Mary's Fashion: Hit & Miss or just Miss and Miss?

[Barrie]

What I can say that is positive about Mary is that she has great taste in shoes. The lady has a great shoe collection that I would love to have. The clothes that she matches with those shoes can be a problem.

[Summer]

Well she has an amazing array of really high stilettos!  Her clothes are.....interesting.   I know that she has access to the most amazing designers, however I can't think of one outfit that she has worn that I'd really like to have.   Some outfits are okay, others are boring, many are just strange.  Considering the money that she spends and her 'expertise' in fashion, she should dress better.

[Barrie]

I did like the dress she wore to her sister's wedding(sage green and she had a tan, had colour yea) and the outfit she wore to the opening of Parliament this year. She should embrace the coatdress and that style of hat. As for the Christening, too bad we all talked it to death. But still not one of my favourite outfits, but her makeup looked nice that day.

[patricia]

Her style is what she wore before access to the Black Amex. She chose those clothes according to her tastes, so that is her true style.  She may now have access to stylists and designers but no one can erase the fact that unless everything is carefully choreographed and set up, this woman can't putll it off on her own.

[Barrie]

I think Mary before she met Fred had the kind of style that many modern women do, working casual. Alot of J Crew, Banana Republic, GAP and H&M. She looks better in casual clothing, it is with couture she struggles.

[patricia]

I agree, but also Barrie, in Banana Republic and even Gap and J Crew, there are many nicer, more upmarket clothes, especially in Banana Republic - but Mary didn't go for most of that.  Remember something so basic as combining that black dress with ugly brown shoes for that wedding or something she went to with Fred?  

[Barrie]

Mary was living in the one of the most expensive parts of one of the most expensive cities in the world. Maybe she spent all her money on rent? Obviously it was more important to have the address not the clothes.

[Eliza]

Mary was living in the one of the most expensive parts of one of the most expensive cities in the world. Maybe she spent all her money on rent? Obviously it was more important to have the address not the clothes.

But, didn't she have flatmates?

[Hester]

Mary was living in the one of the most expensive parts of one of the most expensive cities in the world. Maybe she spent all her money on rent? Obviously it was more important to have the address not the clothes.

Don't like to contradict you Barrie, but she was near Bondi Junction, and nowhere near the sea, not Bronte or Woollahra! She was in a downmarket share house in the cheapest part of the eastern suburbs. Her rent will have been $150-$175 a week for a room at the time, out of a salary of $800 a week in the hand.  I've lived variously in Elizabeth Bay, Bronte, Woollahra, Rose Bay and Vaucluse and never on a high income!

Hes

[Barrie]

She made $800 a week, that is very good coin, but I have read and been told that Sydney is a very very expensive city to live in. Anyways, her clothes were very middle range, nothing too fancy. Did she have a car?

[Sunny]

I think Mary before she met Fred had the kind of style that many modern women do, working casual. Alot of J Crew, Banana Republic, GAP and H&M. She looks better in casual clothing, it is with couture she struggles.

H&M (yes, well the Austrlian equivalent as H&M is not in Aus to my knowledge)... but trust me, pre-Freddums Mary's clothes were not even the quality (not close) to Crew, Banana Republic and the Gap.  They were nasty, nasty, nasty and nary a natural fibre in the collection.  Just look at the Starmaker Outfits and the shoes....yikes (salmon vinyl, turquouise vinyl...).  And remember, for Starmakers she was dressed up !!

[Sunny]

I agree, but also Barrie, in Banana Republic and even Gap and J Crew, there are many nicer, more upmarket clothes, especially in Banana Republic - but Mary didn't go for most of that.  Remember something so basic as combining that black dress with ugly brown shoes for that wedding or something she went to with Fred?  

Patricia, I believe the infamous outfit to which you refer was what she came up with for the Melbourne Cup one year when she dragged Freddy there to let everyone know 'she had made it'. Truth be told, the only way they got the invite was on the condition she show up with the European Royal.  The outfit was a disaster. It was funereal and dark, and black and brown...  It has been reported that she actually consulted a stylist to pull this one off.  Good grief.  What I found interesting about it was despite the horrid colours, it was clear she was trying to restrain her inner bogan. Her first inclination would have been to wear a revealing slutty sundress of some sort and with the brown-black choice she thought she was being the model of decorum as well as style.  You are 100% correct :  the woman has no style (or class) - never did, never will.

Money can't buy you class or style.  Money can however buy your familiy real estate and kit houses in Tasmania.

[Hester]

It's an expensive city to live well in... she could have afforded a small car and parking isn't impossible in that street, but I don't think she had one.

[Barrie]

I know that outfit you are talking about. It was pure trash. So cheap looking, she looked completely out of place. That was the beginning of the, what is it that Australians say "looker me" act.

[Maria]

Don't forget the see-through dress - I know I won't.

You know, I don't consider myself a prude but that was just too much self-promotion for my taste.