The pattern called for a ruffled collar, shirred trim on the bodice, and a four-tiered underskirt. Three tiers will be enough. And that collar and trim—too fussy. Maybe piping instead? In a nice jade green.

She had left the best part for last. The bodice of the dress buttoned from waist to collar. She would need twelve buttons.

She opened the enormous button box, letting her gaze rove over the rows and columns, enjoying the bounty, the colors, the shapes and sizes. Then she chose a few possibilities. Round white pearl buttons. Domed glass buttons, also white, but with an iridescent sheen. Flat circles of gold-­colored metal, each etched with a daisy-like flower. She made three neat rows of buttons on the green sprigged lawn and stepped back to judge the effect.

The gold buttons didn’t suit. Their color was wrong for the green of the lawn, which had more of a silvery undertone. She swept those off the fabric into her hand and put them back in the button box.

Pearl buttons were customary on a lawn dress, pretty without being the least bit garish. This sample dress had to appeal to a wide range of customers, and the pearl buttons would be the safest choice.

But Hanna wanted something just a little out of the ordinary. The glass buttons glinted with elusive colors that changed depending on how the light touched them. They would provide the extra hint of elegance she was aiming for.

Frontier towns like LaForge, as well as their surrounding homesteads, were perpetually either dusty or muddy. Most of the women she saw followed Mama’s first principle about clothing.

“Clean and neat. You don’t have to be fancy. But clean and neat shows respect to other people. And respect to yourself.”

Hanna was impressed by women like Miss Walters who made the added effort toward stylishness, living as they did in a place where luxuries or even niceties were months away if they could be had at all. Between observing these women and poring over the pages of Godey’s, she had begun to form her own opinions about fashion.

The design of a dress, she thought, could emphasize either the fabric or the cut. If the fabric was beautiful or special, the cut of the dress should be simple, to allow for long uninterrupted sweeps of the material. If the style of the dress was elaborate, then the fabric should be a plain weave in a solid color, the better to show off the structural details.