White shirt

Rachel Bilson in Los Angeles. Picture from Rachelbilsonweb.com

Relegated to the back of the wardrobe in favour of the T-shirt for the past few years, the white shirt is this spring coming to reclaim its fashion crown. Listed, along with the the LBD and the trench coat, among the "classic staples" of a woman's wardrobe (not necessarily a sexy moniker), it has the power, unlike any other garment, to add style to your look, a crispness to your line. It is a grown-up piece of garb, and perhaps for this reason was ignored for so long by a fashion firmament concerned largely with the raiments of youth. When designer Gianfranco Ferre died in 2007, it was almost like the white shirt - his trademark piece - went with him. But of course the joy of fashion is that it, unlike a fashion designer, can be reborn. Thus we spy from afar Kate Moss on the beach in Thailand with a block of white stretched between her bikini bottoms and her Ray-Bans, and Rachel Bilson strolling through Los Angeles, that city obsessed more than any other with youth, in a snow-coloured button-down.