Jess Cartner-Morley on fashion: in praise of slightly silly clothes

I do hope you are wearing your zebra stripe trousers today. Anyone who is anyone is wearing zebra stripes this month, you know. If you haven’t yet got with the programme, I suggest you nip to the shops and snap some up before they are all gone. It would be mortifying to be the last one without a pair. Hurry!

Only teasing. Fashion doesn’t work like that any more. The days when people like me bullied everyone else into wearing banana yellow one season and puffball sleeves the next are over. Looking trendy is over. Timeless chic is the only show in town. Peacocking has been phased out in favour of understatement and personal style.

This is a very good thing. The fashion playbook that minted a whole new look every six months has a lot to answer for, seeding a sense of clothes as disposable that has got us into the right old mess that the industry is now in, with a glut of poorly made garments. Clothes that you never tire of, that you look after and repair because you want to wear them for ever, are obviously the holy grail of a sustainable wardrobe. When a look has the timestamp of a specific season – like Brat green in the summer of 2024 or Barbie pink the year before – it becomes a sell-by date. Clothes have a longer shelf life when their appeal isn’t based on novelty.

But. There is a but, I’m afraid. Which is that in the eminently sensible process of making fashion less frantic, I do sometimes find myself wondering whether we have lost some of the fun along the way. Fashion should not be disposable, but it is quite nice for it to be slightly silly now and again. These are heavy times and we need a little levity. Are we missing a trick here in our ageless button-down shirts and tasteful straight-leg jeans and classic loafers? The aesthetics that have dominated style recently – from the cashmere neutrals of Quiet Luxury fashion to the doe-eyed wholesomeness of Clean Girl beauty – have been so polite, so well behaved. There is a drift toward a generic upscale smart-casual aesthetic, the unspoken dress code of hotel lobbies, which is frankly a little bit dull. An epidemic of unimpeachable good taste. Have we lost our edge?

Which brings us back to the zebra stripes. Not specifically – think of the zebra as the mascot, not the mandate. The zebra stripes are a flag planted in the ground for the idea of an outfit that isn’t scared of being a lot. For standing in front of your wardrobe and deciding that Out of Africa meets Studio 54 is your vibe for the day, because why not? That instinct to reach for the loud thing instead of the safe thing.

This is harder than it sounds. We have become more thoughtful about evaluating new purchases with a coherent, lasting wardrobe in mind. We want to buy pieces that will work seamlessly for weekends as well as work and not date too quickly. And this is great, in the way that a really dependable boiler is great. But wardrobes need a bit of mischief in them. The earring or bag that catches your eye in the lift mirror and makes you smile is a functionally important part of your Monday morning outfit.

Edge doesn’t have to mean excess. It can be a single quirky piece in an otherwise sensible ensemble. You can wear a practical grey coat with statement shoes. One necklace too many. A jazzy sock. None of this requires abandoning the principles of buying less and buying better. The clothes that earn their keep are not necessarily the ones that blend into the background, but are sometimes the charming oddballs you have owned for 15 years.

So no, I am not telling you to buy the zebra trousers. I am telling you that somewhere in your wardrobe, wedged behind the neutrals, there is a garment you stopped wearing because it felt unfashionably frivolous. Get it out. Fashion doesn’t need another trend – it just needs to get its nerve back.

Stylist: Melanie Wilkinson. Styling assistant: Charlotte Gornall. Model: Moli at Milk. Hair and makeup: Sophie Higginson using Kiehl’s haircare and Victoria Beckham beauty. Jacket, £75, M&S. Top, £40, and trousers, £46, both Topshop. Heels, £450, Dear Frances. Sunglasses, £24, Free People