This style has been around for a while, but until recently it was called 'wearing your coat like a cape' or 'pretending to be a superhero'
At fashion week, anyone who is anyone shoulder robes. Yes, they shoulder robe. It's a verb, and is what I'm doing here, wearing a jacket without putting my arms in the sleeves. I am shoulder robing the jacket.
This is important. This style has been around for a while, but until recently it was called "wearing your coat like a cape" or "pretending to be a superhero", neither of which sounds like a true-blue fashion trend. Shoulder robing has a good solid garment-industry ring to it.
Shoulder robing is a challenge. You have to stand up straight, so it looks deliberate, and resist the urge to hunch forward to stop the jacket falling off, or you'll look as if someone has thrown a blanket over you, like a criminal being protected from rotten tomatoes, which is not the energy we are channelling here at all. You also have to think what you are going to do with your stuff, because you can't carry a shoulder bag in the normal way. The fashion-week standard is to hold your bag clamped between body and forearm, as if it were a clutch bag.
It's tricky. Which is precisely why it is the alpha fashion manoeuvre of the moment. The fashion week in-crowd love nothing more than pulling off a look normal people find puzzling. Wearing sunglasses was once the alpha fashion manoeuvre, until it started to look post-surgery. Wearing ridiculously high heels at 10am was one, but these days – well, let's just say the Ryder Cup golf Wags are on to this now, and move swiftly on.
Successful shoulder robing makes you look both terrifically busy and glamorous, a bit like a bulging, glossy Filofax did in the 1980s. To pull it off, you have to look as if your schedule is so tight, you simply don't have time to put your arms in your sleeves between high-powered meetings, but must simply charge through the day with the wind in your sails like an urban matador. And now that we fetishise being busy – ask someone how they are and the answer is likely to be, "So beyond manic it's ridiculous" – shoulder robing is about as now as fashion statements get.
• Jess wears jacket, £89.99, and shoes, £49.99, Zara. Top, £18, Topshop. Trousers, £69, Cos.
Photograph: David Newby for the Guardian. Styling: Melanie Wilkinson. Hair and makeup: Dani Richardson at danirichardson.co.uk using MAC Cosmetics.