Christmas party fashion - some thoughts

Selecting an outfit for a Christmas party can be more problematic than you would imagine . We have seen some pretty horrific styles over the years (and no doubt worn a few ourselves), to know that there are certain rules that should be obeyed when it comes to dressing up this season. Anyway, here are some of our top tips that you may wish to bear in mind:

Dresses

Be frugal – Spending too much is never a good idea as Xmas party nights can get messy - no need to indulge your hard-earned on designer wear when you can achive a glamourous look direct from the high street. As we've mentioned previously, the Pearl Lowe dresses range at Peacocks is along the lines of what we would go for.

Be simple - a lesson we have learned to our cost in the past: avoid long, single-coloured cotton dresses - we have lost count of the number of dresses ruined by food and drink related incidents.

Be glam – this is the one time of year that you can truly let your hair down and shoe your colleagues your true personality – blow them away with a black sequin dress or mini skirt.

Other Xmas Party Considerations

Wear comfortable footwear – jumping around the dancefloor can become an agonising experience if your shoes are giving you blisters.

Coats are essential – chances are that you will be wandering the streets at a late hour trying to flag down a taxi home, dont get caught without a warm coat or you’ll have more than a hangover the next day.

ENJOY YOURSELF! :)

Ok thanks for reading, these are a few rules that we follow. What are you wearing to the Christmas do this year?

Celebrity fashion UK

Celebrity fashion. No, not fashion worn by celebrities but fashion designed by celebrities. Kate Moss did a range a while back that was successful not only in terms of the way it looked, but by choosing to make it widely available on the High Street she managed to eschew the kind of exclusivity vibe that high fashion had latterly become synonymous with.

Then over the past few years Pearl Lowe has started a successful career in clothing design and has produced extremely successful collections for Peacocks clothes. Pearl is probably better known now for her clothes designs than for her Britpop-era music with band Powder. In a genius move, Pearl employs the talents of daughter Daisy Lowe to model the collections. And there's a name to watch: Daisy Lowe. At the start of what is bound to be a successful career.

Other celebrities doing fashion include Fearne Cotton and Liam Gallagher. The success of a clothing line depends not upon the celebrity status of the designer but on the quality of the designs.

Fashion in extreme winter

A lot of snow about lately. A lot of sub zero temperatures. So, easy to feel decidedly cool, but how to look cool?

The first thing to do is forget about anything other than practicality. You might want to go to the army and navy stores and pick up a heavy military coat. Go for boots rather than shoes. And when the snow turns to ice, make sure that whatever footwear you're wearing has a good grip on its soles. Cos it's going to be slippy time soon.

Other than that, heavy wool jumpers are big anyway right now, so stock up on them.

The siberian weather isn't going to disappear any time soon, say the newspapers. So make like you're from Novisibirsk (Russia's third-largest city, located in Siberia) and wrap up well, whatever it takes.

High heels hit new heights

Interesting report in the Daily Mail today about the rise in sales of high heeled shoes, which is, possibly, says the paper, down to the influence of famous fashionistas like Cheryl Cole and lady Gaga going for this style.

The article quotes a Peacocks spokesman, who says that: Customers are attracted to a shoe boot’s dual purpose. You can wear them for Christmas and beyond, as they look just as great with a party dress as they do with jeans and a jumper in January.

The Peacocks party shoe boot looks likely to be a festive smash hit this year.

The Guardian also features the story, with the dramatic headline 'sales of killer heels quadruple'.

So, if all the women you see suddenly look taller, there may well be a shoe related reason for this.

Clothes design software

Gone are the days of sketches, perhaps:

Best Dressed 2010

GQ Magazine is doing its vote for best dressed 2010 right now - so why not get your vote in for this year. Voting closes at the end of November. Email address is

gqbestdressed@condenast.co.uk

Who to vote for? How about Paul Weller, Noel Gallagher, Boris Johnson or ... err... hmm, dunno. Gordon Ramsay?

Party season clothing

Now that Halloween and Bonfire Night are out of the way, the party season stretches before us like one long shiny street full of Christmas trees.

Everyone will have their own list of stuff to get - make sure you've got a spare hat and set of gloves - you don't want hypothermia kicking in while you wait for a taxi home after a great night out.

Other things that will be high on the list of stuff to get will be shoes - whether it's womens shoes or mens shoes, this is a very shoey time of year since people get stuff for the dancefloor or the dinner restaurant, but they also need shoes to kick around in the snow with.