Who is popular today?

Yesterday, I hauled home four large shiny magazines and opened them two at a time, so keen was I to fall into a world where people don’t wear masks and Covid-19 isn’t braided into every paragraph.
The pages of September’s Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle and Tatler collectively exploded like a glitter bomb in my kitchen. So many shiny things! So many sparkly things! So much of everything.
I want them all. I want Burberry’s metallic gold lamé and cashmere trench coat (no price given, which means it’s basically aimed at millionaires.) I want Molly Goddard’s electric blue tulle ruffled dress (at least this one has a price – £2,400, or €2,800). I want Prada’s green knitted dress with huge iridescent spangles like a mermaid’s skin (£7,500). I want everything.
You can’t even try on clothes in most shops these days, so there is a kind of exquisite torment looking at these fabulous confections of imagination and design that require endless cash to avail of. It doesn’t really matter. There is still something so alluring about turning the pages of what are essentially fantasy picture books for adults.

There is a low down to be reported. There are women of colour on the covers of both Vogue and Elle, Gemma Chan and Ramla Ali respectively. Cindy Crawford turns up on the front cover of Tatler, and Naomi Campbell on its back cover. There are interviews with writers Sally Rooney (Vogue) and Elif Shafak (Harper’s).
The thickest magazine is Vogue, at 341 pages, where editorial content only starts at page 98, so many are the cherished ads. The megabucks pull-out ads across several pages are for Ralph Lauren and Fendi in Vogue. In Elle they are Christian Dior, and Fendi again (spendy Fendi!). In Harper’s they are for Louis Vuitton and – yup – Fendi. Tatler has just the one, for Christian Dior. Fendi obviously didn’t think it was worth dropping its coin with Tatler.
There are big questions asked. “What is the new super-rich status symbol?” inquires a headline on the cover of Tatler. It’s signet rings, worn on the little fingers of the rich youth. Elle asks on its cover, “Is property the new porn?” I had to check that the date really was 2021 and not 2011. Or 2001. Haven’t people been saying that for decades now?
Harper’s has a model called Natalia Vodianova on the cover, who gets a whopping 14 pages of an interview and photoshoot inside.

And so to what really matters, the frocks, the trends, the delicious silliness of it all. Some of these trends will arrive at the high street in various watered-down forms eventually. Sadly, I don’t think the metallic gold lamé and cashmere Burberry coat will ever jump the shark, but I can only hope.
Vogue is obviously the Voice of Fashion God, so what have they got? Their number one pick for autumn is “the trophy jacket”. No, not like the metal ones with handles that golfers get excited about. Jackets that have only one arm, or are made of two different halves, or go down to the ground, which in my book is a coat, but there you go.
Cut outs started with swimsuits and have now horrifyingly migrated to dresses. Vogue shows us black dresses missing their middles, the two parts held together with threads. No, Just no. Platforms are back. So are slips, which used to be worn under clothes, but now they have gone up in the world and have become outerwear. Vogue also tells us “skin tight tops” are in. That’s their lot.
Elle goes with numbering their trends too. In at one is the colour silver. Silver everything. Dresses, coats, boots, jackets, the lot. I approve. My favourite colour. Two is rainbow-hued eyeshadow and hair dye. Three is also hair - “sky high hair”. Wear it high and wear it frizzy. Four is “wader wellies”. That’s great big oversized floppy boots. There are 14 more trends, which seems like about at least 10 too many. Big bags. Animal prints (again). Metallics. Fake furry coats. Barbie pink. And “Glam Granny”. This trend involves wearing a scarf over your head and knotted under your chin.
Harper’s approach is to style their picks of various designers, thereby anointing various looks. They’ve gone mad for colour, with reds and greens and purple. There are purple mini-skirts trimmed with red feathers from Saint Laurent, a red taffeta trench coat from Dior, and that glorious gold coat from Burberry I may have mentioned before. Their Gucci picks are gorgeous creations of silver and pink beading and embroidery. Their Armani featured dress is embroidered with with blue and pink crystals, and features a matching tulle and crystal necklace. Oh yes, please.

Dolce and Gabbana are all crystal bodysuits. Valentino has a startling black and white geometric design cape which I could definitely see myself wearing, should a version turn up on the high street at a lower price than the 6,400 it is in this incarnation.
Tatler has chosen one piece from the main collections to showcase. Dolce and Gabbana is pink leopardksin boots, puffer coat and a bodysuit. (Bodysuits, it appears, are also a trend.) In fact, most of their picks - Hermes, Miu Miu, Dior Prada and Gucci - are jackets. Trophy jackets. They must have a mole at Vogue.
And now excuse me while I start figuring out where I can find a bright gold coat.