Anthropologie’s Spring Dresses: Yay or Nay?

Quick sidenote: Anthropologie sent out a first dibs email for its May catalogue yesterday. See the whole page here.

Spring is a lovely time of year for many reasons but for me one of the highlights is watching Anthropologie’s dress section explode with tons of new offerings. Although I’ve admittedly liked their fall stuff a lot better than spring for a few years now, my wishlist is growing like a vine this year.

Let’s talk thoughts on Anthro’s dresses for Spring 2014 so far.

Above are some of the latest Anthropologie dresses that have caught my eye. (You can check out the newest dresses here or all of them here.) I’m excited that more and more of the options have waist definition and many of them spill to the knee. I’ve read many online reviews with amusement where petites report preferring the regular version of a dress simply for the length, and with people like Kate Middleton rocking knee-length dresses to perfection I can only hope this is finally, finally the return of knee-length dresses.

On the other hand there have been several Anthro dresses that I’ve loved online but been disappointed by in real life. I have some dress reviews coming up tomorrow that are a mix of pleasant surprises and letdowns. Have you experienced this too? Take the Silk Tableau Shift ($178) in the mix above. I just adore the model shot! And I’m proud of Anthropologie for not only noting in the product description that the pattern varies from dress to dress, but also showing a model shot in a clearly different pattern. Yet I’m still sad that the pattern varies so widely! The model shot’s dress is just…not enticing, especially versus the model shot.

Then again, there are dresses like the Capuchina Dress ($138), which didn’t do much for me online but was wowza in real life! There’s a new medallion version of it that should be online later this week, perhaps even today that’s even better than that. So the surprise factor works both ways.

The only dress I’ve purchased at Anthropologie so far this Spring is the Teahouse Dress ($148, review). And I am looking forward to wearing my Torsade Dress (review) more — I wore it a ton in Europe and on a dinner date with my guy. I am on the lookout for more options from this year’s collection. Non-Anthropologie wise I just invested in this Tory Burch dress while Nordstrom is matching Saks’ Friends & Family price. Not only is the color lovely, the neckline is supremely flattering and it comes to just about the knee on my 5’8 frame.

What dresses have been pleasant surprises for you? Which ones have disappointed? What are you hoping to see in Anthropologie’s spring assortment? I’m hoping for some casual knee-length dresses a la the Hera Draped Dress ($168) in the layout above, just with a neckline more flattering for my shape. I’ll have a review of it soon.