It might sound frivolous, but try listening to Bella Freud’s high-brow, low-fi hit podcast, Fashion Neurosis, in which she almost always asks her guests: “If you fancy someone and you don’t like the clothes they’re wearing, does it kill your attraction?” It’s often far more revealing than you might think.
I can’t for the life of me remember what I wore on my first date with my husband but I can sure as hell remember what he wore: a sparkly blazer.
From an H&M shift admired at a distance to a shiny jacket that belongs in Vegas, our writers reflect on the sometimes stunning, often shocking outfits they wore when they met their valentines.
I wore a long, pale-blue Dôen dress that I’d had for years to dinner with a man travelling from Scotland to meet me – elegant, I thought, yet able to accommodate a sizeable meal.
We didn’t get together then, but I became lodged in his mind, in part, he told me later, because of what I was wearing: a cotton burgundy floral dress.
