What is Elegance?

The 19^th of August marked the legendary Coco Chanel’s birthday, a woman who embodied elegance. Which got me thinking, what makes someone elegant? And what does it actually mean?

The Oxford English Dictionary defines elegance as “the quality of being graceful and stylish in appearance or manner”. It describes something that is somewhat intangible and elusive. Importantly, elegance is not just about what you wear, but how you wear it and how you behave while doing so.

It’s telling that when we talk about elegance, we often cite icons from the past, rather than our contemporaries. There are a number of incomparable men and women who practically embody the word (Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, James Mason, Katharine Hepburn… I could go on) but there are plenty of modern examples too – you just have to look for them. And many of these are ‘older’ women:  Joanna Lumley, Catherine Deneuve, Aung San Suu Kyi. In fact, designer Bruce Oldfield once said that elegance comes with age: women in their 50s and 60s wear “simple good quality clothes… they just get it right”.

But modern life is not exactly conducive to appearing, or behaving, elegantly. It is all about comfort and convenience. Eating on our sofas in front of the television (and not engaging in meaningful conversation as a result). Table manners are also neglected – are there such things as sofa manners? 

And it’s not just at home. You see it on the street, every day. People hunched over phones not paying attention to where they’re going (never mind the traffic). Food is available everywhere, at any time of the day or night, which means we are subjected to appalling manners and pungent smells on the street or on public transport. It’s not a pretty picture, is it?

Now I’m not suggesting we return to the stiff formality of years gone by. But in these uncertain and divisive times, wouldn’t it be nice to restore a bit of old-school propriety?  A bit of elegance? I think there are a few simple steps we can all take, women and men, to up our elegance stakes. Here are my six:

1. Wear clothes that fit properly as without a good fit, you will never achieve elegance. 
2. Keep it simple, less is usually more.
3. Think about ‘polish’ rather than ‘flash’, covering yourself in designer logos does not suggest elegance, in fact it indicates the opposite.
4. You don’t have to be dressed up to the nines to look elegant, a crisp white shirt and dark jeans often does the trick.
5. Always be gracious, courteous, kind and pleasant.
6. Retain an air of mystery, don’t reveal everything (literally and figuratively).