Sylvia Eldridge, who was brought up in the Wirral, remembers she ‘always had a good time in this dress’. It was bought for her by a family friend who went on regular shopping trips to London. It was worn to dances in the Chester and Liverpool area at venues such as Quaintways, Clemences and Reeces. Horrockses was a well known label at the time and she knew it was a Preston firm as her father was from Lancashire.