Summer is here! Old-school glam, bold colours and graphic prints take centre stage in our fashion-focused edition of Wanted

Ed’s letter | Forever in blue jeans

I’ve been a Wanted reader since the magazine’s inception 17 years ago, primarily because my parents have always been Business Day subscribers. Long before I worked in the group and had access to its glossy pages, my mum would put their copy aside for when I next swung by.

I’d get a text from her informing me of its arrival. One from years ago, we still talk about. It read, “Wanted is here. The fashion is weird. There are men with jeans on their heads.”

Now, because my mum will definitely read this, I have to be clear — Jenny Buitendach is a very chic lady. She has never seen a Breton stripe she didn’t like and rocks her box-white Stan Smiths, a Burberry trench, a nice pair of boyfriend jeans and pearls. She does classic, casual Wasp well. And I can tell you with certainty that my fashion sensibility comes straight from her closet — the red lipstick, the tweed jacket (it literally was hers, till I nabbed it), the shirt dresses — all 100% Jen genetics at play.

She’s also quick to make short shrift of something she’s not keen on. The men with jeans as turbans (they were also wearing denim too, for context) were a case in point. “It’s fashion,” I said. “Rubbish!” she replied.

But Jenny is no fool. She’s well aware that fashion is sometimes trailblazing, conceptual, and edgy, and I know she absolutely appreciates it. She knows that what seems totally outlandish now will be de rigueur tomorrow. After all, this is the person who introduced me to Mary Quant and Yves Saint Laurent as a kid; she’s well versed in the ever-morphing sartorial universe. Hell, she even put up with my wearing steel-toed Caterpillar boots as a teenager. But that doesn’t mean she has to like it.