Fashion Blogs

 Long lines and flow … Kristin Scott Thomas. Photograph: Ian Gavan/Getty Images

Everybody loves a wedding, but choosing what to wear when you’re middle aged is not the same as when you’re in your 20s and you get invited to one every month. By the time you’re 50, the whole wedding-guest experience is different, if only because the chances of being invited to a celebration of your peers have sharply decreased.

 

Dress, £108, by Michael Michael Kors, from net-a-porter.com

Wedding guests aged 50 or over will want to avoid looking like the mother of the bride – it’s a wonderful role to play, but traditionally a fashion nadir involving bolero jackets and fascinators. When invited to a friend’s recent celebration, I was far from the only one worrying about what the hell I would wear.

The couple, two journalists who had met in Australia and followed each other around the world, were marrying more than 25 years after their romance had started. The dress code for this unusually mature group was “party”, but this is not an age to go trawling Topshop.

Instead, some of the best-dressed female guests went long, eschewing the standard lilac cocktail suits for between ankle-length and floor-length dresses or skirts that allowed them to twirl and swish with panache.

One of the bride’s best friends wore a long, orange satin dress that was modest – no cleavage – but had a crossover front split to give a flash of leg. She wore it with metallic, 1950s-style Pretty Ballerina flats and had a gamine grey haircut – she looked dazzling. Another on my best-dressed list wore wide, splash-printed palazzo pants (I’ve seen similar ones in Zara) and a tight waistcoat, along with rough-hewn amber jewellery.

Shorter dresses strike me as best when structured, floaty or featuring bold florals; wear a pastel tea-dress style after a certain age and you can come across like a tragic Tennessee Williams heroine.

Proportions bear thinking about, too: if the skirt has volume, wear with a slim T-shirt shape, or a fitted white shirt for that Carolina Herrera vibe. If it’s a slim, more sombre skirt, go a little mad with the top: colourful, patterned, but not too bare for a special do.

But the best advice is to ignore specialist wedding outfitters, and choose a shape and style you love, that flatters you and feels worthy of a one-off extravaganza.