Outfit Saving Coats For When Your Morning Has Gone To Shit

My alarm didn’t go off yesterday morning.

I blinked myself into existence in the dark, already suspicious that I hadn’t been rudely awoken by the ‘peaceful’ bird song of my Lumie Alarm, and grappled around blindly for my glasses. As soon as I popped them on I saw the time just ticking over to 7am, one hour later than our usual wake-up call and only 30 mins before Keiran was due to set off for work.

We shuffled and grumbled and lamented the loss of our morning cup of tea and TV session, before Keiran got up and went to get ready for work. I, on the other hand, struggled to even lift my head off of the pillow, and spent the next 20 minutes drifting in and out of snoozes, partially dreaming and partially aware that I couldn’t let myself suddenly switch off and wake up at 11am.

It was just one of those mornings, you know? After dragging myself out of bed and rushing to get ready and out of the house for my usual Monday morning coffee and work session, I dropped everything I could drop, left everything in a mess and battled with an unsightly series of spots which I had unwittingly fake tanned the night before and turned a beautiful deep brown. My hair looked crap, the bags under my eyes were heavier than the guilt I felt for not eating anything other than bread, pizza and biscuits the day before, and I certainly didn’t have time to consider my outfit.

I’ve never been a night-before outfit planner, but I do usually allow myself the 10 minute luxury of grabbing a couple of things from my rail and lying them out on my bed to visualise. I might even have a scroll back through my own Instagram feed to inspo myself up if I’m feeling generous with time, but yesterday morning was not one of those mornings. Yesterday morning I grabbed the first two things I saw and then completed my look the way any true busy girl would - with a giant coat and a scarf that was wrapped around the bottom banister of my staircase.

Coat - ASOS*

Scarf - New Look via ASOS*

Jumper - Topshop*

Trousers - Topshop*

Shoes - Zara

Bag - Gucci

Sunglasses - Ray-Ban*

Coats are my ‘oh-shit-I’m-late’ saviour (that and hats, but you guys know that by now). Whether I’ve spent 45 minutes frantically trying to decide which white slogan t-shirt is going to look best with my blue jeans, or I’ve woken up late and I’m on the cusp of missing my irritatingly overpriced train into London, chucking a big coat over the top of my ensemble always makes me feel as if I have my shit together. And as a petite girl, there’s something even more enchanting about a coat that is seemingly too big for me. When it comes to outerwear, bigger is better, and I’m particularly partial to something that can be belted in the middle and give off the air of a very important magazine editor darting between meetings (not sure the sight of me basically running to my local coffee shop in Ipswich is going to fool anyone in this manner, but worth a go).

Honouring my barely-made-it-out-of-the-door morning, I thought I’d pull together a quick edit of the best the high street has to offer in terms of outfit saving coats. I often get questions regarding outerwear for those of us who are vertically challenged, so rest-assured if you’re a petite girl too, all of the pieces in this edit are items I either own and so know don’t drag along the floor, or are items I would bag for myself if my pockets were chucking up more than some rusty old change.

Don’t be shy of maxi lengths if you are a petite girl however; I know that there is often this ‘dressing rule’ perpetuated in glossies and style how-to guides that suggests oversized coats will make us look smaller than we are, and the truth is, for the most part they do. They also look elegant as fuck, however, and there’s nothing wrong with looking short when you are indeed short. If I spent my life trying to make my legs look longer, I’d be stuck in high-waisted black skinnies and my wardrobe would be left barren of awkward culottes, so as always, dress for your style and not your ‘shape’.

Nonetheless I hope you're all having a decent Tuesday my loves, and let me know if you’ve bagged any outfit-saving coats of late that I’ve missed off of the list. A girl can never have too many maxi robes, right?

Until next time x