This season boasts something to offer every lover of fashion. If you love print, you’re sorted. Post-modern dazzle? You got it. Even a glamour-take on the military look is there for the taking, with Balmain pushing the bold shoulder to the final style frontier.

But if you’re someone who likes their fashion the way they take their coffee, this season’s sleeper trend is the equivalent of a non-fat latte, minus the trimmings.

This summer, if out-and-out dazzle and Riviera prints don’t do it for you, there is always the road less travelled. On offer is the ‘back to basics’ trend. Think of natural fabrics, unfinished hems, and a subdued palette of real-life-ready, workable neutrals.

But look closer and you’ll soon realise that this isn’t just a re-hash of Nineties minimalism. Ripped fabric, sheared hems and peeled-back layers: it’s a whole new way of looking at minimal fashion which has recently taken a back-seat to the attention-grabbing maximalist trends. Never the most exciting trend in fashion’s back catalogue, this new spin takes us to (quite literally) the woman underneath, injecting sex appeal and a dose of nonchalance where there was none before. Minimalism has in the past received bad press, being seen as a little po-faced with a tendency to take itself a little too seriously. Good news: this new take on minimalism is for the girl who takes life, but not herself, seriously.

Prada did the look with their trademark polish. Their collection – awash with 50’s prints and sunny skies – had a darker side if you were willing to discover it. This was translated by means of tailored shorts and neatly cropped jackets. Scissor sharp, these pieces left deliberately unfinished were an exercise in restraint: a symphony of cut and fabric. You almost cut yourself on the edges of the Prada jacket.

Chanel also did a U-turn on their impeccable tailoring, leaving the hems of their tweed suits unfinished to give them a playful, youthful edge. Other hits included Donna Karan’s folds and pleats taking on – and redefining – the power suit, and Nina Ricci introducing light-as-air trench coats that expose the outfit underneath. Handy if you’re someone who begrudges the necessity of a raincoat when you’re having a good clothes day.

The linen dresses, hessian bags and frayed coats on display aren’t just about reworking an old trend; they’re a wonderful antidote to the hard-edged ultra glamour of high fashion over the past decade. It’s a respite from the take-no-prisoners approach spearheaded by micro-trends such as the bold shoulder and body-con. Kinder and softer, this trend is more about the feel of fabric: this sometimes overlooked dimension is often what sells a garment on the shop floor. How many times have you vetoed a sweater on the basis that the wool was just too scratchy?

But this look is far from the soft option. The dramatic silhouette may not be there, but the emphasis on going ‘behind the seams’ hints at the very core of construction and skill required to make these clothes. Going back to basics reminds us of how supremely talented these designers are. The execution of skill and judgement (what to finish, what to leave) is what makes this look so refreshing. After several seasons of exaggerated lines and wow-factor finishes, this quieter look has a lot to recommend it.

This is ideal fashion for those who just can’t do pristine. It’s elegance for a new generation; the kind of girl who mastered the Prada pigtails within a week of seeing them on the runway. For those who missed Nineties minimalism the first time round, this revival is a wonderful way to experiment with cut and fabric but without losing out on detail.

Getting to the heart of the trend, the feat of engineering it takes to make a Jil Sander ripped trench owes more to super-construction than deconstruction. Some of these looks are only a few threads away from being back on the mannequin. It’s what’s holding the coat together that is the genius part.

The unfinished, undone look is a trend where the detail speaks for the big picture: an evocation of what’s great about high fashion. It can do show-stopper trends but also it does the quieter pieces with a precision that’s hard to beat. If ever you wanted a reason why high-fashion still exists, here it is. Like that most elusive quality, elegance, it’s all about what lies beneath.

HELEN TOPE

If a cursory glance through the minimal trends for Spring and Summer left you thinking that dazzle had been left on the sidelines this season, think again.

While all-out glitz has been temporarily shelved (even on the red carpet), the new way to wear sparkle is through pieces that hint at craftsmanship and heritage. Detail and finish take their lead from haute couture, not mass production. Shades of bronze and pewter take precedence over silver and gold: think ‘old-gold’ rather than ‘shiny penny’.

This wow-factor dress from Miu Miu is a brilliant example of how the new approach works. The layers and layers of sequins make for a cool, edgy finish that’s smart, not showgirl.  The column dress is nothing new for evening, but the avant-garde detailing makes this a head-turner for all the right reasons.

Many classics for S/S 2010 have been revisited this season: military, tribal and even minimal chic. Each one has had a major overhaul, but sparkle, out of all of these, required the most extensive top-to-toe makeover of all. Tarnished by associations with D-list celebrities going for broke on the red carpet, dazzle done well is beautiful. Applied with no concept of when to hold back, it’s a disaster.

This is why the makeover was needed and why it has worked so well.  The remodelling of glitz and glamour has been from the ground up: you couldn’t imagine this Oscar de la Renta frock making an appearance at the Soap Awards, but it looked pitch-perfect worn by Kristen Stewart at a ‘New Moon’ premiere last year.

Taking elements of the unexpected (Lanvin’s jewel-encrusted jumpsuits; Prada’s cobweb vests and Burberry’s bedazzled coats), the new bling is challenging us to pause, look again and re-evaluate. Nothing here is obvious or on the nose. From Dior to Richard Nicoll, old and new perspectives alike have struck gold with their interpretation of what it means right now to dazzle.

Far from being harsh and over-bearing, the softness of the colour palette being used across the board means that designers can go to newer, bolder silhouettes and no-one bats an eye. The Balmain mini-dress, while certainly challenging for the waist-line, is a perfectly plausible look for Xmas. If done in silver-white, it would be a different story.

The good news is that this look works on every budget. As much as you may covet the Lanvin jumpsuit, not everyone can lay down that sort of coin. But the new dazzle is absolutely achievable; it’s just a case of knowing how to put it together.

When accessorising your mini-dress that pays homage to Balmain, or a jewelled jacket, think laterally. Burberry teamed their mega-watt crystal coat with nude ankle boots. French designer Isabel Marant paired her bronze mini-dresses with suede, fringed Navajo boots.

Footwear is a brilliant way of underplaying glitz. Nude tones also work well with smaller glitzy pieces for day. The trick is for every element of sparkle, anchor it with two quieter pieces, whether that’s an accessory or part of the outfit. This trend has legs too: the pewter and bronze pieces will work brilliantly with the bevy of camel and toffee colours beginning to emerge for autumn. Take the Chloe catwalk as your inspiration: leg-lengthening trousers with a jewelled shell top tucked under a camel coat. It’s smart, flattering and almost unbearably chic. Prepare for this autumn to be your best-dressed ever.

Dazzle and sparkle used to have quite a mean-girl reputation: they translated as ‘look at me’, or even worse, ‘I can afford this – and it’s the real deal!’ It’s not surprising many designers in this frugal age have opted for subdued, less showy looks on the runway. If we’re meant to be moving towards a mood of austerity (and in it together), then wearing your entire bank account on your sleeve doesn’t exactly make you part of the zeitgeist.

This makeover is more than skin-deep: it goes right down to the very soul of the trend. Dazzle now celebrates the very things it opposed: artistry, longevity and uniqueness. It’s a look that not only signposts personality, but encourages you to express yours. This trend’s rarest gem is that it works for all kinds of women. If you want to go all-out sexy like the William Tempest asymmetric mini or quirky-cool like Giles’ skin-tight silver suit, every possible combination works.

This is a sub-trend that you will see emerging this winter too. Gone are the days of one trend fits all. Regardless of your personality, being on-trend used to mean donning a particular heel height or a shade of blue, whether it suited you or not.

What the recession has done for the fashion industry is loosened the rules, by necessity rather than design. Trends are becoming flexible, so they can fit you, not the other way around.

It’s all about the wider movement to create fashion that’s wear-now, love-forever. The days of disposable fashion seem increasingly distant and foreign to the way we live now. A trend’s currency is not only its wearability, but its worth. Making that personal, meaningful connection is rapidly becoming the intelligent way to buy clothes. Buy into the new dazzle and it’ll be the best purchase you’ll make all year. Pick your pieces carefully, and they will, just like the finest jewels, appreciate with value.

HELEN TOPE

The Marc Jacobs collection for Autumn / Winter 2009 struck a nostalgic note when the designer decided to go back to his youth. A collection devoted to the best of 80’s club style, MJ summed up the vibrancy and energy that were the defining moments of a lost decade.

Often scorned during the Nineties and early part of this decade, the Eighties were the poor cousin sartorially speaking – perceived as tacky, tasteless and frankly OTT.

But where Marc Jacobs leads, the rest of the fashion world follows. His treatment of the 1980’s was glamorous, fun and astonishingly creative with every model sporting a different, carefully-sculpted hair style. Instead of creating a pure, undiluted fashion flashback, MJ reminded us of why the 80’s were such fun. As we enjoyed the biggest economic boom in decades, fashion was in turn bigger and bolder – with even shy, retiring types encouraged to unleash their fashion vixen.

Unfairly derided for being formulaic, Eighties fashion was in fact highly creative: asymmetric shoulders, ruffles and embellishments – everything that is now taken for granted as part of contemporary fashion vocabulary derives from the fashion hits of this decade.

This season, the Eighties triumphantly return, but the good news being that this time around, your style muse has more in common with Debbie Harry than Nancy Regan.

The taste factor has been applied with a deft touch. Fashion heavyweights such as Versace, Louis Vuitton and Moschino have delved enthusiastically into this trend and come up with some startling reinterpretations.

Versace, as one might expect, went for the sexy disco look. Skin-tight lycra, fitted bodices embellished with rhinestone and topped off with patent belts and back-combed hair, this is a look fit for a disco queen. Admittedly, that queen has seen her fair share of Jane Fonda-endorsed aerobics, but the look is cleverly evocative of an era where sexuality was proudly and unashamedly on show. No hiding behind coyly-childlike Sixties smocks or dressing like the boys in the Seventies – women in the Eighties did things their own way.

This super-sexy look, spurred on by Herve Leger’s famous bandage dresses, has been sported by every super-toned celebrity in Hollywood. The effect is undeniably primal. If you’ve got the figure (and the nerve), expect all eyes to be on you.

The second act of the 1980’s revival leans towards cocktails at five rather than shaking it to La Roux - take 80’s icon (and uber goody-two-shoes), Krystle Carrington as your lead.

This cocktail look is easy on the glitter (Balmain enthusiasts need not apply), but creating that ‘wow’ factor is still a primary concern.  Moschino worked this trend by using acres of fabric wound, draped, cinched and primped around the body. It leaves the wearer with the ultimate feminine silhouette but not feeling girly or prissy.  Balancing femininity with power is a challenge the Eighties took head-on. They didn’t always get it right, (think Margaret Thatcher and her pussy-bow blouses) but the early efforts paved the way for designers such as Roland Mouret, who are masters in creating dresses for women who don’t see intelligence and sex appeal as being mutually exclusive.

This look is for the girl who wants to bring the glamour back to cocktail hour without getting asked if she enjoyed acting with Sigourney Weaver in ‘Working Girl’. Silk and metallics up the glamour quotient, but it is done in a surprisingly sophisticated, low-key way that will have you sighing nostalgically, not cringing and swearing you’ll never ‘be seen dead’ in that again. Its muted glamour and smouldering sensuality reminds us that we underestimate the woman wearing this look at our peril. Krystle would definitely find lots to admire here.

If fashion is a virtual means of time travel, then anywhere on the sliding scale of Eighties fashion is permissible: gold lame is not compulsory. That is the beauty of the Eighties trend – you can fully embrace the moment (especially if you’re exploring the decade for the first time), or you can apply the brakes and relive the glamour with elegance (knowing full well you did bleached denim the first time round, and the negatives have now been safely destroyed). You can go as extreme as you dare.

Perversely, for a trend celebrating a decade that was all about ‘the new’; this 80’s revisit can be for everyone. With designers such as Balmain spearheading the ‘power shoulder’, that ultimate 80’s style signature, extreme shapes are getting a more user-friendly translation for this season.

Instead of re-hashing the boxy, square jackets that went perfectly with bouffant hair and Fergie bows, designers are taking a step back and reconfiguring the shoulder for a new age, setting the pace for the seasons ahead.

The look is very similar, but only retains a dim echo of its past. This new bolstered shoulder is crafted into a narrow ‘hunched’ shape, and the arms are kept slender and narrow. The boxy, old-fashioned shape is banished in favour of sleek modern lines. By replacing these tiny details, the bold shoulder for the 21^st century is a whole new animal.

This jacket, paired with jeans or trousers, is surprisingly versatile, crossing age barriers in clear strides. While some of the more effervescent party-girl looks may require an 80’s birth certificate, you can cut corners and still get that 80’s feeling without having to pretend you’ve never heard of Wham (much less got the signed tour programme). Slink on a Balmain-inspired jacket and cut a dash on the dancefloor, even if your body-con days are far behind you. Feel that pulsating disco beat, and it’ll be like minimalism never happened.

At first glance, the Eighties trend seems essentially unwearable, save the most fashion-forward. It stands out; a sparkling glitch in the array of recession-proof looks available to tempt us this season. But go beyond the ankle socks and hairspray, and this trend has more to offer. If you want a fully-fledged nostalgia hit, everything is there for the taking: just remember not to breathe in while you’re applying the hairspray. But if you did the decade the first time round, and remember it a little too vividly, then this trend can be watered down with surprising success.

Fashion hindsight can be a wonderful thing, and with a strong editing sensibility, you can cut away the remnants of an age mocked for its silliness, and be left with something altogether more stylish and meaningful.

The Eighties reborn is considerably smarter, sleeker and sophisticated, while retaining that element of fun that the decade is so famous for. This season, take a style nostalgia trip, and pump up the volume.

HELEN TOPE 

This coming season, Paris is once again set squarely in the spotlight. After a few seasons of London scoring all the headlines with the fashion press, this autumn it is Paris that has everyone talking. Its latest obsession, La Parisenne (the Paris girl) is not the newest trend, but it has a fascinating story to tell about just how far fashion has come in the space of a century.

It is a trend that is laden with iconic references: Audrey Hepburn in ‘Funny Face’; French New Wave cinema typified by ‘Jules et Jim’; Catherine Deneuve in ‘Belle Du Jour’ and Jean Seberg in Jean-Luc Godard’s classic ‘Breathless’. These names conjure up a thousand images – postcards from a Paris now long gone, but we can go there again with the help of fashion.

This season, fashion does not pick sides between the Bourgeois Lady (best represented by Deneuve’s love of Roger Vivier pumps in ‘Belle Du Jour’), and the gamine, cerebral Left Bank girl. This season, both banks of the Seine are covered.

The Bourgeois Lady is a girl playing dress-up, and doing it better than her mother. The look is lady-like and pretty – think final year of finishing school. Prim, but not quite proper. Like Catherine Deneuve’s character in ‘Belle Du Jour’, there’s an undercurrent of rebellion bubbling under the surface of impeccable tailoring and good taste.

This side of the Parisian trend is where ‘ready-to-wear meets couture’, according to Vogue Features associate, Pippa Holt. Bourgeois chic is polished to within an inch of its life – no ruffle is left to chance. The devil’s in the details.  

Design duo Marchesa has nailed this look with their incredibly attentive focus on detail. Their dresses, especially popular with Hollywood’s elite, are so lavishly prepared that you could be forgiven for thinking you’ve wandered into the world of haute couture.

Other designers who have felt the call of the bourgeois include Erdem, Roksanda Ilincic and Nina Ricci, proving that regardless of where their design studio is located, many a designer speaks French, and speaks it very well.

The other side of the Parisenne trend belongs to the girl who lives for good coffee and strong conversation. The Left Bank girl lists ‘Funny Face’ and Jean Seberg as their biggest influences (both in life and style). They’re easy to spot: they’re the girls skipping around Paris like it’s their playground – and that’s because it is. If Italian fashion reveres the woman, French fashion is all about the girl.

This look is the most immediately accessible of the two. Balmain shows us how a Breton stripy top (admittedly amped up with the super-cool Balmain edge), a pair of ankle-grazing black pants and ballet flats can be an iconic look for anyone. It never loses its appeal.

It is American-in-Paris Audrey Hepburn at her best. It is as much a part of Paris as L’Tour Eiffel. The Left Bank girl can pull on a sweater and a pair of trousers and look effortlessly chic, because it’s all down to that Parisian style gene: damn elusive and downright infuriating. The rest of us need a dash of red lipstick to elevate the casual look into something wonderful. This look, quintessentially French, has lasted as long as it has because it confers everyone wearing it with a little ‘je ne sais quoi’ - which is no bad thing by any stretch of the imagination.

The freedom of this look to take you anywhere is what epitomises the greatness of French fashion design. This fashion genre is tailored for the journey; it is fashion made to be lived in. Italian tailoring is very elegant, but you do feel obliged to be on your best behaviour while wearing it.

This sense of joie de vivre, the clever blend of formal and casual, is what has made France the fashion capital of the world; the place that Dior and Chanel call home. But it is thanks to Coco Chanel herself that French fashion has the reputation it does.

Born in 1883, Chanel was responsible for creating both the Bourgeois and Left Bank looks, in themselves, now seminal moments in the history of fashion.

Chanel, raised in a convent as a girl, became fascinated by the black and white of the nuns’ habits. This obsession with monochrome and uniformity led Chanel to create the now-legendary two-piece Chanel suit.

It was a uniform, but its streamlined approach to tailoring meant it fit a variety of women giving shape without the necessity for corsets or corrective underwear. To us it now seems a given, but in Chanel’s era, to go outside without being encased in whalebone was unthinkable. Chanel rebelled against the womanly, but ultimately false, silhouette and created a whole new way of dressing: beyond youth and beyond age.

She developed her design philosophy into the Left Bank look (newly revived by Karl Lagerfeld) and completed the Chanel circle. She created, for herself at first (and then for customers as it caught on), a bold, new direction for the 20^th century woman.

By liberating women from corsets, she was saying no to sexual coercion and control. The body was now left as nature intended. No whalebone, no crushed ribs. The shape was sleek, fresh and absolutely radical: after Chanel, there was only one way forward.

Parisian fashion has the reputation it now does, due to Chanel’s hard work at pushing back the boundaries that fashion had created for itself. Allowing itself to be fenced in by its own impossible standards of beauty, Chanel instead made clothes that created something more than a fleeting spark of interest. She became the pioneer of women’s fashion as we understand it today.

To those who say that fashion is a misogynistic business, of no relevant to the intelligent woman, I give you Coco Chanel. In creating a new way of dressing, she changed the way we feel about dressing up.

By creating freedom of the body, freedom of the mind swiftly followed. It was a new freedom that found a perfect fit for the new century. By acknowledging that a woman can be a different person from one day to the next, Chanel gave modern women the equality and liberty to dress as they pleased.

She gave us fashion that was beyond barriers: space to move, breathe and think without constraint, and what in the end, is more feminist than that?

For the past few seasons, shapes on the runway have become increasingly exaggerated and enhanced. Hips curve wildly, shoulders stretch to the ceiling and what should have been a very ordinary piece of clothing turns into something extraordinary.

Christopher Kane has submitted his style thesis this year, and his theme was revising the classics. He created very simple, familiar shapes (jackets, dresses, coats) and made them startling and unfamiliar.

By piecing circular pieces of fabric layer by layer over a stark foundation, Kane’s take on the party-dress creates a delicately flowering fantasy of blushing petals, artfully laid on top of one another. It betters the summer favourite and transforms it into something whimsical yet wearable.

Avant-garde design does not normally win plaudits for being desirable, but here it does: not as a piece of futuristic fashion puzzle (left for only the most daring fashion fans to figure out), but as a piece of legitimate art. Kane has literally removed the temptation to think of fashion in linear terms, and created something both beautiful and brave.

Kane’s whole Spring / Summer collection is an exploration of this idea. Coats and jackets are structured with wire to create an epic style statement not necessarily for the shy and retiring, but worth a second glance.

Already a favourite dotted among the editorial pages, this look sharpens the mind. What passed as unpalatable five years ago now seems right. By making old shapes new again, Kane is forming a sartorial revolution. Kane is making us more alert to the direction in which fashion is going, and where it has already been.

This celebration of extreme has also been explored by other designers including Dolce & Gabbana and Chloe.

Hannah MacGibbon, designing for Chloe and proving herself to be the champion of the modern woman, went softer with the theme: gently scalloped edges on jackets and shorts, created an unusual outline that was still real-life appropriate. It was a gentle but decisive nudge towards 21^st century design.

Dolce & Gabbana showed the extreme shoulder, which has rapidly grown in popularity, thanks to the rise and rise of the iconic Balmain jacket. Now worn and loved by a generation of women who swore they’d never see so much as a shoulder-pad in their lifetime, the exuberant 80’s style is back and wowing a whole new crowd.

The trophy jacket has proved its worth by making itself simply indispensable for the fashion-forward. A high-impact winner when paired with ripped jeans or peg trousers, the Balmain look does all the hard work for you.

Extreme fashion here is part-homage to the flamboyance of the Eighties, and also a nod to military detailing which has embedded itself in the history of fashion many times over, and will continue to do so in seasons to come.

Dolce & Gabbana went a little more romantic with this notion of extreme shapes, parading hugely-puffed sleeves that were reminiscent of the Pushkin heroine, circa Russia 1830. It was opulent romance, the kind that Italians do best.

The fact that Dolce & Gabbana are still doing a roaring trade proves how brave ideas can alter our perceptions of what is acceptable on the fashion front-line. What would’ve been dismissed as a fashion oddity a decade ago, now whispers to us of hastily-scribbled love letters and duels at dawn.

This examination of the new is what keeps fashion moving and evolving. The argument that, in terms of creative output, everything worth doing has already been done resurfaces with alarming regularity and this summer is no exception. With the rest of the world in the economic doldrums, the fashion press feels almost obliged to ponder the big question. Is there any such thing as a new idea?

There is no doubt that designers use the past as a form of influence to propel their ideas forward, and there is no greater fashion kick than in getting a reference – the more obscure, the better.

But the fact remains that while there are still new talents breaking into the industry there will always be fresh points of view. Many ideas have already been done, but everyone experiences and interprets life differently: what is anathema to one person is inspiration for another. There are no limits to the ways in which experience can be translated into something bold and exciting. The circle goes round and round.

The argument that there are no new ideas, only old ones recycled, is something that will reappear with every passing crisis the fashion industry has to face. But what is truer is that crisis breeds creativity: many of our greatest moments have coincided with times of devastating upheaval.

Still not convinced? Think of the Second World War – the biggest political, social and economic upheaval of the last century. When it came to an end, the fashion world needed a new direction to separate itself from the Forties. Christian Dior pioneered the ‘New Look’, a glamorous, escapist fantasy that turned the notion of military tailoring into something feminine and decadent.

Without this history to inspire him, Alexander McQueen would have been a very different designer as this theory underpins his entire body of work. Understanding a woman’s body is key to creating good fashion and McQueen’s vision and mastery of fit owes a great deal to Dior’s expertise. Of course, being a working-class lad from East London, and going to work as an apprentice at Savile Row forced him to cultivate and follow his own vision. Rebelling against the ‘fashion bourgeoisie’, McQueen became the enfant terrible of British fashion in the early Nineties. His early, ground-breaking work inspired young designers-in-training to think bigger and bolder. His global success encouraged them to use couture detailing in their ready-to-wear collections. One such designer who was inspired to do so? Christopher Kane.

So one idea inspires another: as the fashion wheel spins, some come back up for a revisit (especially if they were any good the first time) – but with different creative forces guiding it in a new direction, the possibilities for re-interpretation are infinite.

HELEN TOPE

This summer sees the return of a stealth trend. Monochrome makes the cut, with its Gothic credentials translated to the warmer months by the use of simpler shapes and bare skin.

It is a somewhat surprising choice, as the bulk of this season’s most fashion-forward looks revolves around detail – and lots of it. From tribal to super-luxe, not a fringe or fastening goes unwasted. Everything, from head to foot, speaks for itself – but there is a danger of an outfit becoming too chatty.

Monochrome, so much the lynch-pin for autumn and winter, in spring and summer, is a subtler machine at work. It moves away from epic statement to quieter sophistication. If monochrome was the choice of teenagers for A/W, then this summer, it has definitely aged up. Black and white this season is all about one mission statement, and a simple one at that: easy glamour and one-step elegance. This summer, if you want to look pulled together with the minimum of effort, the choice is (quite literally) black or white.

Fashion is rapidly turning its back on the high-gloss, high-maintenance glamour girl look of previous years. Something about the emphasis on constant upkeep just reads as hopelessly old-fashioned right now. When the WAGS start to ditch the mega watt highlights in favour of low-key hair colour, you know it’s all over.

No-one has the time or inclination to sit and plan an outfit for hours anymore: we still want to look good, but not at the expense of our spare time (or sanity). No-one wants to look like they’ve tried too hard – it wins no fashion points whatsoever, and falls into that high-maintenance category that the style-aware are now keen to avoid.

The ethos of B&W, deceptively simple and fuss-free, shines a spotlight on the way we live now. When Victorian novelist Anthony Trollope satirised greedy politicians and empty-headed social climbers, he would be even more despondent at the thought that 100 years on, very little has changed. In these times where nothing is quite what it seems, it is no coincidence that we are choosing to go simpler.

Just as we are turning our back on the political hub that claims to be acting in our best interests, we are also choosing to go our own way in fashion terms. We know what the ‘hot’ trends are, but whether we’ll wear them or not is entirely a matter of taste. This growing autonomy is no bad thing: the relationship between designer and client is becoming a dialogue, and fresh ideas breed fresh design.

The prospect of a narrow colour palette sharpens the mind, and forces the designer to stamp their point of view on an outfit through other means.

Balmain’s development of the 80’s ‘power shoulder’ is a sardonic glance back to another time when politics and fashion were closely aligned. The relationship between designer Jason Wu and First Lady Michelle Obama hints at how politics and fashion are again reading from the same page. But this time round, the extreme silhouettes are just for fun. No-one takes it too seriously, and the look as a consequence, reads as young, vibrant and exciting.

Politics and fashion are now forming a bond that is softer around the edges. Michelle Obama may have the toned biceps of an athlete, but she’s no Iron Lady. Her ongoing collaboration with up-and-comer Jason Wu is testament to how the right choice of clothes can say so much. Michelle’s relaxed tailoring and quietly luxurious details put the electorate at ease: this is a new way forward based on the principles of honest, straight-forward design. It is hard to imagine the First Lady getting excited over a gladiator sandal.

This is why the B&W trend has experienced such resurgence. It is about using simplicity to say something very complex. This trend provides ease and elegance for those who feel that the fashion world has abandoned them. It is reassuring (who doesn’t love the little black dress?), but more importantly, it is guiding fashion down a more democratic path.

The time for bling is speedily passing us by, and in its place is a more thoughtful and resonant take on liveable glamour. It is inclusive, (high-street, designer and vintage all apply here), and there is something here for everyone.

Black and white may seem limiting at first glance, but in the simplicity of it is the choice – once again, anything is possible.

HELEN TOPE