Style Is Everything.

By Karen and Erica

How should women of our era dress in 2025? Our answer: In anything that makes them feel elegant.  Anything that expresses their style.

We looked around to see what some of the fashionistas who have us on their radars had to say about what they find elegant and stylish.

Vanessa Friedman, who has been the fashion director and chief fashion critic for The New York Times since 2014, has it right. When thinking about whether she would wear a tuxedo-shorts jumpsuit with which she was initially quite taken, she realized she would not–not because she might not look good in it, but because it does not express who she is now. 

Personally, I feel like my years have been hard won, and experience is worth wearing. Which means I have said goodbye to clothes I generally associate with my youth: hemlines above my knees (especially attached to skater and rah-rah skirts), tops that show off my belly button, ruffles, slip dresses. Anything, really, that takes me sliding down a wormhole into an era when I was a much less formed person, or one that I lived through once already. That has as much to do with personal associations as it does with actual years.

In an earlier article, she noted that it can be difficult to find clothes that work for our ages and shapes. As she put it, fashion has a two-faced relationship with age–older designers creating clothes for the younger who have ruled that world since forever..

Add the shrinking spending power of the employment-challenged younger generation, and fashion’s sudden embrace is shaping up to be a bona fide trend.

But while it’s one thing to pay lip (and advertising) service to the importance of the mature market, it’s another thing entirely to design for it. And the truth is, catwalks are still speckled by short skirts and skinny trousers, the sheer and the sleeveless.

To us, style is key. We adhere to Yves Saint Laurent’s dictate:  Fashion fades, style is eternal. Style also includes so much more than clothing. Style is everything about a person, and is specific to each person:

Style is important, often undervalued because it is so widely misunderstood. Style is what we really want when we say we want to be fashionable. Style delights because it is always fresh, is a little ode to creativity and novelty. It gives a hint of personality. always a little excursion into self-expression. It is a reflection of your unique complexity as a human being.

More than anything, style is more than mere clothes. For one thing, it takes less in the way of clothes to express style than you might think. Style is a little excursion into self-expression through clothes. It is self-knowledge and self-confidence expressed through what you choose to wear, a life-affirming expression of your character and spirit.

We are in accord, and we think that as we get older we know better and better how we want to express ourselves, and more and more about how to manifest that expression.  But we also like to play with fashion, and consider how we might import fashion ideas that are new to us. We enjoyed reading about interviews of several over 60 fashion bloggers by the Wall Street Journal’s fashion editors. They all agreed women like us should wear what feels right, and should not be bound by conventional views of what women our age should wear:

“Ignore the coastal grandma shizzle,” declared Alyson Walsh, 61, the Londoner behind the blog That’s Not My Age of the pressure to look younger. “If it fits with your personal style, wear the sweater vest!” 

And they also had a few specific ideas. 

• Let necessity work for you. If you need eyewear–make it great. (Karen follows this advice religiously when it comes to sunglasses and readers.)
• A black dress and a jacket hide all sins. (And, in our view, go everywhere, just as they always have.) 
• Boot cut jeans, or barrel styles, are more flattering than skinny jeans. (Maybe true for everyone?)
• Get a really good haircut.
• Strong shouldered blazers send the right message.
• Flat shoes. Including Chuck Taylors. (Yayyy!)
• Bright lipstick. (We’re working in this.)

Other stylists have similar thoughts. One advocates for her definition of chic.

In order to be chic, one must embrace age with confidence and drown out negativity. It’s as much about who you are, as your authentic self, as it is about the clothes you wear. “[Chic] is one of the easiest, and most easily maintained fashion styles one can opt for,” etiquette expert, lifestyle consultant, and founder of Etiquette Expert Jo Hayes exclusively tells Women. “Including and especially, as one matures.”

Chic often means classic.

Anything that could have been worn just as easily in 1960 as it can be worn today is something worth putting your classic capsule collection. “Classic is always in style, and with this classic capsule wardrobe, one can stay stylish and chic, no matter the season or current fashion,” says Hayes. “One can style as is, or add a piece that is on-trend with a current-season color or item.”

We like fashionistas that understand now is our time to be bold. And to blend timeless with a touch of today.

Big patterns, bold colors.

First, let’s toss the old “rules” and expectations for how a 60+ woman should dress. Those days are over—it’s time to live out loud! Love florals? Go for a print with full blooms. A fan of pink? Skip the safe pastels and live a little in bright magenta. Our Stylist’s advice: “Have fun showing your true colors + personality with bold prints.” In short: take up space with styles that say, I’m here!

The point is–by the time you are a Lustre Lady, you know what you are doing, you are fearless, and you have no-one to impress but yourself. 

What do you wear that best expresses your style?