Fashion

Bring on the wolf whistles with style guru Charlie Dawson

1 new trend in 60 seconds…

SEQUINS
Ooh, isn’t fashion a slippery, sketchy and downright sneaky sort of thing? No sooner have you bagged and tagged some trend of yesteryear and sent it to down to Oxfam to dress the unemployed when – rats! – you wish you’d kept your mitts on it.

Et voilà, the journey of the sequin. Them shiny things are everywhere in the Autumn/Winter collections, which have already dropped in shops as you rest your pert buttocks in your seat.

If you don’t want to “Do a Dynasty”, then hand over your cash for the don of all sequined items… the tuxedo-slash-oversized boyfriend blazer. Rachel Bilson, Gossip Girl’s Taylor Momsem and, er, Alesha Dixon have all rocked this look with varying success.

On the catwalk, where professionals show us how to do it best, Stella McCartney’s iridescent green motorcycle jacket was worn over a satin sheath dress, and Balmain showed a €16,000 sequin cardigan (Car… cardigan? Decisions, decisions) which sparkled at the credit crunch, thus disorientating it.

For the Lady Ga Ga’s among you, try a second skin of sequins on your harem pants, leggings or big flashy knickers worn over opaques. If you’re angling for an ogle, ditch the black and go red like designer Betsey Johnson who added her signature sass to a grey ponte knit lapel dress by using red sequined leggings underneath.

But before you go shimmering like some over-excited bird on a hen do, some rules:

There are good sequins and bad sequins. Good ones are halfway between matt and shine and can be oversized (superquins!) if preferred. Bad ones are already hanging off their threads.
Dress doooooown your sequin piece. That means your boyfriend blazer worn with tatty denim or your leggings with a grey, slouchy sweatshirt.
Dry-clean, dry-clean, dry-clean.

WE LOVE
€75 www.next.co.uk
Sequins on a simple shift dress. Rock it with next season’s tapered-heel statement shoe.

€87 www.styefinder.com
Ta da! The blazer of love from Warehouse. Welcome it into your wardrobe and treat it like a princess.

€28 www.awear.com
Shiny leggings are hard to pull off – literally and metaphorically. AWear nails them with this quality pair.

WILL IT TRAVEL?
YES
Victoria Larsson, 36,
Stockholm
“Swedes wear sequins because they can. As of yet there are no regulations governing sequin usage.”

NO
Peter D Silva, 28,
Lisbon
“Portugal is really sunny. If you add in sequins, sparkles and gloss to your wardrobe you’ll never see so much shine. Não to sequins!”