What I wore this week: an 80s party dress

I have this whole theory about the return of the 80s party dress. I reckon that after the financial crisis we look at the fashion of boom eras through a different lens. Where we once saw macho, muscular but fundamentally solid tailoring, we now look at the same years and what springs to mind are clothes for recklessness, ego, giddiness.

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Yeah, I know, needs work; I don’t think Thomas Piketty’s got much to worry about just yet. But it’s enough to base a shopping expedition on, right? Because the 80s party dress is where this festive season is at. Those 90s slip dresses are feeling droopy, and the 70s revival is dragging on a bit. What we need is a brassy tequila sunrise of a cocktail dress.

Which is why I am wearing one which is lurex, and sort of turquoise, and has one of those silly belts that don’t do anything. It’s a ridiculous dress, really. But that’s good, because the whole point of a party dress is that you need to reset the dial, to retune yourself from what’s sober and sensible and proper to a different channel, where you can be someone slightly different.

The thing is – and this is where the trend-led narrative of fashion falls down – no one in their right mind goes out shopping thinking, what I really need is an 80s party dress. You think: I want a party dress that looks nice on me. In the back of your mind is the thought that it needs to be a little bit different from the party dresses you’ve already got in your wardrobe, because otherwise how can you justify spending the money on a party dress instead of something you actually need, such as a new boiler. And that is how trends get in, through the back door, by creating newness out of nothing.

The virtues, then, of nice party dresses you might encounter in the shops, were you to find yourself in aforementioned shops in the near future: a certain jazzy, sweetie-wrapper colour and fabrication which is as timelessly festive as Quality Street. Also – and more importantly – recklessness, ego, giddiness. Which are indeed virtues, because we are, after all, only talking about party dresses.

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