Jane and Beryl go canvasing for colour

Jane and Beryl go canvasing for colour

Wednesday 7 June 2017

Jane and Beryl Go Canvassing for Colour

 What are the advantages of colour blocking, political or otherwise? Jane and Beryl take their cues and their hues from our female leaders, who look svelte and co-ordinated and stand out from the crowd in eye-popping brights.   

Red for Labour

Hobbs jacket £160, Marella trousers £150, handbag Primark £6

Jane is delighted that the red of her new trousers matches exactly the red of her old jacket, and being a not-so-secret pinko she's feeling right home. This top to toe colour blocking is not a look she would normally run towards, but she reads in the fashion mags that it is a good technique for giving a pulled together look even if the colours only tone together rather than are identical. And, of course, there is a red out there for everyone, it's just a case of finding it (blue-red in Jane's case). 

Nicola Sturgeon also favouring the bold colour block (because she's very short, says Beryl) is wearing a dress and jacket by the Edinburgh-based designers Totty Rocks which ensures all their clothes are deigned and produced in Scotland. 

Teresa May rocks red despite its Socialist connotations with her Amanda Wakeley suit which is an old favourite of hers. The nipped in waist of the jacket is a sure fire winner on many WOACAs emphasised by the belt for extra waist definition. She is showing off her pins - one of her best features - and has softened the neckline with a floral scarf. Matchy-matchy shoes finish off this well put together look. Jane and Beryl think that this is one of her best outfits to date. 

True Blue For The Conservatives

Blue wrap dress Dorethy Perkins, £35,

Little did Beryl think that she would ever be photographed in front of a Tory party poster when she was camping outside Greenham Common in the 1980s? But we all know that when it comes to fashion her morals have slipped. This dress is that intensely blue shade that both Beryl and Jane associate with the Thatcher years, but is suddenly looking Right for this season. Here she wears it with Jasper Conran £59 blue shoes for Debenhams and a vintage handbag £45.

Christine Lagarde knows how to use the colour block and indeed every other fashion ruse to full advantage. She understands the power of floor-length colour in a room of black suits.  

Green for Hmm...The Green Party

M&S trousers £49, top, borrowed from a friend, Principles jacket, charity shop £12

Jane has been having endless amount of trouble finding something to wear with these trousers, much as she loves them. So the colour blocking could be the answer... except that Jane is pathologically averse to bottle green having been clad in it from top to toe in her formative years ('72-'79) as a schoolgirl (even the knickers). However, for the sake of the Green party - which she adores - anything. 

Orange for The Lib-Dems 

Orange jumpsuit £100 this season's French Connection,
 Karen Millen shoes £130, also still available 

Ahh the orange of Liberal Democracy, not something that she normally thinks about when she dons this jumpsuit from French Connection. One colour top to top is a great idea for the vertically challenged. This is the painting by numbers version of dressing, and it is rather relaxing as the decisions are made for you.   

Lace jacket £22 BHS closing down sale.
Bag £30 John Lewis

  

The Liberals originally used yellow and the Democrats red, making a lovely shade of orange. Hillary Clinton dresses her pear shape rather well here in a shade of mango sorbet.