4 Wednesday January 19 2022 | the timesfashion
T
he hourglass, the wasp;
nipped in, whittled or
cinched. The words
we use about waists
sound about as
comfortable as the
rigid underpinnings
women used to rely
on to keep them in check — and were
in turn kept in check by.
I appreciate that news of the waist
being fashion’s latest focus might not
be what you want to hear at this point
in January. Listen up though, because
without one your carefully put-
together ensemble risks looking more
than a little passé. There’s no easier
way to date your outfit than to
disregard your diaphragm.
This isn’t just another fashion diktat.
Trends come and go, but silhouettes
take longer to bed in and they tend to
hang around for a decade or more.
Ten years ago, we were still in the
tail-end of the low-rise Noughties;
now we are peak waist.
Look around the shops and you’ll
see endless pairs of jeans that button
above the tummy. T-shirts and
jumpers designed with higher
waistbands in mind now end just
below your ribs rather than on your
bottom. The infinite variety of
mididresses on the rails either tie
around the middle or are darted,
while skirts now zip all the way
over your hips. On the high street,
there is a full-blown corset revival
under way.
Meanwhile, the street-style crowd
are engaged in something of a belt-off,
drawing attention to an area that has
become fashion’s newest and most
effective billboard space. Valentino’s
£680 VLogo style is the favourite,
having superseded Gucci’s £355 take.
Among stylists, Isabel Marant’s looped
Lecce and Lonny leather belts are
the way to best update and make
versatile everything from dresses to
blazers and cardigans.
At the menswear shows in Milan
last week, several female front row-ers
skipped belts entirely to simply
present a sliver of abs betweenSlashed shoulders and peekaboo elbows are having
a moment. They’ve won me over, says Anna Murphy
How to show some skin now?
Try cut-out chic — I did
T
here was something
missing in the City
on Saturday night.
And for the first
time since March
2020 it was not, to
my amazement,
people. Because the
ground floor of the Ned hotel, a
fabulous reincarnation of the vast,
once-abandoned Lutyens-designed
Midland Bank headquarters, just
round the corner from the Bank of
England, was buzzing.
I was out-out, heady stuff for any
January, but especially for this one.
And so were an awful lot of other
people, it transpired. It was the
sceniest place I had been since, well,
probably March 2020. And this in
what has consistently been one of the
most depopulated parts of the capital.
I would walk there occasionally in the
day during the first and second
lockdowns to experience the
otherness of this most urban of
environments rendered as quiet as the
Yorkshire moors I love.
So what was missing in the City this
time round? Well, that depended on
the woman. One was down a shoulder
on her bodycon top. Another was
down two. Several were wearing a
midriff-revealing ensemble outfit that
made navel-gazers out of us all. There
were quite a few who looked to have
lost part of their sleeve in — I don’t
know — whatever variety of heavy
machinery one finds in EC2, or
perhaps the hefty door to the Ned’s
members-only Vault bar. Once the
bank’s strong room, it still contains the
original safety deposit boxes, all 3,000
of them, as well as, importantly, a
most excellent mixologist.
Here was proof that the so-called
cut-out trend has gone mainstream.
And it wasn’t only young women
giving it their almost all. And it wasn’t
only super-slim women. Not that I was
surprised. Because I — long a cut-out
resister — have finally embraced them
too. I have found that the subtle
variety, which doesn’t reveal anything
too biblical and is rendered in a
dialled-back hue signalling chic rather
than shriek, can be a great way to look
after-dark appropriate. Depending on
the cut-out placement, and especially
if it is combined with long sleeves, this
can even be a more discreet way to
flash a bit of flesh than to go the
decolletage or miniskirt route.
My favourite brand is Alix NYC,
which I sport here, not just because
of the quality but because it
understands the interplay between
revelation and concealment that is so
key when embracing the cut-out trend
at an older age. Pair one of its
bodysuits with sleek, tailored trousers
and no one is going to mistake you
for mutton dressed as. It’s a tad
Samantha in Sex and the City in a good
way. The world’s favourite manslayer
may have been written out of And Just
Like That... — lucky her, as it
transpires — but she still looms large
in the collective consciousness.Present Alix NYC options
include a double cold-
shouldered midnight bodysuit
and a claret ribbed polo-neck
dress with a waning gibbous
moon (to be precise) sliced out of the
chest area (£141.21 and £237.89
respectively, net-a-porter.com). Fitting
the brief at a lower price is Zara’s black
high-neck one-sleeve knit top (£25.99,
zara.com). For the whittled of waist, its
black high-neck dress with twin cut-
outs exactly where your obliques may
or may not make their presence felt is
another winner (£49.99).
For an approach that would work
for day — and even for the office —
try Reiss’s Laurel jersey top, available
in black, teal or orange, its crew neck
flanked by small oculi of skin (£75,
reiss.com). Prepare to turn heads when
you take off your blazer.Laser focus
Talking of flesh-flashing, I am ready to
get my legs out in 2022. I am not one
for new year’s resolutions, but I do
tend to cast an eye over what I have or
haven’t achieved in the year that’s
passed. Gosh. 2021. I didn’t make it to
the Galapagos. I haven’t nailed
Debussy’s Suite bergamasque. There’s
some yoga stuff that continues to
elude me, goddammit. I would go as
far as to say that my greatest
achievement of the past 12 months is
hair-free legs. By all means judge me,
if you so wish. I couldn’t be happier.
I had a couple of laser hair-removal
sessions in my twenties and drew the
conclusion that it didn’t work. That
was because — you guessed it — I
only had a couple of sessions. This
time round, half a dozen sessions
down, it’s job apparently done. And for
a hairy person, what a liberation that
is. I wish I had knuckled down years
ago. An investment, certainly. But to
my mind money well spent.
I went to the Pulse Light Clinic,
where a package of eight sessions on
one area costs from £309
(pulselightclinic.co.uk).
Instagram: @annagmurphyIt’s a tad
Samantha
in Sex
and the
City — in
a good way
Anna wears red
cut-out sweater,
christopherkane.com;
cut-out bodysuit,
alixnyc.comEverything looks
better with a belt.
This trend is
here to stay, says
Harriet Walker
cropped shirt and low-slung trousers.
The rise of the crop-top co-ord means
the midriff has become a regular
feature on the red carpet, while
rib-height cut-outs artfully placed to
draw the eye to the narrowest part
of the torso are commonplace even
in bridal design.
Before panic sets in, your waist
doesn’t need to be of the 18in
whalebone variety — or even
necessarily a size 14. Nor is your
midriff about to become public
property. This isn’t about body shape
or size so much as styling and
proportion: our eyes have become
accustomed to this medial caesura.
“Most of us don’t have a waist to
begin with, especially once the delights
of the menopause kick in,” says the
body shape expert Anna Berkeley,
whose method of personal styling pays
close attention to the geometry of the
body. “So you have to create one: side
tucks, asymmetrical details, diagonals.
Clever tailoring is the easiest way, but
clean lines help too.”The most simple trick is a styling
technique known as the French tuck,
the ubiquity of which is proof of our
silhouette obsession. Devotees include
the model Gigi Hadid, the Duchess of
Sussex and Theresa May.
It involves tucking only the front
section of your T-shirt/shirt/jumper
into the waistband of your jeans/
trousers/skirt better to highlight your
mid-section, camouflaging overhang
while also pulling you in a bit visually.
It’s great for those who feel thick
around the middle, as a bit of billow
at the back is more flattering than a
360 tuck. There are even ways to
customise it to your shape.
“If it’s asymmetrical it can slice into
a bigger tummy and make it appear
smaller,” Berkeley says. “Doing it
diagonally into a high waistband
detracts from a long body. If you tuck
at the front and leave it hanging at the
back, it can minimise a large bottom
and add shape to a flat one.”
Crucially, almost anything you do
with your waist — except hiding it
away — will have a flattering effect on
your bottom half. Remember theMost of us don’t
have a waist, so
create one with
clever tailoring