'The It-jean of the moment is patched or patchworked. Not pretty, but on trend'
Down the fashion rabbit hole, things get a little topsy-turvy. For instance: if you want to blend in, you dress up. Turn up to a fashion industry 9am meeting in five-inch heels, age-inappropriate crop top, movement-constricting pencil skirt: nobody bats an eyelid. Turn up dressed down, on the other hand, and people will dissect your look. Are V-neck sweaters a modern fashion statement? Is the trainer the new power shoe?
So when editors and buyers started wearing jeans in the front row at the most recent catwalk shows, it was clear that jeans were A Thing. Jeans never completely go away, but they slip under the radar for years at a time. Their last long-term spell in the sunny uplands was in the Friends era, when Monica and Rachel wore jeans with T-shirts in the daytime, and jeans with sparkly tops in the evening, and the rest of us did the same, while flicking our shaggy, shoulder-length hair. Then there was the designer denim moment, when having the right brand of jeans became a style statement in itself, and we learned to identify the fashionability of a given bottom at 50 paces by dint of the shape and colour of stitching on the pockets. But recently, although jeans have featured in chic daytime combinations (a silk Equipment blouse, jeans with turn-ups, pointy ankle-strap high heels – especially if you shoulder-robe your jacket), the jeans-and-snazzy-top combination hasn't cut it as a dressed-up look. Where it once looked admirably insouciant, it has come to look a little half-hearted. A bit bridge and tunnel. Harsh, but true.
Now, jeans are back. But the new It-jean, the jean you can wear to parties, is not a sexy or flattering jean. Which is annoying, and massively counterintuitive, because out in the non-rabbit-hole real world looking nice is sort of the point of dressing up, but hey – I don't make the rules. The It-jean of the moment is patched or patchworked, a deliberately hoiky kind of jean. Not pretty, but on trend. Not glamorous, but fashionable. Unbelievable, I know. But in fashion we often believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast.
Jess wears top, £49, frenchconnection.com. Jeans, £45, by & Other Stories, stories.com. Sandals, £60, dune.co.uk. Photograph: David Newby for the Guardian. Hair and makeup: Sharon Ive at Carol Hayes Management using Lancôme.