mumsy

"When I think of strength, that's who I think about - mumsy. Whenever we stray off the path, there's a voice that guides us back and that voice for me is my mum's."

Riccardo Tisci at Burberry finally found his lane, something that cannot be easy for a designer who thinks like an architect and yet is employed by a global conglomerate with a bottom line built on trench coats and mumsy plaid scarfs.

Over at Harper’s Bazaar, the perennial runner-up of American fashion magazines, where Mr. Gan had a second job as its creative director from 2001 until 2018, Glenda Bailey, the editor in chief, long positioned herself externally as the so-called nice editor, parlaying her Mancunian accent and bustling manner into a mumsy image.

Probably not, but it’s an excuse to needle drop the sound of mumsy acid wash denim.

Indeed, for each silver-haired model with sharp cheekbones and a long, lean body that designers put on the runway or venerate in an advertising campaign or on the red carpet, they articulate countless cautions against “old lady” style, or ensembles looking too “mother-of-the-bride” or “mumsy” — all of which land like a thousand paper cuts.