When she was twenty years old, my mother lived in Guadalajara, Mexico.  She told exactly two stories about the six months she spent there with my godmother: First, that their hostess, who they all called Mamà, would fix them horse meat on a regular basis; and second, that she got so sick the last week she was there she thought she was going to die—her hair fell out in droves and was never the same again.  And that was that. 

 

Until I moved across the country and within a quick train trip of my godmother. Over a lazy summer glass of tea on the porch, we got to talking about her adventures with my mother, and I asked about Mexico.  She ran inside to find a box of old photos and returned with a stack of snapshots that would make any hipstamatic user green with envy.  While she regaled me with stories of late-night escapades at steamy salsa clubs, wild taxi rides home, trips into central america and expeditions to the local markets where iguanas would regularly pounce from neighboring trees, I kept thumbing through the photos, completely enamored of the two young women in them.  

 

There was my mother, so young and vibrant in an acid green dress with arms loaded with brass bangles, standing with my godmother in a polka doted dress that would make Frida Kahlo proud, each holding an armload of fruit from a street vendor. And another, lounging in hammocks in perfect 70s patterned skirts.  I could hardly believe my eyes (and my ears, to be sure…and here I thought my mother was always so responsible and cautious and, well, motherly), all the silhouettes, shapes and patterns of their easy summer clothes.  

 

It was those dresses that inspired the Inca Trail line.  One part retro, one part South-of-the boarder flare, and one part off-the-beaten-path explorer, it's a collection of dresses and skirts that are prefect transition pieces.  Wear them now in the blazing heat of a high-dessert summer with just a pair of glitzy sandals to spice up the outfit, then layer one with a cardigan, tights and boots for those chilly nights out dancing under the stars as fall rolls in.  Keep one on hand for a last-minute trip as the seasons change.  Soon you'll find these will become memory makers in your own closet.