Hi Stargazer's Wife!
With dresses and skirts, you have a few options. It's not quite as bleak as some of the posts above suggest: the
beautiful thing about carrying in women's clothing is that our clothing can be so much more flexible than men's clothing. But it's true that there aren't a lot of resources for figuring it out.
You don't mention whether you're slender, athletic, sturdy, or curvy -- and that does make a difference in which carry methods will work. My experience has been that curvy women tend to do best with carry methods that place the firearm in front of the hip (such as appendix carry, crossdraw, and related methods), while slender women tend to do best with the gun behind the hip or on the thigh or ankle. For athletic women, the sweet spot tends to vary a bit more, but they often do well with shoulder-holster based methods (including compression shirt holsters). There are exceptions to every rule, of course! ... but that's where I'd start.
SmartCarry works quite well with skirts, provided you wear loose skirts rather than figure-skimming ones. If you're a fan of snug skirts, the method becomes a bit more difficult. If you go that route, the firearm should be as slender as a Kahr rather than thick like a Glock. Incidentally, you needn't "flash the bad guy" to draw from a SmartCarry while wearing a skirt! The draw remains
exactly the same as if you were wearing pants--you reach down into the waistband and draw from there, just like the guys in dress slacks do. However, you can also wear it with a dress and in that case you'll need to flip the skirt in order to draw. (But you're only drawing to defend your life by shooting the guy, and if you shoot well enough he'll never tell anyone you flashed him anyway...)
I love my belly band, which allows me to position the firearm nearly anywhere on my torso. It really opens up possibilities for dress carry, too... but there are two caveats. First, belly bands sometimes "roll" around the top and bottom edges, particularly if you have curves. They tend to work best for people with excellent postures, who can wear them higher on the torso. For those with curves, they often work well worn low on the hips, to mimic a belt holster without a belt. Second, it is disturbingly easy to position the belly band somewhere where the firearm is well-concealed but impossible to draw. Be sure to check your ability to draw with
each outfit you use.
A thigh band holster, such as the one sold by Galco, works well if your upper legs don't touch (or barely touch) when you stand with your feet together, and if you wear loose skirts. Again, a figure-skimming skirt will be a problem. And if you don't have that extra room available in that area, thigh carry isn't for you.
Depending on your preferred skirt style, you might even be able to go with a standard IWB or OWB belt holster. A lot of good jeans skirts have standard belt loops.
Evyl Robot did a nice job presenting the shoulder holster option. Let me add one more source for shoulder holsters: Ken Null at
http://klnullholsters.com makes some very nice minimalist designs which work well for smaller firearms and small-framed people.
A carry method similar to shoulder holsters, but somewhat more flexible, places the holster on an undershirt and positions it directly underneath the arm just like a shoulder holster. See
http://abetterholster.com for one example. The caveat here is that if you are very buxom, you might not enjoy the uniboob look that compression shirts tend to give. If you instead go with a mesh undershirt, such as those from Kramer at
www.kramerleather.com , you'll find that even a lightweight firearm tends to sag the shirt and conceal poorly. However, they are a comfortable way to carry and with a very loose cover garment (and a light firearm) they're great.
Hope it helps!
pax