Winter wardrobe: seven key pieces you'll need

The one winter trend catching on fast – it was everywhere in Paris – is the faux fur gilet, an easy-to-wear item that allows freedom of movement and warmth not to speak of adding luxury and sleeve interest.

Throw it over a dress, a winter sweater and jeans or even a trouser suit and it transforms an outfit into comfort with convincing street attitude.

The best gilets (which used to be mundanely called jerkins) are those in single colours, in boucle, curly Mongolian fake fur or shearling, while the shaggy, multicoloured versions can sometimes look just too much.

A cool way to keep warm, so to speak, gilets are an alternative to winter coats, even the chubby sort in bold shades like electric blue. Difficult to wear over the other seasonal trend, the fuller skirt – too much overpowering volume – but as stylist Eva Borland shows here, such skirts suit a roomy coat with a slimline sweater keeping the silhouette in shape.

Knitwear

Knitwear is showing its strengths too this year – striped, lame, plaids or checks are the new winter armour toned down with solid colour separates like the blue sweater here that brightens up a black coat whose cropped sleeves leave room for display or the blue and white plaid that lifts an all-blue ensemble. Mixing prints and patterns needs a bit of thought – the best combinations are those with matching tones for harmony and unity.

Coats

Coats this winter everywhere are more enveloping; dramatic yet offhand with much more surface texture, and as the French would say, less contracté or structured. Parkas have lost their utilitarian origins and are now the coat of choice on many a chilly winter street where faux fur finds another place to make its mark on their wide hoods.

There’s a sporty, relaxed vibe in winter fashion with the overall look one of comfort and urban femininity.

Mixing high street and high end, Borland gives a lesson here in how to put seven winter looks together in affordable and accessible ways.

CREDITS

Photographs Anita Sadowska. Stylist Eva Borland. Model Grace at Morgan the Agency, Hair and Makeup by Mary Ellen Darby.