‘This shoe is shamelessly attention-seeking, but in a joyous way that has much more charm than the platform-soled, stripper-height peep-toes of old’

The demise of the sexy shoe (and it was a demise, oh yes: people were wearing Birkenstocks last summer, have you forgotten?) came about because sexiness, shoe-wise, became synonymous with extreme heel height. Yeah, I don’t think you have to be a fully paid-up Freudian to see what happened there. And in the end, the ultra-long heel came to overshadow all the subtleties that make a shoe sexy: the contrast of leather against bare skin, the arch of the foot, a glimpse of toe cleavage. All that mattered, all that counted, was a crazily high heel. And heels that high are crazy, because they cramp your style, which in the end meant we got blisters and gave up. And we ended up in Birkenstocks.

But the sexy shoe is back, and this time it’s not calibrated by the inch. On the contrary, the element that makes this new breed of shoe sexy is also the one that makes it comfortable. The new take on the sexy shoe is all about laces and straps that run across the front of the foot. The thing is, these laces and straps don’t just make the shoes look fancy, they change the engineering. In a classic, cutaway court shoe you are effectively hanging on to a spindly heel, like a koala hugging a tree; in a firmly laced-up shoe you are comfortably strapped in, snug as a newborn in a Baby Björn. OK, maybe not that comfortable. High-heel comfortable, which translates as not in actual pain.

The weather is getting warmer … well, the clocks are moving forward at least. It’s time to start thinking about summer – and sandals

* 50 of the best sandals to buy – in pictures

Fashion is the art of wearing clothes before other people are wearing them. Like one of those card games where the skill is spotting when you need to slam, split-second timing is of the essence. The first person to wear a poloneck to the pub gets the fashion bragging rights; the last to swap out skinny jeans for wide legs loses.

Related: 50 of the best sandals – in pictures

‘This season, the band jacket has gone all democratic. You don’t have to find one in a vintage shop in LA, because you can buy this one in Zara, or find one in H&M’

This is a jacket to make you cool, rather than to keep you warm. That is in no way a disparaging comment. Far from it, in fact: once the big winter freeze is over, a truly practical jacket is one that you can wear as part of your outfit, rather than over it. In the winter, you need an indoor outfit with an outer layer. But now, when outside is slowly warming up and inside is a little chilly with the heating turned off, it is much more practical to wear a jacket that works as part of your outfit, rather than one which squats on top of it like a big, woolly killjoy of a coat.

The band jacket is a stone cold classic. In fact, most of the time I am a little put off by this look because it’s a bit too cool. The band jacket – marching band jacket, drummer boy jacket, whatever you want to call it – is cool in a slightly self-conscious way, like leather trousers. But this season, the band jacket has gone all democratic. You don’t have to find one in a vintage shop in LA, because you can buy this one in River Island, or find one in H&M, or – if you’ve got the cash – splash out on a divine, intricately gold-braided, navy Gucci version. This summer, the band jacket has dropped the I’m-with-the-band attitude. It’s just, you know, a cool jacket.

‘The new white shirt has stopped being a coded sartorial cipher and become a look-at-me piece in its own right’

The white shirt has come out of its shell this spring. In fact, it has had a personality transplant. It will not have escaped your notice that the white shirt has been A Thing in fashion for ages, but until now it has always been a deliberately blank canvas. Plainness has been the whole point. A crisp, buttoned-up white shirt was meaningful in a blank-piece-of-paper kind of way; a simple, soft ivory silk blouse, à la Stella Gibson, was suggestive in a bedsheets kind of way.

The new white shirt comes with an extra topping of fashion. It’s stopped being a coded sartorial cipher, and become a look-at-me piece in its own right. I don’t mean embroidery or ruffles or anything as predictable as that: I mean a white shirt with attitude. Basically, when shopping for this shirt, pretend you are Zaha Hadid. Think to yourself: would Zaha wear this? Is it a bold, sweeping architectural statement? Does it suggest its wearer is at the vanguard of blue-sky-thinking modernity? Because that’s the shirt you want. Look for Sydney Opera House shapes, artist-studio balloon sleeves. Zoom in on looping apron ties that look expensively artisanal, touches of wit. (When I say wit, I mean the highbrow kind. Alexander McQueen’s white shirt of the season has an extra seam curving in bolero jacket shape around the body, for instance, like a tracing paper echo of a matador. That sort of joke, not the slogan-T kind.)

Now, this is remiss of me in the extreme. A major shift has taken place on my watch, yet I’ve only just noticed. I was wondering, the other day, why there hasn’t been a New Black for ages. Remember the New Blacks? In the old days, we got a new colour every six months. It was like your football team getting a new away strip: you’d go and buy it, and that was your fashion fandom signed and date-stamped for another season. But the New Blacks don’t really happen any more. Our fractured attention spans have made every season a kaleidoscope: it might be all about a pink coat, with a white shoe, and a metallic bag.

But what we do have – not always every season, but every two or three – is a New Neutral. The New Neutral is, in fact, the new New Black… even though the New Neutral isn’t actually black, if you see what I mean. (It may be next season, but it’s not now. Of which more later.) The New Neutral is not supposed to be the colour you wear all the time. It’s background music, in your wardrobe, against which the starry pieces you buy (the pink coat! The white shoe! The metallic bag!) get to pop.

The supermodel and the Céline designer give a masterclass in androgynous occasion-wear

We all know that unisex, androgyny-tinged dressing is the chic option – denim dungarees looked so much cooler than teeny dresses at Coachella, and trouser suits are beating tailored-dresses hands down at the office – but after 6pm, most of us still automatically feminise our look in the pursuit of looking dressed up. You might have been in sleek mannish separates all day, but when cocktail hour rolls around, dresses and heels, decorative colours and feminine fabrics reassert their hold over our wardrobes.

‘It is nigh-on ergonomically perfect. It is relatively flat, so the weight sits against your body, rather than tipping you over to one side’

The second most important thing about the saddle bag is that it is terrifically fashionable right now. The best thing about it is that it’s a dream to wear, because it is a bag designed to be carried.

This sounds a ridiculous thing to say – surely, all bags are designed to be carried? – but it’s not, sadly. Many trophy handbags are designed exactly that way round: as trophies first and handbags second. They are beautiful objects to be sighed over and stroked – the handles are an afterthought. The thing is, you don’t notice this when you experimentally dangle the bag, stuffed with tissue paper, over your shoulder in a shop. You will, however, notice it the next day, when it becomes evident that the bag, now heavy and full, won’t stay on your shoulder without you hunching your shoulders up to your ears, or can’t be relied on to stay closed, and has to be clamped under one arm. Or that internal pockets have been sacrificed to a clean-lined minimal design, which leaves you scrabbling around for your lip balm in a very non-clean-lined-and-minimal fashion.

Designer’s long-awaited interview at Vogue festival kept a rigid focus on the catwalk, skirting awkwardly around 2011 incident that led to him departing Dior

In the wake of disgrace such as that which embroiled John Galliano there is first rehab, and then there is rehabilitation. Galliano, whose bizarre anti-semitic rant in a Paris bar in 2011 brought his drink and drug problems into the public eye, tackled the first with long stays at the Meadows clinic in Arizona.

The second, more subtle issue of his public rehabilitation was the focus of an appearance at the Vogue festival in London, the designer’s first public speaking engagement since the scandal.

He has never been photographed, is very tall and nobody know what he looks like. But that’s pretty much all we know about the fashion designer Margiela. So how on earth did they make a film about him?

When we heard that filmmaker Alison Chernick had made a biopic about Martin Margiela, launching at the Tribeca film festival and now online, we were excited. The cult designer has never been photographed in public, and never once taken a catwalk bow. No one outside his inner circle knows what he looks like, beyond one grainy and unverified picture on Google Images. Finally, we’d get to see the real Margiela!

Well, actually, we don’t. (The clue is in the title.) Although this documentary was made with the full support of Margiela, he never appears in it. (We do get one nugget: Jean Paul Gaultier, whom Margiela assisted earlier in his career, tells us that “Martin is very tall”.) So, how do you make a biopic about a man who has never appeared on camera?

Valentino designer Bertrand Guyon has been appointed as design director by Schiaparelli, the heritage fashion house

The house of Schiaparelli has never been one to do things quietly. Elsa Schiaparelli was a surrealist and a free spirit, a philosophy graduate who made clothes for Greta Garbo and dressed Wallis Simpson in a “Lobster” dress inspired by Salvador Dali. The relaunch of the house, backed by Italian luxury mogul Diego Della Valle, has been a stop-start process rather than a smooth revival. In just two years, collections have been produced by Christian Lacroix, Marco Zanini and the in-house design team. Today, the house named a new designer: Bertrand Guyon, who currently heads up Valentino couture.

You can choose the size (small), strap (stainless steel) and the clock face (phases of the moon), but what I really liked about the Apple Watch is not having my iPhone in front of my face

Related: Apple Watch review: beautiful hardware spoiled by complicated software

I have been wearing the Apple Watch for two hours now, and I’m profoundly disappointed. Because despite chuckling with exaggerated laughter as I read an email on my wrist in Topshop, and ostentatiously finger-sketching smiley-faces in full view of the queue in Wasabi, not one single person has noticed it. Even when I used it as a phone, answering a call from my husband walking through St Pancras station with the watch in front of my mouth in full Knight Rider fashion, nobody is impressed. (Least of all my husband. “Wait, do you mean my voice is coming on speaker out of your watch?” he asks, and then pretty much hangs up on me.)

Dressing your kids in matching outfits was once old hat. But not now. Jools Oliver and Victoria Beckham are leading the way – and if you want to join in, the Von Trapp outfits from The Sound of Music are up for grabs …

No offence to Joan Didion, obviously, but you know who the real style icons of the moment are? The Von Trapp family, that’s who. Fifty years after The Sound of Music premiered, a Los Angeles auction house is inviting bids on the seven sailor-style play outfits that Maria (Julie Andrews) sews – from curtain fabric, if memory serves – for the brood. (Think: the scene where they sing Do-Re-Mi.)

Take a look at these bad boys. I mean, how on trend? Alexa Chung, previously considered fashion-forward, is suddenly exposed as being half-a-century late to the pinafore party. And that moss-green-and-oatmeal colour combination? Exactly the kind of delicately off-key artisanal-neutral combination that costs an arm and a leg in Marni. Even Karl Lagerfeld is in on the Von Trapp trend: the beauty look for the most recent Chanel Métiers d’Art show, in Salzburg, was all plaits and wholesome, meadow-fresh pink cheeks. And Karl’s tiny godson upstaged Cara, Stella at al with his ensemble, which was the last word in haute alpine chic.

‘It’s eye-catching, because it looks at once dishevelled and deliberate. Carefully scruffy, if you will’

What with the week of national drama on which we are poised to embark, I thought it a fitting moment to address an issue that challenges long-held assumptions and strikes to the very core of our identity. All around us, the old ways of doing things are being questioned. At every turn, there is disillusionment with the status quo, a yearning for a fresh start.

I speak of the burning issue of the season, which is whether to embrace the half-tuck. For centuries, standpoints on shirt tails have divided neatly into two camps. You tucked your shirt in, or you let it all hang out. The two were entirely distinct looks and said pretty much everything about you that the rest of the world needed to know.

Company hopes to build on recent womenswear sales boost, with leopard print coat and black velvet jumpsuit set to be standouts

Marks & Spencer fashion made headlines twice last month. First it was announced that, after almost four years of decline, sales of general merchandise – including womenswear – rose 0.7% in the final quarter of the last financial year. Secondly, its tan suede 70s midiskirt – already seen on every fashion week front row – finally went on general sale, swiftly selling out despite costing £199.

The precise relationship between these two events is not easy to unpick. Despite the fanfare surrounding the suede skirt and the pink coat which preceded it as the mascot of M&S fashion, the reality of the business is that such high-end purchases make up only a tiny percentage of sales.

Related: This season's cult item: The Autograph suede skirt

Related: Marks & Spencer clothing sales rise for first time in four years

Related: The summer of suede: will M&S strike gold with ‘timeless’ skirt?

The latest issue of New York magazine scored an interview with US Vogue’s head honcho, Anna Wintour. What did the interview reveal about the famously enigmatic editor?

The sphinx-in-Prada is the great enigma of modern fashion. No matter how many hours we spend subtly (well, ish) observing her from across the catwalk, Anna Wintour doesn’t give much away. So on the rare occasions she gives an in-depth interview, it’s worth forensic study. Here’s what we learnt from Amy Larocca’s interview with Wintour, in the latest issue of New York magazine:

Nicolas Ghesquière’s show taps into futuristic trend as architecture and locations that push boundaries are sought out by luxury brands

The space age is back next season – on Bond Street, at least. A nostalgia which has embraced 70s bohemia and 90s minimalism is making way for an intergalactic aesthetic, with Louis Vuitton the latest fashion power player to turn his catwalk into a spaceship.

A hit combination of Louis Vuitton’s Parisian glamour and the brutalist flying saucer desert chic of the late Bob Hope’s Palm Springs estate threatened to break Instagram on Wednesday as designer Nicolas Ghesquière staged his new cruise-season collection in the John Lautner-designed house built for the comedian in 1973 – and on the market for $25m (£16m).

‘Sailor trousers fall into the surprisingly useful category, because smart summer trousers are hard to find’

Breton top devotees look away now, because you’re not going to like what I’m about to say. Nautical-themed summer fashion can get horribly naff. It is the self-consciously tasteful grownup’s equivalent of festival fashion. Yup, sorry, I’m talking to you, in your stripy top, your navy and white, with the espadrille/yachting plimsoll thing you’ve got going on for a weekend morning, the vaguely basket-ish tote. It is just as much a summer cliche as the 18-year-old on her way to a festival with her hair in complicated plaits and wearing those denim shorts where the pockets poke out at the hem.

So, how do you wear a summer classic without looking like a summer cliche? Don’t ask me; ask Coco Chanel. Now, there’s a woman who knew how to make nautical style look ultra-chic rather than travel-supplement generic. On the beach, she wore flowing, wide-legged, white, sailor-style trousers, with a simple black sweater tucked in and ropes of pearls around her neck. This style of wide-legged, high-waisted trouser – with two vertical rows of buttons for the full monty – is the simplest way to wear nautical-themed fashion without drowning under it.

The Duchess of Cambridge and Samantha Cameron have both made the switch – so isn’t it time you embraced the cool, crisp and effortless style of the shirt dress?

Related: 10 of the best shirt dresses – in pictures

There is no easy way to say this, so I’m just going to come right out with it. Your summer dresses are all wrong. I’m talking about those curvy shift dresses, knee-length or thereabouts, maybe in a jewel colour that nods to Roland Mouret, that you wear to work drinks. So easy to wear, so flattering, so dawn-to-dusk.

‘It wasn’t until recently when, for a week, I thought I’d lost it, that I realised how much I rely on it’

You know what in your wardrobe needs more love? The boring stuff. It’s always the same stuff that hogs the limelight, gets the compliments, and is fussed over. A party dress gets shown off on big occasions, lovingly dry-cleaned and left to lounge around in your wardrobe for weeks. Meanwhile, the hard-working pieces that make or break your day-to-day look rarely win the props they deserve. I’m talking the smart-but-comfortable flats that you wear so often, that stay kicked off inside the front door overnight, ready to be put back on; the jacket that lives on the coat stand rather than in its dry-cleaning sleeve.

I have a grey wool blazer that, outside the very coldest and very hottest months of the year, I have worn about twice a week for the five years I have owned it. But it wasn’t until recently, when I thought I’d lost it, that I realised how much I rely on it. Heck, how much I love it, even. I know, I know, it’s like the plot of a terrible the-girl-next-door-was-there-all-along-you-doofus romcom, except starring a Gucci blazer instead of Jennifer Aniston. Thankfully, after six days of heartbreak, I opened the boot of my car and there she was, my little beauty. (The blazer, not Aniston.)

Goddess dressing is out; gladiator chic is in. With the launch of Mad Max: Fury Road happening in parallel to the festival proper, femininity – by way of Charlize Theron’s shaven-headed hero – got fierce at Cannes. Last week, we were the first to bring you the breaking news that the December release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens is having a red-carpet impact. Stormtrooper lookalikes Isabella Rossellini (in Stella McCartney) and Karlie Kloss (Versace) went straight on to our mood boards for Secret Cinema outings this summer. Meanwhile, at the Billboard Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday, Olivier Rousteing launched his Balmain x H&M collection flanked by Jourdan Dunn and Kendall Jenner looking more armed-guard than arm candy; and the premiere of Taylor Swift’s Bad Blood video gave us tooled-up Victoria’s Secret models throwing punches and kicking in windows. Flexing your muscles is the new duckface. NB: Real-life tip! If machine guns and hotpants feels like a wardrobe stretch, try channelling Rachel Weisz on the Cannes red carpet, looking sleek in a black Narciso Rodriguez jumpsuit.