At 62, I finally asked who decided what was appropriate for my age
At 62, I finally asked who decided what was appropriate for my age
Six things the Sol gets right that the safe jumper gets wrong, from a woman who is not a fashion writer.
Caroline Richards · Customer · Nottinghamshire · 5 min read
Let me be plain about who is talking. I am Caroline, I am 62, I live in Nottinghamshire, and I have never once sat down to write about a jumper. What I have done, for about the last ten years, is run everything past a little committee in my head before I buy it. Is that too young for me. Would people think I was trying. Am I going to look like a woman who has not noticed what year it is. The committee has never once been outvoted, and my wardrobe has got quieter and quieter because of it.
The jumper I am writing about is called the Sol, from Nottingham Boutique, a small boutique that has been quietly dressing women our age for a few years now. A great yellow sun high on the chest and long rays fanning out across the whole of it, into purples and blues and greens, pieced together like patchwork. When the boutique later asked if they could put my letter up for other women to read, I said yes, on the condition that I could be completely honest in it.
I nearly did not order it. Read on.
Here is what finally got me. I was in town in the spring and there was a woman ahead of me in the queue, older than me, seventy at least, in a coat the colour of a conker with a scarf that had no business working and absolutely did. I remember thinking, she looks marvellous. And it took me until I was back in the car to notice that I had handed her something I have never once handed myself. She was allowed. I was not. I had been quietly enforcing a rule on myself that I would have thought was nonsense applied to anybody else.
I could not name one single person who had ever told me to stop. I had been taking instructions from somebody who does not exist.
The Sol is the first thing I bought after that, and having worn it most weeks since, I can tell you it comes down to six things.
The morning it came. I had it on before the tea had gone cold.
IT LOOKS LIKE A DECISION, NOT AN ACCIDENT
There is a difference between a bright thing and a considered thing, and it is the difference between being looked at and being spoken to. The print on this is a proper piece of design, a sunburst pieced together like patchwork, dozens of little panels each its own colour and its own stitch, radiating out from the sun on the chest. It does not look like somebody ran out of ideas and reached for the colour. It looks like it was meant.
Hung on the back of the door the night before, which tells you how I felt about it.
It is bright but it is not silly. There is a difference and this is very much on the right side of it.
Margaret A., KirkbyUNDERNEATH THE COLOUR IT IS A PROPER JUMPER
This is the bit that makes the whole thing work and the bit I would not have guessed from a photograph. Take the print away and what you have is an entirely sensible jumper. Long sleeves, ribbed cuffs that keep the sleeves neat at the wrist, hip length so it covers what I would like covered, with little flowered panels down at the cuffs and the hem. Nothing about the shape is asking for attention. The colour is the only bold thing about it, and that is exactly why you can wear it at our age.
The cuff. Ribbed, neat, and a little flowered panel just above it.
Good long sleeves and it covers my hips, which is all I ever ask. The colour is the bonus.
Sheila B., Sutton-in-AshfieldTHE COLLAR KEEPS THE DRAUGHT OFF MY NECK
It is a true turtleneck, the sort that folds over on itself rather than the mean little band you get on a lot of jumpers now. It sits close without any of that gripping feeling, and from about the middle of September that has meant I stop picking up a scarf on the way out of the door. It also finishes the whole thing off at the top, which is what I was forever trying to do with a scarf and never quite managing.
The collar folded over. The bands of colour run right round it.
A proper fold over collar, not a token one. Warm at the neck without feeling strangled.
Dorothy E., BinghamIT SKIMS RATHER THAN CLINGS
I will say the quiet part out loud, because I would have wanted somebody to say it to me. Part of what the committee in my head was really worried about was not the colour at all. It was that something bright would draw the eye straight to my middle. What I had got wrong is that a clingy cut does that, and a colour does not. This is made relaxed and easy with room to move, it hangs down off the shoulders rather than following you about, and the pattern lies across it instead of being stretched over it.
I am a size 18 and had talked myself out of prints for years. This hangs properly and I wish I had found it sooner.
Valerie N., EastwoodPLAIN JEANS AND YOU ARE FINISHED
It is the easiest thing in my wardrobe to get dressed in, which I did not expect from the brightest thing in my wardrobe. You put it on with plain jeans or plain trousers and you stop. No necklace, no scarf, nothing fiddly, no standing at the mirror adding things and taking them off again. Everything else I own needs help from something else before it looks like an outfit. This needs none, and on a cold Tuesday morning that is worth more than I can tell you.
Put out the night before. That is the whole outfit and it took me about a minute.
Jeans and this and I am out of the door. It has halved how long I stand in front of the wardrobe.
Joan C., RuddingtonTHE SIZES GO UP PROPERLY
Six sizes, UK 8/10 right the way through to UK 18/20, which I mention because I know exactly how that goes. You find the one thing you actually want and the sizes stop precisely where you need them to keep going. The cut is relaxed so it is forgiving either way, and if you like a bit more room through the body for layering underneath there is nothing wrong with taking the size up. I am ordinarily a 14 and mine is comfortable with room to spare.
Ordered the 18/20 and it fits lovely across the shoulders, which is usually where these things let me down.
Elaine S., StaplefordThe Sol, against the safe jumper I would normally have bought
I have a drawer of perfectly sensible jumpers that the committee approved. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.
Chosen because nobody could possibly object to it
Navy, grey or black, the same as everything else
Needs a scarf or a necklace before it looks finished
Nobody ever mentions it, and neither do I
Appropriate, which is not at all the same as nice
Chosen because you actually like the look of it
A sunburst in golds, purples, blues and greens
The collar and the shape finish it on their own
Three women asked me about it in one afternoon
A proper grown-up jumper, easy through the body
About the price
The Sol is £32.95 at the moment. It was £66.00.
I will pass on what the boutique told me, which is that the middle sizes go first and once the autumn stock has gone it can be a wait for it to come back. Their words, not mine. What I can tell you from my side is that half price is usually the point at which I start asking what is wrong with a thing, and a good few weeks of wearing it, I have not found it.
And I do not trust perfect scores, so I read the reviews before I ordered. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars, which sounded like real women rather than robots, so I read on. The same six things I have just walked you through come up in them, over and over, in other women's words.
Tuesday morning, nowhere in particular to be. I have stopped saving it for things.
If you have a committee of your own, and I rather suspect you do, I would start here. It is only a jumper. But I had spent ten years taking instructions from somebody who does not exist, about a rule nobody ever actually made, and it had cost me more than I realised. Go and have a look while your size is still there.
Caroline
SOL | Retro Sunburst Print Turtleneck
- Sunburst print in a patchwork look, gold through to purple and green
- Fold over turtleneck collar with a retro finish
- Relaxed fit that skims rather than clings, with room to move
- Long sleeves with ribbed cuffs, hip length
- Little floral panels at the cuffs and hem
- Six sizes, UK 8/10 (S) to UK 18/20 (3XL)
- Free UK delivery and 30 day returns
The autumn sale is on now, half price. The middle sizes go first.