As the Times fashion editor, I’m used to writing about what the Duchess of Cambridge is wearing. Likewise, the Kate Effect, when admirers flock to snap up her look, has been part of my beat for years.
What I’m not used to, however, is HRH popping up in something the rest of us are already wearing. Nor, I will admit, something I quite want. When she appeared in Glasgow on Monday in a sage green gilet and walking boots, the duchess was every inch the off-duty royal: all Balmoral quilting and tack room chic.
But she was also surprisingly on-trend. Her gilet was from the Danish It girl brand Ganni, beloved of the front row and Insta-influencers alike (£255, ganni.com and close to sold out) and the boots were from See by Chloé. Less rarefied deer-stalker, more yummy mummy dog-walker.
Whenever the duchess wears something borderline cool, pundits ponder whether she has stepped out of her comfort zone. Perhaps, this time at least, we should be asking when we stepped into hers.
Muddy wellies, a padded gilet, fleeces and an outdoorsy coat that doesn’t let the rain in. Chelsea boots. A dog. No, not the kit list for a shooting weekend but an inventory of the nation’s shopping habits over the past year. As circumstances forced us to commune with nature rather than commute, our wardrobes and tastes adapted. Whether you spent lockdown walking the perimeter of your own estate or skirting one of the council’s, we’re all dressing like the country set now.
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In 2004 then-royal girlfriend Kate Middleton posed, perched on a shooting stick seat, on the lawns of Blenheim Palace in striped shirt, tweed mini and Le Chameau knee-high boots. She looked like one of Country Life’s classic “girls in pearls” at a time when most other 22-year-olds were to be found wearing skinny jeans and a thong.
These days she’d fit right in. GQ has declared this winter the season of “dressing like a weekend royal” after heritage checks and wellies featured on the menswear catwalks, while Vogue is trumpeting the return of the tweed jacket.
The welly brand Hunter saw its sales increase 94 per cent last year, while searches for hiking boots jumped 60 per cent in the first half of 2021. The must-have coat this winter is known among fashion editors as the Balmoral jacket for its similarity to the Queen’s preferred off-duty look.
Zara has three of these diamond-quilted green styles on its books, inspired by the Husky of Tostock hacking jackets that the Queen and Princess Anne popularised in the Seventies and which were taken up in the Eighties by the Sloane Ranger crowd.
I’ve long had my eye on Ganni’s sleeveless version hanging in Selfridges but HRH pipped me to it, so I’m looking at Lavenham’s hooded gilet instead (£175, lavenhamjackets.com). My other favourite is Arket’s in shiny recycled polyester (£89, arket.com) but even M&S has a Per Una version (£55, marksandspencer.com). Ever choosy fashion editors are building their own in bespoke colour combinations at the ultra-hip quilted jacket label du moment Marfa Stance (marfastance.com).
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From the Kate Effect to The Crown Effect — New York Magazine referred to the recent season of the hit Netflix series as “Barbour jacket porn” and Google searches for the style rose by 196 per cent last year.
Of the brand’s latest collab collection with Alexa Chung, the green Gala jacket with its brown corduroy collar and fireman-clip fastenings is not dissimilar to something Emma Corrin wears on screen as a young Lady Diana (£279, flannels.com) while the quilted Billie has more than a hint of Sandringham to it (£229, barbour.co.uk).
Then there are the country set labels giving their wares a little more urban spin to better appeal to new wardrobes while simultaneously bringing boot rooms across the country bang up to date.
I like Troy London’s streamlined puffer coat in sage (£525, troylondon.com) and the long-line plaid shacket (that’s a shirt-jacket) from another HRH-sanctioned label, Really Wild Clothing (£395, reallywildclothing.com). Don’t tell the pro-hunting lobby, but Holland Cooper’s padded khaki Colorado down coat comes with faux fur trim (£549, hollandcooper.com).
Meanwhile, Hunter’s classic hunting, shooting, fishing set Balmoral boots have been given a new ankle-height look with a neoprene cuff that makes them my favourite of a crop of what really are being called “fashion wellies” by those in the know (£135, hunterboots.com).
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Of that category (also known as “rainboots”, they’re technically Scandi in origin rather than traditionally posh, but they fit the same outdoorsy mould) I also like Stutterheim’s (£135, stutterheim.com) and Everlane’s (£71, everlane.com). The real poshos among you might prefer the £29 version from John Lewis — just don’t forget to blood them with mud before you wear them so you don’t look like a parvenue.
The truly countrified might well balk at the prospect of buying any of this clobber new when there are 15-plus old doggy ones hanging in the very cold downstairs loo. Still, post-pandemic there is now a subset of rural folk who have only recently — or perhaps temporarily — relocated from the city and therefore might need to stock up. They are farmers of the Soho House rather than Cold Comfort variety, and they are the reason Jimmy Choo and Gucci now do hiking boots (£495 and £795 respectively, net-a-porter.com).
Finally, there are the urban walkers who discovered during lockdown that comfortable, warm outdoor clothes don’t have to look like something you bought for a camping holiday in 1978 and that a coat you can wear to the park might also be a coat you can wear to work.
For sturdy walking-style boots smart enough for town, I’m a big fan of Rogue Matilda’s suede-trimmed Inca style (£225, roguematilda.com). Before you worry about pulling on a pair of authentically Jilly Cooper-style jodhpurs to go with them, note that the duchess wore nothing more challenging than a pair of black skinny jeans — everywoman, I will go with thee.
