Karina Bland
The Arizona Republic
Apr. 24 2008 2:07 pm
Mothers are, if anything, honest. When you're a teenage girl, regardless of your relationship with Mom, you can count on her to make sure you go to the high-school prom looking like a princess.
Your friends might say you look good in a particular gown to boost your self-confidence, but most mothers will only say so if they mean it.
It's no wonder then, with prom season in full swing and the stores packed, that many girls are bringing along their moms in the hunt a dress.
Related: Affordable dresses | Check out a slideshow of moms helping their daughters pick out prom dresses
Darleen Olson, manager of Cache, a clothing store at Scottsdale Fashion Square, says girls coming in with friends invariably come back with Mom. Sometimes, the whole family turns up to watch - grandparents, parents and siblings.
"This is a big deal in a girl's life," says Olson, who has been selling prom dresses for almost 30 years.
For many girls, prom is the first grown-up event in which they're expected to wear formal attire, eat in a nice restaurant and act like a lady. It's important to find the perfect dress.
And there's no one better suited to help than Mom.
Mothers wait patiently outside dressing rooms for their daughters, who are verging on adulthood. As the girls emerge, their moms happily offer advice. They know what flatters their daughter's body shape and complexion, and they know what shade will best bring out the color of their daughter's eyes.
And Mom knows what dress is appropriate for her daughter's age - and what's not.
Lori Wallace, an Ahwatukee mom of three girls, ages 14, 18 and 21, considers herself a veteran prom-dress shopper.
This season she's shopping for an eighth-grade promotion dress for Kanani, the youngest. She has been to four department stores and two dress shops.
"Every year, it gets harder and harder to find something," Wallace says. "The hemlines just keep going up, and the necklines get lower."
Kanani comes out of the dressing room at Windsor in Chandler Fashion Center in a short purple dress.
"Oh, no!" Wallace says.
Kanani scowls and turns on her heel back to the dressing room.
Shopping with Mom
Two girls, both 17 and from different parts of the Valley, are in search of the perfect dress, going from department store to dress shop to clothing boutique. They take their moms, of course, because they know they can count on their advice.
Seventeen-year-old Casey Gonzalez of Avondale has been dressing up since taking dance lessons at age 3.
But this is different, she says as she enters Cache.This is her first prom, where she'll dance with her best friend rather than on a stage.
Casey's not sure what she's looking for. "Once you try it on, you just know," she says.
Seventeen-year-old Jamie Harshfield is shopping carefully for her prom dress. It's her first formal gown, and she's paying for it with money from her part-time job at Lombardo's Gelato at Arizona Mills in Tempe.
She scoured the mall on breaks, flipping through dresses and coming back later to try them on. She found one she liked, nicely cut but bright green: "It made me look like a tree."
Jamie eventually wound up at Windsor, bringing her mom along for valuable advice. Her parents have veto power, even though she's spending her own money.
Finding the perfect dress
At Cache, the first dress Casey tries on is black with a spiderweb back of rhinestones.
"I look huge right here," she says, slapping her thighs.
"You do not," her mother, Margaret Gonzalez, says.
But she does look very mature. Casey is 5 feet 7 inches tall and has been since she was 11. Her mom has been vigilant about making sure her little girl dresses her age, even though she was in junior sizes in sixth grade.
Casey looks like a ballerina in the next dress, an ivory chiffon halter with pewter beading and a soft, jagged hemline. She twirls in front of the mirror.
"It passes the spin test," Casey says.
But it has a $338 price tag. Gonzalez is willing to spend about $200.
Too mature for a teen
At Windsor, Jamie says she'll know the perfect dress by the way it fits - and how it makes her feel. She would like something classic, but not black. She figures she'll spend $80 to $150.
"You would look good in that," says her mom, Bobi Harshfield, pulling a floor-length purple gown from the rack. She lays it over her arm for Jamie to take into the dressing room.
"We want nothing too revealing because of the way people dance today," Harshfield says. She has chaperoned enough junior-high dances to know.
Harshfield attended her junior prom in a long pink gown with spaghetti straps. She wants her daughter to wear something that looks youthful.
"I'm excited to see her grow up," Harshfield says, adding, though not too fast.
Jamie, a junior at McClintock High in Tempe, thinks along the same lines.
"That's too mature," she says, pulling out a long blue gown with a halter top.
She holds up another. Jamie is going to the prom with her boyfriend, 17-year-old Jared Pickens.
"I don't think my mom would like the slit there," she says, running her finger up and down a rhinestone-lined cut in the front of a long pink dress.
Her mom hopes prom night is everything her daughter dreams of, as long as she makes her midnight curfew.
Not your mom's prom
At Cache, the store manager offers Casey's mom a chair while she waits for her daughter to come out of the dressing room. Gonzalez would rather stand. Shopping for a prom dress is a new experience for Gonzalez. She didn't go to her high-school prom.
"I was too cool for all that," she says. She was 18, employed and, since she was of the drinking age at the time, she had other plans.
But Gonzalez still has plenty of prom advice for her daughter, such as saying "yes" to any boy who gets up the nerve to ask her to dance. Casey, a junior at Xavier College Preparatory, insists she'll only dance with her best friend, Matt Kazmeirzcak. She's going with a group of friends.
Casey comes out in a sleek, black satin dress. Out of Casey's earshot, her mom, grimacing, says, "She looks 30."
Casey studies herself in the mirror: "I feel really old in this, like I'm 30 years old."
Her dad and two older brothers, ages 22 and 24, also likely wouldn't approve.
Casey puts on a short blue dress covered with sequins.
"That's cute!" her moms squeals. Casey winces: "I feel like Barbie."
Mother knows best
At Windsor, Jamie comes out of the dressing room in a bright-blue one-shoulder gown, not bothering to show her mom the last one she tried on.
"The other one was cut way too far down," she explains. "I like this one."
She ignores the mirror and looks to her mom for approval. Harshfield picked the dress out, telling Jamie that it would make her bluish-green eyes stand out.
"Yeah, Mom knows best," Harshfield says.
Jamie likes this dress best, but she's going to look around some more. Her prom isn't until May 10, so she still has time.
A time for bonding
At Cache, Casey puts three dresses on hold, not yet ready to choose one. They range in price from $198 to $300. She wants to look around some more. Mom and daughter will go shopping again tomorrow.
"I think I'm lucky," Gonzalez says.
She knows some mothers don't get along well with their daughters.
Casey appreciates that her mom is buying the dress, so she should have a say. But they do disagree sometimes.
"Usually it's the amount of bosom showing," Gonzalez says.
Casey laughs. She says she trusts her mom's opinion, and not just when it comes to prom dresses.
