The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - Saturday
FOUR TARTAN PIECES TO BUY NOW...
Chloe Mac Donnell
My abiding memory of my secondary school days is of my heavy tartan skirt. Falling just above the ankle, it came with a thick waistband that meant attempting to shorten it by rolling it up left even the most slender of teenagers looking like they’d paid one visit too many to the tuck shop.
So when I saw what was essentially the exact same green and navy print on the Michael Kors autumn/winter 2018 runway, I immediately began to shudder with flashbacks of its scratchy material and stuffy exam halls. Fast forward to last night and I’d added a Tibi wool blazer in a very similar pattern to my Net-a-Porter wishlist. You see, tartan is once again trending and even the most sceptical of us can’t resist its timeless appeal.
Everyone from royalty to rock stars claims certain tartans as their own. In the 1840s, Queen Victoria had a special tartan designed for holidays at Balmoral.
The punk movement of the Seventies adopted tartan as a sartorial revolt against the monarchy. Their queen? Vivienne Westwood, who opened a shop on London’s
King’s Road selling ripped and distressed tartan clothing with safety pins, bondage gear and anarchist slogans aplenty.
Since then, a string of designers, including Alexander McQueen, have used tartan’s semiotics to comment on Britain’s politics and culture.
For 2018, it once again appears in plenty of guises. At Simone Rocha there were tartan dresses featuring shimmering lurex trims and bows. Donatella Versace played with punk tartan, mis-matching and piecing vivid hues on shirts and short skirts, while Isa Arfen spliced more traditional tartan prints on to trench coats and ruffled tops.
For the brave, there’s head-to-toe, à la Emilia Wickstead, but for those of us a little bit more shy about joining the clan, start with one item. Balenciaga’s embossed scarf will get you major street cred, but Lochcarron of Scotland has plenty of similar colourways that won’t break the bank.