Marguerite hoped that the made-over lavender dress would make her white.

Momma had put "ruffles on the hem and cute little tucks around the waist" of a "white woman's once-was-purple throw-away." The material of the dress was silk, and Marguerite fanticized that

"once I put it on I'd look like a movie star...I was going to look like one of the sweet little white girls who were everybody's dream of what was right with the world."

With a sense of exquisite delight, Marguerite imagined how surprised everyone would be

"when one day I woke out of my black ugly dream, and my real hair, which was long and blond, would take the place of the kinky mass that Momma wouldn't let me straighten...my light-blue eyes were going to hypnotize them..."

The tragedy Marguerite expresses is the self-hatred felt by Southern black girls growing up in a society where to be white was the ultimate good, and to be anything else was to be something less, worthless, of no account. In the Jim Crow South, the black population lived in constant fear of white society, and every interaction between the two races reinforced that they were inferior, and to be kept in their place. As a child, Marguerite dreamed of being white, only to be reminded at every turn of the reality of her black skin, and the societal position in which it entrapped her. She concludes

"If growing up is painful for the Southern Black girl, being aware of her displacement is the rust on the razor that threatens the throat...it is an unnecessary insult" (Prologue).

What did Marguerite hope the made-over lavender dress would do for her?

The lavender dress is a white woman's throw-away, a used garment that she no longer needs. Marguerite is nonetheless determined to have it, as it's still very pretty and, with one or two alterations, can be made to look as good as new.

Before she puts on the dress, Marguerite spends a lot of time fantasizing about what she will look like when she wears it for the first time. She thinks she'll look like a movie star, one of those “sweet little white girls who were everybody's dream of what was right in the world.” In other words, by wearing the lavender dress Marguerite thinks that she'll be able to meet the standards of beauty of white society.

It's notable that Marguerite, despite being African American, doesn't feel beautiful in her own skin; she believes that in order to feel and look beautiful, she has to copy the style of a white woman. To this end, not only does she fantasize about what she will look like when she puts on the dress, but she also imagines what she would look like with long, blonde hair, instead of the “kinky mass” that her mother won't allow her to straighten out. Thus, Marguerite essentially hopes to look entirely different than the way she was born because society has instilled in her that white women are the standard of beauty.