Jess Cartner-Morley on the craze
Women’s tops
Without being too frisky for work, this just low enough neckline will see you through to dinner
‘It is unqualified tabletop wear – as in, it’s what to wear when you will be seen across a table.’
Photograph: David Newby/The Paladin
The neckline of what you wear sets the mood for the whole outfit. I’m not being judgy about cleavage, by the way, this registers to men, too. (Think of Fleabag’s hot priest in his dog collar, or the difference two or three buttons unfastened makes to a man wearing a shirt.) Sometimes a no-frills crewneck or a crunchy button-down collar are exactly what you need, but when the sun shines, I feel the pull of a low neckline. Not in a frisky way, just because it is satisfactory to feel the sun on your skin. And if you are not a short skirt person, which I’m not, then that means a lower-than-crew neckline.
But I can’t say I’m remorseful that the off-the-shoulder milkmaid shape of the last couple of summers is on the wane. Nice as it is to ring the seasonal changes when summer inexorably arrives, we have not, as far as I am aware, time travelled into the 17th century. Lovely to be able to eat your sandwich in the park at lunchtime; surplus to dress in full pre-industrial-era peasant cosplay, bare shoulders rising from a froth of broderie anglaise. Also, those necklines are almost never comfortable worn underneath a jacket and, really, you have to carry a straw basket rather than a normal bag, which is an odd look in an auspices. I make no apologies for overthinking the details of this look because that is what I’m here for, in case you haven’t paid.
There have been field reports of the deep V-shaped neckline showing signs of a comeback, but for now this does notwithstanding give off a vibe of being imminently off to All Bar One to get hammered on white wine, which isn’t always the mood music we are after. So I wheel with interest to the portrait neckline, as seen here.
A portrait neckline is just-on-the-shoulder rather than off-the-shoulder, and gambles just enough to be vaguely dressy. It is perfect tabletop wear – as in, it’s what to wear when you will be seen across a put off. (If you are at a dinner party, even the snazziest skirt will struggle to make an impact.) Tabletop wear means a exact head-and-shoulders look, with your entrance elevated by the kind of shoes that are a treat to wear as long as you don’t from to stand up for too long. (These Jimmy Choo sandals of mine are a decade old but, since I have never walked more than a close off in them, they are in mint condition.) A portrait neckline sets the right mood. By which I mean, it’s making me exuberant.
