Pulling focus from the bride. By wearing a wine rack. On your head.

Which is a pretty big call if the bride is a commoner about to become royalty and, indeed, a future Queen.

With 2 billion people around the world watching the whole thing. In HD.

So what was Princess Beatrice thinking, hmmm? Don't get me wrong, I'm all for stretching one's avant garde muscles -  my formative years were all about wearing the kookiest New Romantic get-ups I could wiggle into, to the quiet despair of my elegant Mum  -  but I do have some doubts about the outfits Beatrice and Eugenie sported at the royal wedding.

                Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Europe

Philip Treacy is a genius and a national treasure and makes the most wondrous hat confections I've ever laid eyes on. But, honestly, Beatrice's bonnet looks like a plaster moulding prised off the ceiling of the throne room at Buckingham Palace, upon which poor Phil accidentally spilled his morning latte from the Starbucks around the corner. But hat choice aside, for me it's all about the colour. Or lack thereof.

Redheads have to be careful about colour, being mostly pale and wan-looking (I speak from personal experience). Nude tones in particular can leave a redhead looking at best like a sepia photo or, at worst, like a corpse.

                    Photo courtesy of  Now magazine

A rather splendid row of teeth and stormy panda eyes are the only distinguishable features in a frumpy sea of cafe au lait-tinged high-necked rouleau-swamped matronly Valentino far more suited to her grandmother's style. Which is unfortunate because she's an attractive girl with a beautiful mane of hair. Ten points for chutzpah, but aim for colour to complement your titian gorgeousness! As she did on the cover of Tatler. Stunning. The defense rests.

                      Photo courtesy of Tatler

And there's Eugenie, going hammer and tongs in the opposite direction, in an explosion of colour-drenched Vivienne Westwood (another of my favourite envelope-pushing designers). It takes some pluck to wear Westwood so, again, ten points, but whoever styled her may need to take a test to determine if he/she is technically blind, as this choice of ensemble suggests.

The optical illusion of  a neckline is one of the most effective ways to change a person's proportions, adding length and losing mass without the need for Weight Watchers or a pair of crippling Jimmy Choo's. Square necklines are the trickiest to wear unless you closely resemble a twig. Eugenie has a lot of curve going on, and plentiful boobage and square necklines are not happy companions. That hard horizontal line takes her chest to acreage proportions. And adding three fussy bows to one's front when one's front doesn't require any further attention-seeking behaviour...

And whilst I personally love the beautifully-executed sculptural cut of Westwood's designs, one really needs to be six foot two and/or somewhat willowy to cope with the volume of sculptured shapes. This outfit cuts her in half and the draped skirt stopping abruptly at the knees widens her hip department disproportionally. It doesn't mean she can't wear Westwood, she just needs to wear Westwood like the one she wore for Tatler (this mag definitely knows how to style these girls...)

                     Photo courtesy of Tatler

When in doubt, wear a dress. All one colour. Keep the eye on the vertical and diagonal lines. Wow.

The new Duchess of Cambridge, by the way, looked superlatively beautiful. Flawless. Perfection.

Sarah Burton, I bow and scrape before you.

autostylography

Right then. It's the new year. Time to bring this blog into the real world of real women and men, and the real joys and woes that we find in our wardrobes.

And where better to start than yours truly.

I'm having a MAJOR clear out of clothes and accessories that no longer have a place in my life, let alone my style, anymore. It is truly amazing, and not a little idiotic, what we hang on to and why, and how difficult and traumatic it can be to simply remove it from the house. Permanently.

So, over the next few weeks, I'll be documenting my wardrobe purge for all the world to see. Why I toss some things and keep others, the different ways of getting bags of rejected clothes out of the house without turning it into landfill, the gentle art of archiving, and how to re-style the keepers into a wardrobe that works for me rather than against me. And you, faithful readers, will witness the whole thing.

Feel free to ask me what the hell I was thinking when I post photos of the little gems of horror hiding away in my closet. Don't hold back in asking "Hey, you're a stylist! WTF?"  Because even stylists, the apparent arbiters of all things cool and on-trend and fabulous, get it wrong sometimes. I'm as vulnerable as anyone to a so-called bargain during the sales. I get all hot under the collar about trends that are exciting and sexy and playful and cutting edge but simply won't work in a day-to-day wardrobe. I flip through Vogue and fantasize that I can carry off that awesome dress worn by [insert name of preferred supermodel here] even though she's six foot three and I'm five foot two.

Personal style is an ongoing process, evolving gently with every passing year, changing as we change shape and size and our perspective on life. And this is a really good thing. As fun as it was, I'm glad I moved on from the silver Lurex footless tights and white jersey mini dress I wore when I was 15 and wanted to be the backing vocalist for Duran Duran. With white and gold winklepickers. Now we're talkin'!

So, saddle up, folks. We is goin' on a ride!

Exhibit A.
My lovely box of scarves. 

Which, strangely over time, has morphed into a box of scarves 

plus a bunch of other crap that won't fit elsewhere.

And the last time I wore any of this was... ummm, yeah. OK.

And for those of you who have never experienced winklepickers first hand
(or foot, I suppose)
this is what they are...

 Terrifically pointy shoes! Perfect for picking winkles!
Extremely bad for your toes!

like trying to dress the Empire State Building...

...which is the challenge for the stylist who glams up Christina Hendricks for the red carpet, according to my husband.

Tall, magnificently hourglass, pale skinned and carrot-topped. Maybe it's easier to dress a size 0 suntanned blonde, but not half as much fun!

Her gown for the Golden Globes was definitely eye catching - knock 'em dead RED and a proper nod to Mae West in its skin-tightness.

But the ruffle on her shoulder? Bless her, the last thing she needs above her tiny waistline is more volume. Combined with the soft mussed up hairstyle, it was all too busy and suffocating around her face, which is quite small and delicate. The final effect was top heavy and disproportionate and it was all because of the clothes, not her figure.

Because when she keeps it streamlined, she looks AMAZING. But ya know, having said all that, she is an emphatically stunning poster girl for voluptuous women and redheads everywhere, no matter what she wears.

2011 - the year of YOU. And me too, come to think of it.

Great fortune and buckets of joy for a glittering New Year to all the folks who read this blog. Which isn't a lot of people but, hey, that just means more fortune, joy and glitter for those nice ones who do.

I wanted to start a full year of blogging by tipping my hat to the Renaissance Zen Man who thoughtfully and quite unknowingly provided the name for this blog. He was the 1st AD on a film I costumed in 2007, a wonderful project designed to give young aspiring filmmakers and crew a leg-up into the industry. It's called The Butterfly Tattoo, and it's available on Amazon UK for £11.99. You really should buy it. (end of shameless plug)

The Costume Department (myself and my fab assistant Rachel) and Make Up (the lovely Leanne) were always plonked into the same corner of wherever we were filming - tents, vans, warehouses, paddocks. And we became known collectively and appropriately as The Glamour Department.

Thanks, Mr Christian Gill.

 

I'm torturing my husband. With my head.

Not actual physical torture, of course. More psychological. Because my lovely husband really adores my hair. His nickname for me is all about my hair. I'm pretty sure he married me just for unlimited access to my coppery curly mane of hair. My hair, you understand, is red.

But I keep, you know, messing with it and it's freaking him out. Although he's doing his level best to be brave, I can't help noticing the flash of fear that crosses his face when I tell him I'm off to get a haircut.

Phase One of the torture happened in 2006. I cut it all off. It was becoming dull and thin and bedraggled for a whole bunch of reasons. We were living in France at the time so I ran away to Australia and cut off all my hair, thinking distance would soften the blow. Yeah. Not so much.

My husband, being the most loving and diplomatic soul that ever walked the face of the Earth, told me he still loved my hair, provided it was really short or really long. At this point, to get it really long again would involve running away to Australia and hiding there for five to ten years. So, really short is how it stayed.

And then it happened. The grey. The odd gnarled grey twig of a strand became a forest of petrified wood sprouting out of my head in all directions. One minute I was all "Yes, grey pride!" followed by "Does L'Oreal do a semi-permanent in copper-gold?". Does that grey flash make me look old? Arty? Mysterious? Worldly? Indifferent to personal grooming?  Enter Phase Two of the torture. I headed to the salon and had a proper semi-permanent a couple of times. The most recent one was two days ago. They do an amazing job, getting very close to my original colour, if a shade darker.

My man loves the cut. Very short. But he took one look at the colour and plaintively asked where his flame-haired girl had gone. And I'm a total sucker for plaintive.

The next morning I'm kickin' around the web and I come across this
http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/beauty/it-pays-to-be-grey-20101201-18ftj.html

Helen Mirren is a sex goddess, so I go and look at this
http://goinggraylookinggreat.com/
and this
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/beauty/article6948640.ece

and I've pretty much decided to see how I can rock the ashes-of-flame look.

Is it all about the cheekbones? Style Hug # 2

Dressing up is a bore. At a certain age, you decorate yourself to attract the opposite sex, and at a certain age, I did that. But I'm past that age.

You either love her or hate her, but there's something about her that makes her compelling. Some say it's those knife-sharp cheekbones, others point to the feisty personality both on and off-screen, and for others it's the no-nonsense New England clipped accent. OK, maybe not the accent - I don't know anyone who liked her voice.

But for me, it's always been her style. Boyish, practical, unapologetic in its androgyny and yet strangely desirable, never detracting from her rather odd beauty.

When she glammed up, it was less about girly frills and more about clean lines and understated elegance with a good dash of dramatic strength in the details.

In fact, she looked awkward in softer, more feminine get-ups. Probably wondering how anyone could play a round of golf in this little number.

And there's something pretty cool about not giving a damn about what people think of your clothing choices and just doing what makes you happy. In a time when society was rather particular about who should wear what, she marched around in her trousers, men's shirts and saddle shoes because it suited her and her active lifestyle. I can't help but admire her self confidence and chutzpah. She didn't dress for the pleasure of other people - she flipped them the sartorial bird and dressed for her own pleasure and comfort and personality. It's a brave position in a competitive and image-conscious world, but not an impossible one to live by.

Next time I'm standing in front of the wardrobe, wondering what's appropriate to wear for the occasion,  I'll rephrase that question into "What's appropriate to wear for me?"

If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun.

Thanks, Kate Hepburn, for being proudly yourself.

style chat #1 - Curvaceous. Cuddly. Rubenesque.

Call it what you will, but it's a fact. As a species, we humans are getting bigger. And there's been a lot of press about it over the past few years, mostly pretty negative.

Whilst there’s plenty of emotional and social debate about this issue, the technical job of clothing increasingly large bodies has been a bit underestimated.

As a stylist, my job is to help people feel great about themselves through the way they dress. And I have to admit that styling plus-size women and men does present problems. But perhaps we're focusing on the wrong side of this issue. It’s not as much about size as it is about proportions and the distribution of weight on the body. It can be equally tricky to dress a woman with a UK size 8 petite frame and a 36DD bust. Like the gorgeous but unusually-proportioned Christina Hendricks, above, anyone outside the range of  "standard" proportions can find themselves seriously at odds with the mass-produced fashion industry.

The New York Times had a fascinating article on this very point.

Weight gain at the leaner end of the body spectrum does very little to change body proportions and shape – the waist generally stays smaller proportionally to the hips and bust on a woman, for example. But as weight gain increases, it varies greatly from person to person where the weight is laid down. On some people it’s thighs, on others it’s the tummy, on others it’s the chest and shoulders. And this is why so many plus size clothes are shapeless and stretchy, because catering to this diverse range of proportions creates surprisingly expensive technical problems for the folks who make clothes. And that expense has to be met by profits. But it is fair to force plus size consumers to pay more for their clothes? Which takes us straight back to the emotionally and socially heated plus-size debates.

I’d love to hear some opinions on this, particularly from those who are not a size 8 and find it difficult to look and feel good in clothes originally designed for a size 8. It’s about positive solutions. Have you found brands that work for you? Do you make your own clothes? What styles do you aspire to wear?

Or have you completely given up?