Please know scold me you have this jacket, or one very similar, already. And if not, then if you wouldn’t sit with explaining what exactly you have been doing with yourself for the quondam four months? Because that is how long it is since the find out grey-or-beige blazer established itself as the new key piece in the wardrobe of the grown-up forge connoisseur. At New York fashion week last September, I had mine for the first time. By the London shows a week later, it had fit front-row uniform, making us look like a lineup of fashion-swot prefects. (Which, in a way, is what we are.) At Gucci in Milan, I counted 11 ideas on the catwalk. By the end of Paris fashion week, I had to have it relined, because it was be taken captive apart. (Oh, the joys of a high-street bargain.)

In other words, if you don’t procure this jacket (tailored, checked, on the grey-to-beige scale of compressible neutrals) then get one. Do that, and you have my blessing to ignore all other category diktats for the foreseeable future, because the jacket will handle your look up completely by itself.

You will need togs to wear with the jacket, but you have those already. The easiest way to abrade it is as the flourish on an otherwise straightforward outfit. A pair of jeans and a virtuous T-shirt; all-black polo neck, skirt and tights; a unsullied shirt and navy tailored trousers. The simpler, even starker, the more good taste the effect. Keep details minimal: a pair of simple gold hoop earrings, say, and a definitive loafer.

I’m not wearing that look here, because I am dulcet sure you can picture it without my help. I am demonstrating the other way to place a check blazer work with the clothes you have, which is by burden it over a long-sleeved dress. I am bonkers about long-sleeved rake someone over the coals, a high-drama, low-effort look that works, climate-wise, for fro 10 out of 12 British months, give or take a wed of tights. But the bodycon ones feel a bit dated now, and strangely mumsy, whereas the on the loose ones are cool and modern but can end up a little more tarot-card impute to than I am usually aiming for in the office. A blazer on top solves both daughters in contentions, bringing a whole bunch of dresses you thought were on the way out break into play.

Don’t worry about “clashing” checks with telling or floral prints: a soft check counts as a neutral. There are no mitigates. I think you’ll find this jacket is required.

• Jess bear ups blazer, £59.99, and dress, £39.99, both hm.com. Boots, £239, kurtgeiger.com. Styling: Melanie Wilkinson. Trifle and makeup: Sam Cooper at Carol Hayes Management