Reader Q&A: our fashion editor Jess Cartner-Morley answers your questions – live
Jess is live
The Guardian’s fashion editor Jess Cartner-Morley is now answering your questions about her career on the front row.
Key events
Is there such a thing as ‘mutton-dressed-as lamb’?
FlusteredCustard asks: When I was younger (44 now) I thought older women who stuck to fashion formulas from when they were young looked vaguely silly and thought staying up-to-date, no matter your age, was the key to style. Now I am older, I find the clothing adopted by younger people to be what looks vaguely silly, and tend to dress according to my own, no doubt frozen, formulas. Where does the balance lie? Is there such a thing as mutton-dressed-as lamb?
Jess:
Ha! I am 53 so I’ve been debating this for a while! I do believe that staying current is part of what being chic is about. At the moment, for lots of people in their 40s and 50s, this is about wearing a looser silhouette than we are used to. Your clothes say a lot about you, and I guess one of the things that I want mine to say is that I’m looking at and engaged with the world around me even at my advanced years. I’d probably rather be mutton dressed as lamb than mutton living in the past?
What has happened to mid-range shops?
Indigohippo asks: What has done for the mid-range shop and will it ever come back? The place that Topshop famously occupied (but see also Miss Selfridge, Dorothy Perkins, Oasis, Warehouse) when I was in my teens/20s is vacant. Now it’s all cheap fast fashion that falls to pieces or rather higher end (& Other Stories, Whistles, Nobody’s Child) which I love in my mid/late 30s but couldn’t have afforded at 20. Shops which sold affordable but decent quality clothes just don’t exist anymore or have been bought up by Boohoo/Sports Direct/Asos and are now shells of their former selves in both style and quality. Why? And will we ever see the likes of Topshop again?
Jess:
I feel about high street shopping the same way I feel about social media: I lived through the bit when it was feel-good and optimistic and now it’s gone a bit nasty and it makes me sad. I miss the old Topshop so bad! Although they do have some good stuff again now, plus you can buy there without the money going to PG which is good. The silver lining of this though is that many of the younger shoppers who, as you rightly say, are priced out of the ‘haute high street’ stuff are shopping from car boot sales or on Vinted instead.
Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters
Tips for post-partum and perimenopausal bodies?
Redstar1000 asks: What brands produce comfortable (and stylish) trousers for post-partum bodies? I’m looking for a pair that fits well over my c-section pouch, still very noticeable one year after birth, sadly.
nardacnardac asks: I’m perimenopausal and suddenly clothes don’t fit round my waistline anymore. Are there any tips and tricks for dressing fashionably that will look sexy despite my thickening waistline? I don’t want to have a whole wardrobe of shift/tent dresses as my only option.
Jess:
You are in luck my friends. Defining, accentuating or narrowing the waist has been such a strong element of women’s fashion for so long (corsets!) that it can be easy to think of it as a non negotiable. But a lot of the best dressed women around right now are wearing generously cut shirts and not tucking them into their trousers at all. It’s very elegant when you get your eye in and it means you can pick a waistband solely on grounds of comfort. Alternatively, look out for trousers which are elasticated on the back half but look smart at the front. Me + Em do great ones.
A comeback for the suit?
paulrennie asks: Can the proper suit ever come back?
Jess:
I can’t see this happening in the medium term. The overarching trend for decades has been the decline of men’s tailoring as a proportion of menswear sold. Hence why every designer got into sportswear and streetwear. Clothes have got more casual and more comfortable and most of us like it that way. In fact I was at the weekend I was walking through a back-to-school kids’ uniform section in a store and wondering how long it will be till schools ditch the matching trousers and blazers? It seems to me kind of wild that children are dressed more formally for school than their parents are for the office?
Is fashion a cultural artefact?
pleicetene asks: Yesterday’s article about the history of the weekend was great. Are you interested in fashion as cultural artefact, as a reflection of social and cultural history, and even a shaper of it sometimes?
Jess:
Appreciate you! That’s so nice of you to say. I think all fashion journalists are current affairs journalists at heart. Fashion is a live conversation about how it feels to live in the world at this moment, that’s why I have loved writing about it for so long.
Was Oscar Wilde right about fashion?
Nepthsolem asks: More than a century ago Oscar Wilde wrote that “Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months.” Was he right then? Is he right now?
Jess:
Haha. Wilde was a very snappy dresser! The OG dandy, with his velvet jackets and long hair. He saw style as a way of rebelling against stodgy Victorian values – he hated corsets and top hats and thought clothes should be comfortable and freeing. He was anti-fashion-establishment pro-self-expression, I guess. Also, I guess we have to take him with a pinch of salt, since didn’t he also say “the only thing to do with advice is give it away, it is never any use to oneself” 🙂
Jess is live
The Guardian’s fashion editor Jess Cartner-Morley is now answering your questions about her career on the front row.
Welcome to the Conversation
What’s changed in the industry since 2000, have there been any catwalk disasters, and can you really consume fashion ethically?
As Jess gears up for another round of fashion weeks beginning in New York next month, ask her anything about her years covering fashion.
Jess will be here at 3pm BST/10am ET.
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In the meantime, read some of Jess’s expert style tips:
