Me+Em was the real election winner. Never mind broad but shallow support. The independent British brand, with 11 stores in the UK and two more recently opened in New York City, was founded by Clare Hornby and Emma Howarth in 2009, in the days of the last Labor government.
In the last 24 hours, Lady Starmer, who wore a £295 short-sleeved top-breasted jacket from the spring collection to last night’s count, has received 100 per cent approval, followed by a £275 red suit (of course). a dress and flare from the brand’s latest “fall” and a pair of £295 silver slingbacks from Russell and Bromley, also a leading UK brand, to walk into Downing Street with her husband at lunchtime on Friday.
So many key questions come up – Laura Kuenssberg and her colleagues probably won’t address them. Is £295 from now Labour’s new fiscal policy? It is widely recognized in the fashion industry as a middle-class sweet spot – ie. high enough to make a particular item seem ambitious, but not obscene.
Also, has anyone been styling, guiding or otherwise personal shopping for Lady Starmer, who, since we’ve seen her in public, hasn’t lost a sartorial leg?
Dressing for public exam life as a woman is never easy. When you’re as private as Victoria Starmer, determined not to drown after her husband, it’s doubly so. The ex-lawyer, as we all know, is an occupational health worker for the NHS and has two teenage children, who, as they wished, did not accompany their parents on their journey up the famous street.
Also, to judge from the happy kissing and air-kissing that went on between her and the facilities outside her new home, she was not as detached from her husband’s career as reports suggested. So when she finds time on Earth to shop; not to mention working out an appropriate approach to public dressing and pressuring the blow-dried on an impressive scale-but isn’t Penny-Mordaunt becoming her public hallmark?
Maybe she was always naturally stylish. Her strapless wedding dress from 2007 when her future husband was a simple old Keir is a good indicator that this could be true. It’s not really dated.
As her husband likes to call her, Vic has a knack for finding timeless outfits and seems too familiar with unfamiliar labels to have an innate interest in fashion. Take the red cotton pint shirt dress she wore to the polls yesterday – by Jonathan Simkhai, a New York-born designer who won US Vogue’s fashion fund prize back in 2015 and is known for clean, classic American sportswear .
That dress, in a new green iteration, currently costs £445. Lady Starmer may have bought it some time ago at the £395 mark. Perhaps she simply realizes that investing a reasonable amount in what she spends, at this point in her life, is a wise use.
Other cues that Lady Starmer likes and understands the potential power of clothes: the white-trimmed pink beaded dress she wore to a State banquet at Buckingham Palace in 2022 – a fashionable vintage look; the sparkly cream from Needle & Thread, the little princess of Wales she wore to the Japanese State Banquet last week, and the belted red Edeline Lee dress she wore to the Party Conference last year. Lee, another favorite of the Princess, is a Canadian-born designer who makes each of her sheer dresses in small batches in her East London studio, which supports jobs here and minimizes waste.
Cast your mind back to that picture from 1997 of a bleary Cherie Blair answering the doorbell of Number 10 in a cotton nightie from Next and ask yourself if that could happen now.
The truth is, ever since her husband started rocking a Number 10, Lady Starmer’s clothes have probably been run through some sort of approved voting algorithm, carefully vetted for price, fit and someone’s potential. conviction, be it Just Stop Oil. or Natural Born KillJoy Party. The fact that she still isn’t is miracle enough. Here’s hoping she can continue to shine a light on British brands of all sizes – boy, business is tough right now.
Mrs. Starmer, your country’s fashion industry needs you.