The Sharp Peplum

There is structure in everything you put on. A padded shoulder that ends on the bone, a seam nipped at the waist, a skirt in bonded crepe that holds its own shape whether or not you are in it, a bag that stands up on the floor by itself. You do not wear clothes so much as get into them, and you are the only person on this list who owns a garment with boning in it.

This is the most flattering year of the six and everybody knows it. A hard shoulder squares a body in a photograph, a hip seam does work no drape can do, and the covered platform under the toe buys you two hours of standing that a bare stiletto will not. When you walk into a room where the dress code was unclear, you are the one who read it correctly.

What you will not want to hear: the whole silhouette is engineered, and engineering shows its age faster than cut does. The bonded fabric that made those shapes possible has gone hard and slightly shiny in your closet, and the proportion now reads as a person going somewhere important rather than a person at ease. Everyone else on this list can go to lunch in their year. You have to change first.