'All dressed up with nowhere to go?'

Welcome to my world!

In my bedroom. Shirt by unknown, Skirt by Versace Couture, Mules by Stradivarius, Mac by Burberry (Vintage)

It will come as no surprise to you that, having written under the name, “Christ Couture” since my late teens, I’m talking about, and endorsing, clothes. And if you’re reading this as someone with no pronounced interest, you’re probably rolling your eyes right now. For after all, what do you care of clothes?? And so to start, I will quote the legendary character Miranda Priestly in her role as editor of the fictional equivalent of American Vogue in the film The Devil Wears Prada:

You go to your closet and you select, I don't know, that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you're trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don't know is that that sweater is not just blue, it's not turquoise, it's not lapis, it's actually cerulean. And you're also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves Saint Laurent, wasn't it, who showed cerulean military jackets?

And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. And then it, uh, filtered down through the department stores, and then trickled on down into some tragic Casual Corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs. And it's sort of comical how you think that you've made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you're wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room... from a pile of "stuff".

Genius writing. And a reminder to us all that, unless you’re part of some wonderful naturist community, what we wear matters on some level whether that’s because of the production line that came before it, or the effect it has on the wearer or the observers.

In London, my attention to clothing detail was so astute that I occasionally changed outfits halfway through the day, bored of what had been so pleasing only hours before. Every brunch, dinner party, date, shopping trip and visit to East London was an opportune time to walk the imaginary catwalk.

My bedroom conveniently set up with a catwalk…

When I first moved to the Cotswolds and obliviously continued in this way, my then boyfriend and I (him equally enamoured by the fashion industry) were often stopped and complimented on how good we looked; twin peacocks among the racing jackets and tweed favoured by the local horse sets. As obsessed with clothes as we were with each other, we frequently dressed up for one another, turning dinners at home into formal occasions and exhorting saintly patience when one of us took ages to get ready because we “didn’t feel right” in the outfit first tried on.

Stopped by a street photographer on a morning coffee walk

But in general, since Covid and working from home, my outfits have rested rather uninspiringly in athleisure and so, at the end of last year, I decided that my new year’s resolution would be to fall back in love with clothes. I got rid of – and am still getting rid of – a ton of clothes in the last few years amongst all my moving, but fashion still gives me so much joy, which is actually the reason my close friends call me “Doll” 😉

In my teenage years, I devoured the fashion pages of magazines to see street photographer shots of what people were wearing in the cities considered to be home to the most fashionable people. Who were they wearing and where were they going?? I loved a fashion story! And so, in a nod to a throwback favourite pastime, here are some of my favourite looks so far this year and some of the mundane/random events they were chosen for: