Expounding on the idea that it’s cocktail hour somewhere, I think that cocktail dresses should be daywear. There’s just something wonderfully life-affirming about a pretty cocktail frock. It’s simple, requires few accessories and most are guaranteed to elicit compliments and amused double takes.

Cocktail dresses make people feel better — not just the wearer, but the observer. Imagine a work place, city street, pizza parlor in which everyone walked around dolled up in party dresses.

Born in the 20s, the cocktail dress was a symbol of things to come. In, “The Cocktail Dress” by Laird Borrelli-Persson ( Collins Design, March 2009, $21.99), she explains: “No corseted Victorian matron or wholesome Gibson girl would have dreamed of dressing specifically to drink anything but tea.”

The author explains that cocktail dresses symbolized a new mobility for women in the late 20s, literally and figuratively.

Before that, the restrictive “hobble skirt” had been widely popular based on a Parisian design. It was so named because it extended down to the ankle, but was cut so narrow that women had to take very small steps to walk without falling, thereby hobbling the wearer.

Of course, now, the cocktail dress is merely part of a fashion genre worn to special events.

So I wonder if a random Wednesday can be considered a special occasion? One day, when the mood strikes, I’ll test that theory.

Want the book? Be the first to tell me in the comment section below, who is widely-believed to have named the cocktail dress

The dresses above come from Portuguese designer Nuno Baltazar’s fall collection at ModaLisboa fashion week in Cascais on Saturday (green one sleeve dress).

Designer Andy The-Anh’s Toronto Fashion week show Wednesday (the ladies at the top).

Tadashi Shoji ready-to-wear fall 2009 collection in New York (satin magenta dress with long sleeve)

That’s Chado Ralph Rucci’s soft gray silk feathered frock.