Mum in the very fashionable city of Paris

My mother is an incredible woman.

There is no doubt about that. Not only did she raise my brother and me single handedly but she also has a very successful career. She is well respected and has an impeccable reputation. However, there has been something that has always bugged me about my mother; her fashion sense. It’s not that she doesn’t have any per se, it’s just the energy is not focused and the knowledge is slightly lacking.

So, over the past year I have been slowly but surely ‘leading the horse to the water’ and encouraging her to get a flavour for fashion. This was going well especially since I no longer live at home. I had explained to my mother her body shape and what cuts worked best for her. I bought her a secret weapon, a waist belt, to show how to emphasis the smallest part of her body and an ornament clasp was a fresh alternative to jewellery. She seemed to embrace this new trick, started naming things that it would go with and how it would enhance her shape.

With my guidance being no longer being in the next room, I introduced my mother to Skype. However, she doesn’t understand how she can see and hear me on her screen. So instead it was back to the good old-fashioned phone calls and her describing outfits to me. The terminology she was using to describe her clothes was not exactly useful or helpful but when she comes to visit, usually with a food parcel, she is managing to put an outfit together well.

Then I decided for my 21^st birthday that I wanted to go to a place that I had only dreamed of, dreams filled with couture, collections and croissants. I planned to wake up in Paris and be 21. I was more excited than an Upper East Side debutante about to put on her white Vera Wang to make her entrance on the arm of an incredibly rich, gorgeous heir to some form of oil or pharmaceuticals legacy.

There was just one problem, could I take my comfy jean, pinafore-wearing mother to Paris? The woman who thought Issey Miyake was the mentor in ‘Karate Kid’. The woman who uses my Vogue as a coaster. The woman who put me in a dress that had bells in the lining and jingled every time I walked like a collar on a household pet. The answer is yes I could because I believed in my ability to style people; my determination and she quite simply had no choice.

Do not misunderstand; my mother is not one of these women you see on makeover shows that look like they have brushed their teeth with nicotine, moisturised with full fat butter and finds underwear a non-necessity. My mother always has a superb hairstyle, always has her nails done and has an endless supply of fierce shoes and handbags. In essence the tools are there she just needs my guidance to piece it all together and we’ll have a chic woman in no time; in theory.  

First things first were to de clutter the ridiculously large wardrobe. I took a picture with all the doors open and what did I find one predominant colour with only slight variations. Black had overshadowed the wardrobe like a heavy cloud on a rainy day with slight greys and deep navies on the edges indicating a rain. Every now again daybreak would come through in the form of whites and creams but it still looked like a bad forecast for my mother’s wardrobe.

The bad fashion really hit the fan when it was my mother’s graduation. This would be the fourth graduation I would have attended and the second one for my mother. There was a problem that all graduates face when leaving education, not the impending fear of career prospects, not if you would fall asleep and miss your chance to shake hands with the chairman or not even if you trip down the stairs when coming off the stage.

The simple but devastating problem facing the graduates was what to wear under the gown. The gown did not have proper sleeves and it needed some form of fastening to help keep it in place. So what did my mother decide to wear? A black sleeveless shift dress with a slash neck that underneath it she would wear a white shirt. My 50 something year old mother wanted to wear a pinafore.

So this is where the real mission began. I had been trying to show my mother for years how utterly fabulous she is. I have always said to her “You created me and you think I am stunning.  So therefore, it means my mother is stunning. It is simple science”. She usually rolls her eyes at me by this point but I know my mother has such impeccable taste that she deserves to be one of those women who people look at and go “Wow she looks magnificent.”

The plan was simple. I had one month to get my mother’s Paris wardrobe and self-confidence ready to saunter down the Avenue des Champs-Elysées knowing that she looked stunning.

Since it will be winter in Paris when we arrive a good warm coat will be essential. I already had mine sorted, a vintage eighty-year-old camel coat with thin waist belt for extra definition. My mother’s coat that she wears for work looks like a metallic sleeping bag that when she zips up she could be mistaken for a mutant size worm. I took her by the hand and took her on a coat expedition. After many hours, many coats and my mother throwing a three-year-old like fit we found not only a bargain but also a coat that is classic, warm and also a Maxmara.

This shopping trip was also a very important lesson for my mother, like all women she loves a good bargain. That rush when you find something you love and then the rush when you find out it’s on sale is better than a cup of tea and a sit down after a long day. However, I had to teach my mother the difference when something is on sale for being last season and when it is in the sale because it deserves to be there. The Maxmara was last season but it was black with a classic cut, it was never going to age. A scarf she attempted to buy without me seeing that was five different colours of blue and had green with orange flowers beaded on it was not a bargain, it was an abomination. 

After the scarf incident and lunch I felt it was time to try to tap in to my mother’s potential that I know she possesses. I asked my mother what she thinks about fashion and style and the answer shocked me due to the unexpected nature of it. She replied saying, that she knew there was no way she could be fashionable because not only was she “too old and too fat” and that she “didn’t have the money to be stylishly fashionable.”

In these modern times there are so many reports and investigations in to the way that younger girls are being affected by body conscious issues. The size zero debate has reigned strong for the past few years and not many have thought about the effect on all women not just teenagers.

I never expected this answer from my mother and it made me wonder if more women her age felt this way. It was a scary thought that even women who have been in their skin for over fifty years could still be made to feel ugly, fat and insignificant by a magazine campaign. This made me wonder how the next generation would ever make it through life with any confidence.

This is where my plan changed for my mother. I asked her what was her favourite outfits that she has worn and what she loves wearing. This wasn’t just about me anymore and wanting to fulfil my Parisian dream of being uber chic. This was about my mother realising that she is fabulous in every way and that she doesn’t need hundreds and thousands of pounds worth of clothing on her to make her look good.

There was no need for her to adorn herself in black in hope that this would make her magically lose weight. There was no need for her to think that adorning herself in Diane von Furstenberg’s latest jersey dress or a classic Caroline Herrera pattern shift dress would make her look stylish. As gossip magazines around the world have printed there have been several fashion victims in couture, which shows that even though celebrities can be adorned in thousands of pounds worth of designer clothing they still might not look good in it.

With this revelation in mind I started to tell my mother about the changes that have been happening to fashion. I told her of Mark Fast and his daring move to use three plus size models in one of his 2009 runway shows and how it was such a defining moment of recent fashion times due to the uproar caused. In her infinite wisdom my mother simply replied “why did it create so much a fuss using a size 12 model, I bet she looked lovely”.

I told her about Glamour magazine’s November issue in which they had a picture in it with seven plus size models posing in the nude. I told her that in the fashion industry a model over size 6 is considered plus size. I also mentioned that Michael by Michael Kors, Baby Phat and Isaac Mizrahi for Liz Clairborne are some of the small minority of designers that cater for a woman size 12 and above. These facts started to astound my mother.

Then I came across a quotation from man of the moment, Tom Ford, from an interview that he did with In Style magazine:

“Fashion can add to your life. But you should never become trapped by it or believe material things are the key to happiness.”

However as much I agree with what Mr Ford is saying, I enjoy fashion and find it an importance in everyday life just as it is said in Elizabeth Wilson‘s book Adorned in Dreams; “in all societies the body is ‘dressed’, and everywhere dress and adornment play symbolic, communicative and aesthetic roles. Dress is always ‘unspeakably meaningful’. Undoubtedly fashion is important regardless of the negatives that are now linking it to body shaped issues. The way you dress can be directly proportional to how good you feel about yourself and the level of confidence you exude.

After everything my mother has learnt and in turn has taught me the plan was set for Paris. I had given her some useful tips on how to improve the style she already possessed, showed her that it is a moot point what size you are everyone can look good and the easiest and most effective way to look stylish is to wear something you love.