Promising Dry-Clean-Only Outfit Worn Twice, Promptly Forgotten at Bottom of Closet

When 27-year-old Lizby Ducke first spotted the asymmetrical chiffon jumpsuit at wHIMsy+ HEResy in Soho, she was skeptical.

“It looked like one of those pieces that makes most people look like they had last dibs in a community theater costume box, but somehow looks stunning on people who know how to apply liquid eyeliner and have perfect genes,” she says.

But at her friend, the fashion blogger #Meydan., forced her to try it on.

“It made me seem taller and model-thin and like my resume had a special section for professional awards,” she remembers. Ducke balked at the $300 price tag, but she told herself she could wear it to multiple events throughout the spring and summer: “Sarah’s wedding, Marsha’s baby shower, Cara’s wedding, Allison’s wedding, Laura’s wedding.”

Ducke wore the jumpsuit — to great compliment — to her next work happy hour. She also chose it for the birthday party of a friend whom Ducke doesn’t really like but who inexplicably has many attractive single friends.

“That party was outside, so it got a little sweaty,” Ducke reports. “When I got home, I remembered I hadn’t found a good dry cleaner in my new neighborhood, so I put it in this Urban Outfitters bag and told myself I’d find a place to get it cleaned.”

Over the next few months, the outfit sat in the bag. Sometimes Ducke would take the bag with her to work, determined to find a suitable cleaner near her office, “but the day would get hectic, and I’d end up just bringing it back home.” One day, when Ducke was cleaning her room in a rare burst of housekeeping, she threw the bag into the bottom of her closet, promising herself she’d really find a cleaner on Monday.

Ducke eventually forgot about the jumpsuit. She moved on, wearing the same dresses she’d worn to last summer’s weddings to this round of nuptials. But she always felt, she confessed, “like something was missing.”

Last Tuesday, as Ducke was cleaning out her apartment in preparation for a move, she happened upon the old Urban Outfitters bag. All of the sudden, “it was an episode of Maury,” she says. She was laughing and crying and jumping up and down. (The jumpsuit displayed no visible reaction.) “It was like, we got a second chance!” she exclaims.

At press time, the jumpsuit has been sitting on the floor of a closet in Ducke’s new apartment for 8 days, though Ducke did recently open Yelp! and type “dry cleaners.”