Tiny lifeless mammal now available at your favourite online store

I don't usually write posts about accessories:  most designers reserve their rashness for garments, I find.  However, this small item deserves attention:  it's described by Asos as a raccoon tail, which is a charitable description, given that it looks like something the cat has laid on the back doorstep in a gesture of affection to the householder.  The cat presumably expects you to wear the pelts of its enemies as a symbol of your undying loyalty.

Further consideration suggests that this is a charm which can be clipped to a belt or bag, although Christ knows exactly what it's supposed to be warding off.  The bad luck's already arrived, I'm afraid.

£5 in the sale.

Happy New - Gah!

Generally, most garments can be safely categorised as a dress, shirt,  blouse, tarpaulin, etc.  This item, however, will defy taxonomy, and even the most advanced mathematician will be hard pressed to provide an adequate Venn diagram of fashion to incorporate this startling offering from Asos.

I suppose there is something brave about the entire lack of symmetry, the mystifying school-shirt collar and cape-style sleeve, but it's the kind of bravery fuelled by fly agaric mushrooms and big swords.  Fashion magazines will probably describe this as 'adventurous', but the fluorescence will already have warned us off, thanks.

Asos, £70.

Caution: vehicle reversing

Is it any wonder this lady looks tired?  There she is, working hard in a windswept multistorey carpark, her high-vis shirt the only thing between her and being firmly pinned to the security barrier by a distracted shopper.
If anything will serve as a fluorescent warning to fashion-lovers, this ought to:  that curious long flap thing will be tugged at by small children who wish to draw your attention to the fact that Mum has got her hand stuck up the ticket machine.

The overdone cap sleeves and looseness about the shoulders should also serve as further exhortation to avoid flaccid tailoring.

£30 at Asos. Hot diggity.

Just the thing for straining a festive sprout

This diaphanous garment is described as a tennis dress:  wearing it will perk up racquet sports no end, and the umpire will probably lose track of the score.  However, the players will have no trouble washing out grass stains, as the care label has been so glaringly left in the seam.  A lovely touch there, Topshop, seeing as you're charging £90 for what amounts to three square inches of fabric and a great deal of fresh air.

In case you need reining in

This is frankly the most bizarre object to appear in this blog.  Most of the other things I post are merely ugly or strangely-patterned, but this defeats explanation.

It's described as a harness, so it'll be jolly handy if you're in the 4.30 at Haydock, or have been recently executed, your remains displayed in a gibbet at the crossroads as a deterrent to cattle-rustlers.  Worn backwards over the head it doubles as a scold's bridle.

And so handy for Wichita linemen, too!

£40.  There are specialist shops for this sort of thing, you know, Topshop.

Frowned at by your own coat. Even your wardrobe is turning against you

This coat is described as a 'throw-on' - I suspect because it's the first thing you'll grab on your way out of the door to some event at which you really must express your disapproval, for example at a proposed bypass or the latest filth to flicker across our TV screens.  Older readers, do you remember Mary Whitehouse, guardian of the nation's viewing habits, whose rigid hair, unbending attitude and even tighter sphincter bespoke stubborn, inflexible rectitude?  Yeah, that.

Nothing says 'no' quite like this does: those scowling pockets are tight-lipped and clearly find you morally reprehensible.  The sloping shoulders and dreary pattern are likewise an essay in reproach.  £100 for no fun at all.

Topshop, for God's sake, cheer up.