A dress or trousers? Why not wear both!
LAST weekend at the first sign of spring, I went out shopping with my 22-year- old daughter for nothing in particular.
It was one of those purely speculative trips where you hope something, anything, might jump out to cheer you up.
Diving into Topshop, we spied a dummy high up on a plinth. For me it provided a powerful Nineties flashback, as it was posed wearing a printed tea-dress hitched up to one side over a pair of frayed-hem jeans.
The last time the idea of dresses over trousers filtered in to the High Street was after grunge. It was the height of the Kate Moss and ‘ waif’ controversies and the fashion fall- out of illegal rave culture, where kids (now well into their 40s and beyond) took to dancing in abandoned warehouses and fields off the M1.
However, the ensemble rang no sartorial bells with my daughter — it was before she was born.
‘What do you think of that?’ I asked her.
‘Well, I don’t mind the dress, and the jeans are quite nice,’ she mused. ‘ But I wouldn’t wear them together.’
And, when I think about it, nor would I.
Topshop knows it’s a magnet for mother-daughter shopping (in other words, it knows who holds the purse-strings). Was this look its nostalgic call-out to those mummies old enough to know why Oasis and Blur couldn’t stand one another?
THE good news is there is something in the dress- overtrousers look for us — but caution is needed.
First off, I wouldn’t be caught dead putting a flowered tea-dress over jeans and wearing it with trainers — even though I do own all the components.
Truth be told, I could never wear it the first time round, either, though not for want of trying.
every attempt at putting a Portobello market slip- dress or one of my favourite Forties frocks over my Levis resulted in an unmade-bed effect I didn’t dare leave the house in.
The trouble was — and is — that I am a working woman psychologically dependent on feeling ‘together’, and a boho dress over jeans just doesn’t get me there.
To wander the streets attired in a floral frock and trousers at 50 might risk one being categorised as ‘confused’.
However, there are other versions of the layered silhouette to try. I’d suggest an oversized shirt with floaty tails and long cuffs over slim, cropped trousers, which, after all, is simply a cleaned-up version of the same thing.
Try the long shirt from Modern Rarity (£150, john
lewis. com) over Marks & Spencer’s navy, cropped, slim-leg trousers (£19.50, marks andspencer.com). It’s business- like and forgiving to the middle-- section; an ideal compromise on mild days when you want to ditch your tailored jacket.
If you’re rangy enough, you could try the same oversized shirt with fluid, wide trousers (look at Zara’s ‘flowing’ design, £39.99, zara.com).
There’s something very woman- friendly about the feeling that clothes can be fashionably loose and less constricting. You have to be careful, though. All- over volume can be dumpifying. So, unless you’re tall, stick to safe, slim-leg trousers.
Personally, I’m veering towards a tunic over trousers (check out the printed tunic, £ 19.99 and chalk- stripe trousers, £35.99 at mango.com for inspiration).
It’s something I never thought I’d consider, as it was what my mother and aunt used to wear (with an arty pendant necklace) for fancy occasions in the late Sixties.
For years, I regarded it as embarrassingly frumpy. Now, I find myself drawn inexorably towards a bottom- covering structured tunic with long sleeves and a round neck.
It just goes to prove a point I’ve made many times in this column: When it comes to fashion, never say never.