WHY I HAVE CHOSEN TO BE A DARK BEAUTY ON MY WEDDING DAY – November 2^nd 2005

 

Scientists have proved what women have known for years – black really does make you look slimmer.

 

 

hen my boyfriend popped the question this summer, my first thought (beyond overwhelming gratitude) was, naturally, The Dress. Swiftly followed by my second: why, on the day we want to look most beautiful, do we saddle ourselves with white, the most unflattering colour in existence? Instead, we wait to be widows before claiming the colour that contours, flatters and lends instant sophistication: black.

 

Scientists have just proved what women down the ages have always known: your bum doesn’t look big in black. They tell us that darker fabrics make it harder for the eye to make out shadows – and, therefore, any bumps and bulges.

 

Well, duh. We all know black is the most flattering shade to wear, particularly on our derrieres, but our love affair with the colour that is no colour goes way beyond its slimming properties.

 

Black makes us feel more powerful, mysterious and sexy. It’s classic and never dates, its simple to accessorise, easy to match with itself, and you can dress it up with jewellery or down with jeans.

 

Designer Coco Chanel came up with the concept of the LBD (Little Black Dress) in the Twenties and women have word them ever since.  and women everywhere have followed her lead, from Jackie O to Audrey Hepburn.

 

My love affair with black is such that I considered it for my first wedding dress, before concluding that it might send out the wrong signals. Given the misery of our divorce eight years later, I wish I’d stuck to my guns. At least I’d have looked slimmer in the pictures.

 

I hold my hands up: I’m a black addict. Three-quarters of my wardrobe is black: bootleg jeans, cashmere jumpers, suede jackets, silk shirts. And LBDs, of course. Eleven, at the last count.

 

It’s not for want of trying to buy other colours, but if it’s a choice between looking like I have consumption and looking like I have cellulite, there’s no contest. Death-warmed-up it is.

 

A few weeks ago, I was invited to a New York society party. Knowing that every size zero woman there would be wearing black, I decided to go shopping for something pink or blue or, at the very least, silver, in a feeble attempt to stand out.

 

In an upmarket department store, I selected half-a-dozen cocktail dresses and retired to the changing rooms. It took a fellow shopper, a woman in her 40s dressed in Chanel, to put me straight. As I emerged from the changing room for the sixth time, she was waiting with black sheath dress in my size. ‘So much more flattering, dear,’ she whispered. My tally of LBDs now stands at 12.

 

The only problem with black, is that everyone wears it. Walking into a dinner party these days is like attending a wake. It’s classy and classic, but it’s also the teensiest bit boring.

 

Which is where accessories come in. Diamond accessories. It’s no surprise they’re a girl’s best friend; they go so well with black.

 

So what will I wear for my wedding two days before Christmas? Well, let me give you s tiny clue. It isn’t white.