2021’s hottest boutique dresses: The must-have trends

Fashion month at the start of this year showcased the newest and bravest world of digital enterprises, including live-streamed shows, artful videos, and refocusing on shopping small boutique businesses. Designers large and small are adapting to the new social-distanced landscape with gusto, including boutiques around the country and the globe. 2021’s dresses are making waves on and off the runway this year, and boutique dresses are turning heads.

Want to know exactly what 2021 is bringing to the latest in fashion and boutique dresses? You’ve come to the right place!

Disclosure: This post is sponsored by My Sister’s Closet to help you stay on-trend this year.

The roomy button-down

A little oversized inspiration with a nod to the “borrowed from the boys,” in cut and looseness. These boutique dresses are all about billowing silhouettes that take inspiration from standard poplins but in bright pastel shades or blossoming patterns.

Buttons down the front are reminiscent of borrowing your husband’s, dad’s, or boyfriend’s shirt. All with super comfortable proportions.

Everything in full bloom

Spring and summer are for the flowers. This season, fashion is taking it literally and blossoming patterns are decorating dresses from runway to online boutiques.

Not just any flower pattern will do, of course. 2021 is the year of the bold.

Brighter, bolder, and more impactful patterns and designs featuring all sorts of blooms or plant-inspired motifs are on-trend. Watch for florals in delicate lace, daisies in embroidered flourishes, tiny little florals, leaves galore, timeless roses and so much more!

Cinched is in

This season’s returning dress trend is a cinched waist. That’s not necessarily a separate belt, either.

Many of the hottest new dresses are showcasing a variety of waist-enhancing, eye-catching styles. Comfy smocked elastic waistbands, natural waistlines, antebellum, blouson waistlines, empire waistlines, and raised are all making new, innovative comebacks when it comes to boutique dresses this year.

Why so many different waistlines? It’s all about creating a shape on the body this spring.

Pretty in pastel

Getting in the mood for the season is as easy as checking out what colors the boutique dresses will be showcasing. You’ll be finding shades reflective of some of our absolute favorite varieties of roses and spring freshness. Truly, is there anything that says spring better than a stunning pastel?

Colors like buttercup yellow, lovely new lilacs, peony pinks, and subtle gorgeous bluebell are sweeping through designer collections right now, and it could be what your daughter wants to wear to prom too.

Back to basics

While cinched is in, so are the basics! Dresses featuring the ultimate in soft, stretchy, and utterly relaxed shapes are being snatched up by sassy fashionistas across the country.

Given everything going on last year and this year, being comfortable and cute at the same time is definitely back in trend and many of us are glad to see it! T-shirt dresses, jumper dress-like silhouettes, and shift dresses featuring this season’s boldest flower patterns or soft pastels are in-style.

Maximum floating

Whether it’s in minimalistic monochrome, or ruffles erupting everywhere, the floaty, flowy maxi dress is back. This romantic dress has appeared all over catwalks across the globe this season.

Runways connected to the biggest names have already shown off this trend. There are floor-sweeping, sheer, or airy-light styles.

Retro and romantic

You’ll be seeing a lot of delightful nods to throwbacks from the ’60s and ’70s in boutique dresses this spring and summer too. Along with the bold flowers, tiered flower patterns and vintage florals from those eras are making a bright comeback during the warm-weather months.

And speaking of retro and romantic all at once, the puffed sleeve has become something of a mainstay for wardrobes the past few seasons. But spring 2021 has dialed it down just a bit for a more mature attitude to this favorite sleeve silhouette.

Concluding thoughts

This spring and summer, boutique dresses will be fun, flirty, bold in new and innovative ways. Many of us have been enjoying the minimalist fashion trend the last few years, but something about being stuck inside for months on end has been inspiring designers and entrepreneurs to make up for it. They’re finding exciting changes to make to wardrobes.

Look for the exciting and fresh trends mentioned above in the hottest boutique dresses this season.

 

Top photo from My Sister’s Closet, used with permission.