The top 5 unlikely style icons for 2010

Style inspiration can come from some unusual places. Copying catwalk looks is all very well, but we reckon this season you’ll be looking to a few less obvious heroines (and heroes) for fashion pointers…

Emma Pillsbury, Glee

Where do we start with our new favourite guidance counsellor? Miss Pillsbury’s breed of pretty and prim secretary chic makes us want to sing with joy – think pussy-bows, puffed sleeves, brooches and pencil skirts, everything in vivid crayon colours and offset by that perfectly-flicked ginger coiffure.

Hers is a clever look, falling in a sexy middle ground somewhere between dolly and granny. They key is uber-neatness – have fun with colours and accessories, but keep shapes precise and tailored to fit you beautifully. For catwalk inspiration, look to Louis Vuitton and Prada, who showed an array of refined and ladylike looks.
Meanwhile, a floral pussy-bow blouse like this one from ASOS is the quickest way to inject some Pillsbury-style prim into your wardrobe. Well, if it helped her get Mr Schuester (eventually), then it’s good enough for us…

Molly Ringwald

John Hughes’ 80s classic Pretty in Pink has long been one of our favourite squealalong movies. It has all the crucial ingredients – high school, prom, dashing romantic hero with like, his own car, and a nice line in teen witticisms. Meanwhile, Ringwald is divine as its new wave heroine Andie Walsh, a gawky Cinderella we can all identify with.

But it’s only in recent months that we’ve really started to appreciate her wardrobe. It’s Grade A eccentric but still pretty as a picture, with high emphasis on lace, pastels, natty hats and customising. One of the best scenes has to be Andie making her own prom outfit from an old pink bridesmaid’s dress, which has inspired us to get a bit scissor-happy on more than one occasion (if not always with quite such chic results). Also check out her outfits in other John Hughes offerings Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club (where she sports a particularly great leather-jacket-and-cropped-t-shirt combo).

The most obvious port of call when shopping for Molly’s look are vintage stores and charity shops, but there are also some very Andie-esque items to be found on the high street. Urban Outfitters has always specialised in misfit chic, and they come up trumps with this fabulous lace-collar dress. Team with woolly socks and lace gloves.Now all you need to do is choose between Duckie and Blaine…

The Mad Hatter

So Alice might be the obvious point of reference here, but there was another style contender at that tea party, and rumour has it he got 10% off… Yes, for an antidote to all the frou frou petticoats and headbands, take a few tips from the man in the hat.

This is last season’s boyfriend-borrowed chic taken to the next level; part Victorian gent, part late 60s dandy. Think Annie Hall Through the Looking Glass, with blazers, mannish shirts, fingerless gloves and dapper bow-ties in rich colours and prints.

The key to this look is texture. Pile on tweeds, silks, paisley prints and velvet with flashes of metallics for a look that stops just short of the neighbourhood crazy lady. Check out Anna Sui’s Spring/Summer 2010 collection for ways to get it right, and start off your own wonderland wardrobe with some gentleman’s brogues like these lovelies from Office.

(image: victorianweb.org)
Doris Day

When I was just a little girl, I asked my mother, ‘what will I be? Will I be pretty, will I be rich… will I be able to pull off fringed leather with some hotpants and red lippie?’ Yes, the goodie-goodie queen of 50s cinema is an unlikely hero in today’s edgy fashion climate, but for those of us who want to clean up our image for summer, she’s a great example of how to do preppy with pep.

A clean-cut mix of tomboyish shapes and sugar-and-spice colourways, ‘good girl’ chic was a strong catwalk presence at the Spring/Summer 2010 shows, like a palatte-cleansing sorbet amid all the chaotic prints and flounce. Look to Luella for colours and shapes straight out of Pillow Talk, and Lacoste (who else?) for tennis wear that will look as good in a bar as it does on the courts.

Think tailored capri pants, cut to the ankle and worn with jazz shoes or plimsolls. Or go for thigh-bearing, high-waisted shorts like these from Topshop with a tight cashmere sweater in a candy shade.

Keep a smile on your face, a spring in your step and a twinkle in your eye that lets everyone know you’re not as innocent as your outfit might suggest… And if it all gets a bit too saccharine, you can always try channelling Calamity Jane with some dirty fringed lather and a bootlace tie. Yee-ha.

Yourself, circa 1993

That’s right darling, you’re a fashion icon. Cast your mind back 17 years and mentally raid your old wardrobe. Mine consisted largely of little skirts with floral cycling shorts attached underneath, bum bags, stonewashed denim jackets and jelly shoes. The skirt/shorts were particularly useful because it meant you could do cartwheels in the garden without the boys from next door seeing your knickers, a crucial advantage in the social life of a five year old.

If you were a little (or a lot) older, you probably had a myriad of big white motif t-shirts, chunky oversized cardigans, high-top trainers and denim shirts stolen from your boyfriend/brother/Dad. All of these wonderful references and more will be back to haunt us this year, so it’s time to start flicking fondly through the old photo albums. If you belonged to a nudist colony during the early nineties or, oh horror, weren’t actually born, look to the following to see how it was done: Blossom; Claire Danes in My So-Called Life; Clarissa Explains it All, Kelly Kapowski in Saved By the Bell.

TwentyTwelve, Preen and Marc Jacobs have all sent grungey ’90s looks down the runway recently, while there’s plenty of denim, lyrcra, lace and faded florals to be had on the high street. Start off with some cycling shorts, put a lacy dress this one from New Look on top, a cropped top on top of that, and finish off with a denim shirt and some mismatched jewellery. Then put on Rhythm Is A Dancer and do a cartwheel on the lawn.