Elasticated waists? Er, yes please

The designer Anna Valentine is as chic a woman as you will find and Anna, when I visited her studio the other day, was wearing elasticated trousers. From her own label, they were stylish and in a lovely lightweight black wool. But still. You could have knocked me down with a feather boa.

Cut to Zara's shop floor - the thrumming flagship is a hop and a skip from Valentine's serene Marylebone mews - and the elasticated waistband is also making its presence felt there. It was a similar story at Whistles and Cos. Strange times indeed.

Anna Valentine: Vintage to meet ethnic in Camilla's wardrobe

Or perhaps not. Whistles report that their Elasticated Waist Mission is part of a "Sport Luxe" trend (very Stella McCartney) that was introduced last summer and proved so popular that they've repeated it this summer. The reign of the constricting skinny leg jean, with its corset-like grip on the stomach, may be on the wane.

In any event, it's going to have to start sharing the spotlight. Next winter's big trouser story is literally that: a story about big trousers, or at least looser ones, cut wider in the leg. Perhaps the soft, shirred waists filling the shops are a preliminary dry run we could all take a spin down before things get serious come autumn.

Hang on. What am I thinking? Elasticated. It's the slippery slope, isn't it? The descent into hell - that place where there's no point bothering with the hairdressers, and where it's OK to wear sensible shoes and eat too much, every day.

Elasticated waists at Joseph and Zara

I'm all for comfort, but only up to a point, and I thought this was more or less the consensus view of anyone who's interested in fashion. Shockingly, this seems not to be the case. On the one hand you have women who cinch themselves into Hervé Léger bandage dresses or the bossiest of tailoring 24/7 and who think nothing of chucking back a couple of Nurofen to blur the pain of their five-inch stilettos. And then there's generation Fit'n'Buff, who have no qualms about wearing elasticated waists, baggy cardigans - or, come to that, eating too much. Their mean age is 17, so they're really not bothered about any of the above having a negative impact on their allure. Voluminous jumpsuits beneath which you could set up a primus stove, fry a kilo of chips and then consume them without having to let out a single seam have been their go-to staple for summer festival-dressing for years.

No, Generation Fit'n'Buff leave the fretting about sliding standards and one-size fits all phobias to their mothers. It turns out that by spurning elasticated waists on the grounds that they're a primary indicator of Giving Up, I've actually been fog-horning how very middle-aged I am.

The label that transformed a Duchess

The next step requires concentration, however. You need the right kind of elasticated waist: one, according to Anna Valentine, "that consists of a deep waist-band, with good quality elastic. It should sit on the hips - if you wear it at waist level it's going to puff out and make you look bigger, but if it's lower it gives you that nice slouchy look. A flat front helps and pockets shouldn't be placed right on the side seams where they can pouch out."

Valentine's own elasticated trousers can even be worn with shorter tops - the waistband is that well executed, with pencil-pleated gathers that you see on some curtain tops. It would almost be a crime to cover them up. Valentine wears them with drapy jumpers as well as tuxedo jackets and hoiks them higher or lower on her hips depending on the degree of loucheness she's going for. She looks effortlessly elegant. Mind you, she used to be a ballerina.

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