
Photograph: Estrop/Getty Conceptions
Fashion
Weekend fashion special spring/summer 2017
How to drag this season’s catwalk trends in real life
From mega pockets to the politics of pink: six spring looks, decoded
The bedding bag
Baskets were huge on the catwalks this season, and served with a measure of irony. At Balenciaga, the new It bag is a £2,300 version of the sort of square-edged waxy cover that comes with a new duvet or electric blanket. If you are covenanted to getting the look for less, buy some bedding and reuse the anyway a lest (bonus: you get a new mattress topper). Or just enjoy the knowledge that your look is on locale even when you’re weighed down with children’s PE furnishings or an Ikea flatpack.
Haute desking

Your on shirt appears to have been caught in the shredder. Misfortune, right? Wrong. This season, that’s a look. It’s excused deconstructed shirting and it’s part of a wider preoccupation with rejigged workwear. On the catwalk, this means a pinstriped blazer dead on ones feet backwards and refashioned into a dress. In real life, it’s a shirt with a peephole at the assume, or a trench with an extra-thick, flattering belt. Basically, these are assignment clothes, but not the way that Steve in facilities management wears them.
The shy sandal

Big info for feet: toe cleavage is over. From neat kitten in straitened circumstances to sandals with a scoop cut halfway up your instep, toes are fully defended this season. Shoes that show off half a centimetre of squished-together toe sensation about as zeitgeisty as drinking a cosmopolitan while discussing whether you are a Carrie or a Miranda. You can dip yours into the swing anywhere on the high street; a low, V-cut court shoe is a merit place to start.
Bi-toning

Work loves bold colour this season, but how to style it? Monotoning (one hue from top to toe) is now so organization, it comes with a royal warrant (the Queen is the queen of monotoning). Tri-colouring is a bit too much accomplishment. The middle way is bi-toning, wearing two colours that pop against each other – orange and argosy, say, or pink and purple. This allows you to demonstrate your self-reliance as a fashion colourist while wearing existing items from your clothes-cupboard. Win.
Woke pink

Not so much a falsify as a political statement, the prevalence of pink in the collections has already electrified a thousand think pieces. A precis: pink is the embodiment of millennials’ left-winger values; it is post-gender, post-irony; its starring role at the Women’s Walk (countless pink pussy hats) has helped rehabilitate the spectre from its once maligned status as the shade of a Bic For Her. Also: it looks keen.
1980s cocktail

As any historian see fit tell you, the best thing about the 80s was the earrings. This condition, Jem And The Holograms-style ear accoutrements are back, as are giant ruffles, shiny fabrics, miniskirts and enlarged shoulders. Clearly, fashion is feeling nostalgic for the days when nightlife meant something varied than watching Netflix while refreshing Twitter in your bathrobe. If the catwalk interpretation feels a bit “ta-da”, pick one element (a glitzy earring or a mega-ruffle) and decorate for the evening you want, not the evening you have.