A letter from a reader

The two coats 3 women asked me about in a rainy National Trust car park

I have never written anything like this before, and I want to say at the start that I am not a writer and I am not in the habit of telling other women what to wear.

But on Sunday my sister June and I took the labrador to a National Trust garden, the sky changed its mind halfway across the car park, and while a dozen of us stood about under our boot lids waiting for it to pass, three different women asked me about my coats. Both of them, because June had borrowed one. I have now explained the pair of them enough times that it seemed easier to write it down properly.

The woman parked next to us summed it up while the rain hammered on the tailgate. She looked from June to me and said it.

One for the calendar and one for the forecast. How organised.

She meant it as a joke, I think. But that is exactly what they are, and it took me most of my adult life to get here, so I am going to write it down for anyone still standing in a wet car park in the wrong coat.

How it happens

For years I owned one good coat at a time and asked it to do everything. The school run, the funerals, the dog field, the lunches, the downpours.

And a coat asked to do everything does all of it badly. The smart one goes bobbly and sorry for itself because it has been dragged through weather it was never meant for. Or you buy the sensible one, and then you arrive at a nice lunch dressed for a flood warning and spend the first hour apologising for yourself.

Nobody decides to live like that. It happens quietly, one compromise at a time, until a stranger in a car park points out that you have finally, accidentally, solved it.

Because this autumn, without quite planning to, I ended up with exactly two. The smart one and the weather one. Both from Manchester Boutique, a small British boutique that has been quietly dressing women our age for a few years now. Between them they have the whole season covered, and neither cost what you would think.

The green one is the Ashbury

The Ashbury is the smart one. A proper longline trench, double breasted, in a muted sage green that reads as a real colour without shouting about it. Big collar you can turn up when the wind gets personal, a tie belt with a buckle that gives you a waist without an argument, buckled straps at the cuffs, and deep slanted pockets that actually hold things.

The outer is smooth and it shrugs off wind and light rain, so a damp forecast does not disqualify it. But its real job is different. It is the one I put on when I want to look like myself on purpose. Belted over jeans, it turns a trip to the chemist into an outing. June borrowed it for the tearoom on Sunday and I have not fully forgiven her for how well it suited her.

The Ashbury is £34.95 at the moment. It was £70.00. It comes in sizes M to 2XL.

The beige one is the Merrivale

The Merrivale is the weather one, and I want to be fair to it, because the weather one is usually the coat nobody writes love letters to.

It is a softly shaped everyday rain coat in a pale beige, with a smooth outer that sees off a light shower, three buttons, a soft lining that is kind against your neck, flap pockets at the hips for the lead and the poo bags and the phone, and a gently shaped cut that follows you rather than hanging off you like a tent. It lives on the hook by the door and it goes over everything I own without a struggle.

On Sunday it earned its keep. The sky did its worst, the labrador did his worst, and I came home dry and completely unbothered, which I understand is what the well organised feel like all the time.

The Merrivale is £34.95 at the moment. It was £70.00. It comes in sizes UK 10/12 to UK 20/22.

What happened in the car park

So there we were, one sister in each. June in the green, me in the beige, the labrador in disgrace. Three women asked about the coats before the rain let up. One of them asked June where the trench was from while pretending to look for something in her own boot, which where I come from is practically an interview.

The woman next to us asked which one of us she was supposed to be complimenting. I said both, obviously, and then I stood in the rain and explained the whole arrangement, which is how I know it was time to write it down.

Three things I have learned since

One. Name the job and the coat gets simpler. The Ashbury is for looking like myself. The Merrivale is for the sky having other plans. Neither has to pretend to be the other, which is why both do their job properly.

Two. The weather one does not have to look like defeat. That was my mistake for years. A rain coat that is actually shaped like a woman, in a proper soft beige, means the wet days stop being the days you hope not to see anyone.

Three. The smart one gets worn more, not less. Once the downpours belong to the Merrivale, the Ashbury stays looking like the day it arrived, so I stopped saving it. It has done a birthday lunch, the chemist, and the school pickup, and felt right at every single one.

About the price

I want to be straightforward about this, because it was the thing that made me suspicious, twice over.

Both coats are £34.95 at the moment, each down from £70.00. The pair together cost less than one department store coat that would have been asked to do everything and managed none of it.

There is no catch that I have found. They are a small boutique selling directly, so there is no middleman taking a cut, and they run a sale to move the season through.

I did what I imagine you are doing now and went and read the reviews before I ordered. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars. Not the suspiciously perfect five you see on some websites, which if I am honest made me trust it rather more. One woman had written, “Bought the trench for a christening and wore it to walk the dog the next morning. It has not been off its hook since it dried.” That was the one that decided it for me.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If you and I were sat with a pot of tea and you asked me, this is what I would say.

Stop asking one coat to do everything. Get one that makes you feel like yourself, and one that lets the sky do whatever it likes, and the whole season gets easier. It is not extravagance. It is the end of the wrong coat.

Two practical things. The sale is on now and the first autumn stock is already going, so the popular sizes disappear first. The Ashbury runs M to 2XL and the Merrivale runs UK 10/12 to UK 20/22, so check your own before the middle ones go.

One for the calendar, one for the forecast. The stranger in the car park was right.

Maggie