A letter from a reader

At 68, every nice outfit I owned left the house under the same beige anorak

I want it on the record that I own nice tops. A drawer of them. What I also own, or owned, in the sense that matters, is one practical beige anorak, bought sensibly in 2019, and for five years every outfit I put together left the house underneath it. I am 68, I am not a writer, and I had not noticed what that adds up to until my granddaughter showed me the photographs from her mother’s fiftieth, where I appear, in every single one, as a beige anorak with a head.

Then three different women asked me about a jacket at the garden centre café on Saturday, and I have said the same thing three times, so I am writing it down once.

Here is how the anorak takes over. A British summer wants a layer. Not a coat, a layer, because it is nineteen degrees and bright until it is fifteen degrees and spitting, usually inside the same hour. And the only layer I owned was the anorak, because a layer is practical and I buy practical. So the nice top went on, and the anorak went over it, and the nice top stayed a secret between me and the hall mirror. Five years of that.

The outfit, and be cold by four o’clock, or the anorak, and look like the weather forecast. I chose the forecast for five years.

Nobody decides to become a beige anorak with a head. It happens one sensible morning at a time, until the photographs come back from a fiftieth and there you are.

Then Jean turned up at the allotment in one

Jean next door came through the allotment gate in June in a soft blue jacket with a print across the shoulders and a ruffle down the front, over a plain white top, and I said, you are never gardening in that. She said, I have been gardening in it all week, it washes in the machine, and she picked up a hoe to prove it. And the thing I noticed, leaning on my fork, was that Jean, in a plain top and ordinary trousers, looked dressed. The jacket was doing all of it.

It is called the Estrella, from Manchester Boutique, a small British boutique that has been quietly dressing women our age for a few years now. I ordered it that evening, fully expecting to send it back.

It did not go back. The anorak is on the peg by the back door, for actual rain, which is what it was for.

What happened at the garden centre

I wore it on Saturday over a plain white top and jeans, which is the least interesting outfit I own, and kept it on through the plants, the café and the till.

Three different women asked me where it was from before the tea had cooled. And Sylvia, who has known me thirty years and does not hand out compliments, asked if I had been somewhere first. I had been nowhere. From Sylvia, that is practically a medal.

Here is why it works, as far as I can tell. It is the layer and the outfit at once. The print sits across the shoulders and chest, where people actually look, and fades away to plain blue by the hem, so it frames the face without shouting all the way down. The little ruffle down the front edges and round the hem is what makes a plain top underneath look deliberate. The two rows of dark buttons are decoration, so it hangs open and easy, nothing to fasten. It is soft and light, so it stays on indoors, which the anorak never earned in five years. And it comes to the hip with a curved hem, so it covers what I want covered and does not flap about.

It has been out five times in nine days. The shops, lunch, church, the allotment gate, and the garden centre twice, because I went back for compost I did not need.

Three things worth knowing

One. The layer is the outfit now. A plain top and jeans walk out of the house looking decided, because the jacket does the work at the top where the eyes go. That is the whole trick, and the anorak never learned it.

Two. It is practical enough to keep the allotment happy. Light, easy, machine washable, and it hangs open so it goes on and off in a second. Jean gardens in hers. I draw the line there, but I could.

Three. Honest sizes, and plenty of them. From an XS right up to a 5XL, the same easy shape the whole way, which I wish more places would bother with. There is a whole rail of these jackets at the boutique besides this one. I have my eye on a red paisley next. Sylvia has been told.

About the price

I am careful with money and I will not pretend otherwise, so I will tell you the price was the bit that made me suspicious.

The Estrella is £44.95. It was £90.00.

My first thought was that there had to be a catch, because a jacket that does this much work in a department store is nearer the ninety than the forty-five.

There is no catch that I have found. They are a small boutique selling directly, so there is no department store taking a cut in the middle, and they run a summer sale to shift the season’s stock before it turns.

I do not trust perfect scores, so I read the reviews before I told my sister about it. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars, which sounded like real people, so I read on. One woman had written, “Threw it on over a plain tee and got three compliments at lunch. Light enough to keep on indoors and it washes in the machine.” That was the one that decided it for me.

If you were stood at my kitchen table

If you were stood at my kitchen table with the kettle on and you asked me, this is what I would say.

If every nice outfit you own leaves the house under the same practical anorak, you have not stopped making an effort. You have been making it invisible, one sensible layer at a time. This is a layer that shows the effort instead of hiding it, and it is no less practical than the beige one.

Two practical things. The sale is on now, and the middle sizes go first. And once the summer stock has gone, that is it until next year.

The anorak is on the peg for actual rain. Which is what it was for.

Pat