] RUCHED SNAP PANEL DRESS BLACK](https://img.hmmm.pub/brands/threetoeighty/products/50a6be09-bcf5-4445-8bea-26930bd4fe47/0-320.jpg)
↳ In Black
To match the Black color, I picked THREE TO EIGHTY's [2nd] RUCHED SNAP PANEL DRESS BLACK. Thanks to the side-seam shirring and snap-button panel, it's a garment where you can freely adjust the silhouette and slit depth depending on how far you fasten the buttons. Even among the black dresses on the list, its roomy fit that changes its expression to suit your body stands out in particular.
Before the 1920s, black clothing was mainly seen as mourning attire or maid uniforms, and was hardly ever used as everyday wear. When Coco Chanel presented a black crepe dress in 1926 that stripped away unnecessary embellishments to enhance mobility, the fashion magazine Vogue likened it to the popular Model T car and called it "Chanel's Ford." As it spread as a modern basic everyday outfit worn by all classes through day and night, black, which had been a symbol of sorrow, finally became a standard of freedom.
Just as the virtue of everyday black clothes passed down from those times lay in letting the body relax comfortably, the flow of your stride in this dress feels quite different depending on how you fasten the snaps. Shall we first look at what kind of shape it takes when the snaps are opened, or are you curious about other colors, or materials and washing instructions?
Final Selected Products
