According to a survey recently carried out by Debenhams, the image conscious woman doesn’t dress her age until her 70s. ‘89% of women aspire to dress younger than their years with 55% citing 70 as the age they felt they would be, or had been happy to dress their age.’ (CNBC).
But the question here is not ‘do you want to dress your age’, but should you? And the answer is a firm no. As we get older there are some things we have to be careful about wearing, particularly if you, like me, have a gorgeous 20 year old daughter, but we should always dress for our own style, our shape, what suits us and how we feel and none of this has anything to do with age.
Having gone from a size 14+ to a size 10 over the past year and being very much fitter than I was when I started I dress completely differently. Same age - different shape. Things I wouldn’t have touched last January (2010) I now wear and my daughter has started trying to ‘borrow’ my clothes. Lucky I’m a great deal shorter than she is…….well three inches at least. I did notice a Diane von Furstenberg wrap dress furtively leaving my room the other day but managed to haul it back in time. My leopard print heels are now being ‘shared’ (she has almost the same size feet) and my long pale grey cardigan made it up to Edinburgh and I suspect will never be seen again.
What I would say about dressing your age is this…………………forget about age. Age is not the issue. How much confidence you have in how you look (and dress) is all about how you feel about yourself. If you’re not happy with some aspect of yourself it’s up to you to get up off the sofa and do something about it. It isn’t rocket science and if I could you can. In fact it’s surprisingly easy once you start being in control over who you are. You can wear anything you like, more or less provided you feel confident in it, with a caveat to fashion victims that anyone who wears leather or leopard print from head to toe should not, regardless of their age, and ditch the ditsy floral pants. No matter who you are they’re going to look daft.
This week I’ve been working with the Wychwood Deli on their website and feeling very hungry all week. I love cheese and they have some wonderful ones. I’m also knee deep into SEO for www.thesiteguide.com. There’s no short-cut and a vast amount of work. The more you do the more you want to do. I’ll be here this time next year no doubt………………