Perhaps you had simply gone to the fabric store, found the best plaid with tints of red (but not in an overwhelming, blood-red kind of way), and gone home to make the lovely outfit. Such a lack of preparation would have ended with some ugly, misshapen, bloody confusion that would make everyone nauseous.
No—instead, you go to Saks first. Go into the Women’s Studio on the second floor to touch the garments, maybe try them on to see how they look, check the hems and the zippers before the clerks sniff you out and become suspicious. There will be hours spent in a dressing room without buying anything. You’re not stealing, but you might be because you don’t look like the Saks type mainly because you’re not wearing the green and white floral dress made of the good fabric. The fabric makes all the difference, your mother said, even though she was cheap and Dutch.