This is a big decision. Huge. How you feel when you step out of your door, pretty much every time you leave the house for the next six months, is riding on the choice you make here. I mean, no pressure, but you need to get this right.
A good coat is a winter gamechanger. There is a coat out there that will not just make a cold day bearable, but will actually make wrapping up to go out into the cold seem appealing. There is something very satisfying about being in the elements when you are properly dressed for them. You will start suggesting a walk before lunch, rather than skulking out of the room when someone else does.
But warm and dry is merely our baseline here. The right coat is very much more than that. It is a whole mood. As with a spritz of your favourite scent, it has you leaving the house in a cloud of confidence, your mood lifted and your chin up. And the mood of your coat matters, because for most of the people you meet in the colder months, your coat constitutes your first impression. When you walk up to a reception desk, or open the door of a restaurant, or turn up to school for a parent-teacher evening, your coat tells people who you are.
So you need to balance practical considerations with a coat that makes you happy. There is absolutely no point buying an elegant, white dry-clean-only trenchcoat that makes you feel like a movie star if you have a muddy dog or cycle to work. But equally, there is zero point spending your hard-earned cash on a drearily practical easy-care number that kills the style of your outfits stone dead and lowers your shoulders to a slump the moment you put it on. If you’re going to do that, you may as well stay home.
Weatherproofing matters, obviously. If you are a hardy walk-to-work-even-in-driving-rain type, you need a generous hood and a water-repellant fabric. If you spend a lot of the day outside you will want something along the lines of the Uniqlo coat (above right): thick padding, a high neck to keep out the chill without a scarf, the extra draught protection of a drawstring waist.
But the warmest coat isn’t always the most practical. A lot depends on the clothes you wear underneath. If your go-to winter outfit is a chunky, roll-neck bum-length knit and jeans, an open-neck jacket style – something along the lines of our gorgeous pre-loved pillarbox-red Acne shearling number (above left) – might be perfect.
On the other hand, if you are most often to be found in a floaty midi-length dress, adding tights and boots as the temperature drops, you will need a coat that is also below the knee or midi-length – for neater hemlines and to keep your legs warm. Oh, and two layers of structured shoulders won’t work. It looks lumpy and feels stiff and uncomfortable. So if you spend your days in suits, you need something warm but not rigid: a camel coat – such as the Mango one (above centre), which is very close to Max Mara’s iconic version – is perfect.
Colour is where you can have some fun, so don’t automatically play it safe. If you tend to wear black or neutrals, that makes you the perfect candidate for a coat in a pop of bright red or pink. It’s not going to clash with your outfit, after all.
And a colour that feels too shouty and intense to wear for a whole day can work beautifully in a coat. It becomes a shot of energy, a superhero cloak for when you need it most – at the beginning and end of the day – and it can be hung on the back of a door for the hours in between, so you don’t get sick of looking at it.
If a bright colour is too much, what about a softer neutral? Camel looks excellent with black, and even better with a bright scarf and gloves when winter starts to feel festive.
Any old coat can keep you toasty. But the right coat will make you feel warm on the inside, too.
