On the waterfront

If it’s early spring, it must be time to talk nautical, as in predominantly navy and white, the occasional enlivening use of bold red, the positively ubiquitous use of stripes, plus a few blazers and gold anchor buttons thrown in for good measure. So much for the traditional take on nautical, a take you can adopt with ease and success, should you wish (and you probably have all the pieces waiting in your wardrobe, ready to go).

But nautical is so much more fun, and oh so much more chic, than that. At least it should be. It’s no wonder we don’t ever want to dispense with the nautical look as it is a shortcut to easy luxe. We can look assured and well put together, even though it may well be that the closest we have come to a Sunseeker yacht is a wooden rowboat on the River Nidd.

However, the most exciting aspect of the nautical trend is that it can be reinterpreted each year so that it emerges shiny and new and contemporary for each season. It’s really very clever.

There is something about the design simplicity of basic nautical that makes it so good at adapting to new themes. For example, a major theme for the coming spring and summer is block colour, as in key pieces in one statement colour blocked up against a piece in another statement colour, creating a graphic, modern art feel. Well, with nautical, you’re already halfway there. Just take an all-navy round-neck top, for example, and team with a block colour red skirt and a white jacket (or red jacket, navy skirt, white top, and so on), for a super-sleek take on nautical that’s bang up to date. Add a huge tote bag in nude leather, and you’re a walking spring/summer style statement.

Balenciaga’s key nautical look, incidentally, is a crisp white shirt over a pair of bright red shiny shorts, topped off with a slim-lapelled gleaming black tux. So easy, so effective. Slim red jeans would work too, it offers, in fact, one of the few sensible ways to wear red trousers of any kind.

Another way to do nautical this season is to toughen it up by going for black, rather than navy, and quite a few High Street brands have black and white dresses and tops to assist with this. In place of a navy blazer, try a leather jacket instead, blazer style rather than biker style, although blouson styles can work. White jeans are perfect for nautical.

Then there’s vintage nautical. Vintage is major for this spring and summer, and nautical does it very well, as Prada demonstrates with its lovely silk pleated navy and white stripe skirts topped with silk stripe vest tops, for a languid 1920s tennis girl feel. Again the nude bag is key.

So, whether you like your nautical sporty, vintage, sleek or tough, it’s all aboard.