Head up to the second floor of Monroeville Mall, walk toward Macy's, and you will find a store that has spent more than a decade doing one thing well. The Dress Shop sells prom and homecoming dresses. It also sells pageant, quinceañera and special occasion gowns, but the calendar here runs on school dances.
The shop has been dressing students since March 2013. It started out at the Pittsburgh Mills Mall, then moved to Monroeville Mall in 2019 and used the bigger space to widen its selection.
Our goal is to make sure all of our clients who visits our store ends up with the outfit that makes them feel and look their very best.
That line sits on the shop's homepage as its mission statement. The store backs it with what it calls personalized assistance from a friendly staff: someone to help pull dresses and give a candid opinion, which helps when you are juggling a mall trip with a parent's patience.
A registry for every dance, not just prom
The feature that stands out most is the dress registration. The shop records which school each prom and homecoming dress is going to and tries not to sell the same style twice into the same school. The About page is candid that this is part of why the inventory runs so deep: to keep looks unique, the store needs a lot of them.
That registry earns its keep around here. The eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh pack many big high schools close together. Gateway High School is Monroeville's own. Penn Hills, Plum, Woodland Hills, Norwin and Franklin Regional in Murrysville are all close enough that their students can easily shop the same mall in the same few weeks. When five or six proms are shopping from one rack, a written record of who bought what does more work than it sounds.
Homecoming gets the same treatment. New short dresses arrive through late summer and into September, and the shop has run markdowns on in-stock short dresses once the season is underway. The store's advice is simple: hurry in for the best selection.
Designers on the floor
The Dress Shop's own site names the labels it stocks. The list leans toward the names that show up at proms all over western Pennsylvania:
- Jovani, plus its JVN by Jovani line
- Clarisse
- Alyce Paris (listed on the site as Alyce Designs)
- Rachel Allan
- Jasz Couture
- Primavera Couture
- Cecilia Couture, Nox Anabel and Juliet Dresses
Getting the dress home works one of two ways here.
In the showroom
Most of the selection is in stock
- Try on and walk out with a dress
Not on the rack
Special orders
- For the style or size you want when the floor does not have it
The store also mentions payment options, which helps when a family is budgeting for a dress, tickets and dinner all in the same month.
Pricing is part of the pitch. The shop calls it "attainable luxury," and the idea is designer prom gowns at prices that do not require a second job. Personalized service rounds out the list, and the one customer comment the store features on its homepage singles out a staff member by name for remembering returning shoppers.
The guys are not an afterthought.
The showroom is not a full rental counter, but for a date who wants something louder than black, it is a quick stop in the same store.
For families in the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh, the mall location is the selling point. It sits right where the Parkway East and the Turnpike meet the Monroeville retail strip, and the dress, the jacket and the accessories can all happen in one building. It is one of the simpler prom errands in this corner of western Pennsylvania: park, ride up a floor, shop.
Monroeville Mall prom details
Does The Dress Shop register prom dresses by school?
Yes. The store registers prom and homecoming dresses and works to avoid selling the same dress twice to the same school. Tell the staff your school when you buy.
Where is the shop inside Monroeville Mall?
On the second floor, near Macy's.
Can I special order a dress?
Yes. Most dresses are in stock in the showroom, but the shop says special orders are available.