'It looks most modern when it isn't trying to be saucy'
Even in 2013, there are still places where the inhabitants lack the sophistication to recognise leopard spots and tiger print as a fashion message, and insist on a boneheaded interpretation of it as an animalistic come-hither. Namely, Chessington World of Adventures. Where, according to this year's best news story, the giraffes and big cats are barely able to distinguish between a woman in a leopard-print Zara blouse and an actual leopard. For their own safety, visitors wearing animal print are being given grey boiler suits to wear, in a utility-chic take on the neckties they keep behind reception at the Ritz for inappropriately dressed visitors.
I'm not planning to take on the actual tigers in this argument. But I'd hope that, what with evolution and all, most readers have a more nuanced understanding of how it is appropriate to respond to a woman wearing animal print. In fact, if anyone is still with the Chessington creatures on this one, I am here to suggest you think again. Times change. (That's kind of the point of fashion, to be honest.)
Animal print can be done with bad taste, obviously. Bedlinen, for instance. And there will never be anything wrong with classic animal-print hotness – a Dolce & Gabbana-esque leopard-print and black lace dress, say. But animal print looks most modern when it isn't trying to be saucy. Carine Roitfeld in her leopard-print coat; Eva Mendes in her animal-print tracksuit bottoms. A just-below-the-knee pencil skirt in animal print, as seen at Burberry this season, is much more of the moment than a mini. And note that snow leopards, endangered in real life, are flourishing on the high street. Abstracting the print by making it monochrome makes it less literal and more sophisticated.
It's easy to forget this, because the traditions of animal print meaning up-for-it are ingrained in all of us, not only giraffes and boneheads. Which means that even the sophisticated fashion consumer sometimes has a kneejerk reaction to it. And so it's up to us to liberate the animals from their traditional cages. And no, I don't mean that literally. That's the point.
• Jess wears dress, £375, by L'Agence, from matchesfashion.com. Heels, £775, jimmychoo.com.
Stylist: Melanie Wilkinson. Hair and makeup: Dani Richardson using Kiehl's Skin Rescuer.