Ho, ho, ho, it’s all go in a santa sweater

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10 April 2012

Getting dressed on Christmas Day is a highly contentious task that's hedged with conventions and limitations, as well as numerous possibilities. Some prefer to stay comfortable in pyjamas but in doing so run the risk of offending a great-aunt, while others go all out on glitz to ensure that their outfit — much like the six-foot Santa in the garden of No 71 — acts as a landing beacon for incoming aircraft. For the rest of us, with Christmas morning comes the opportunity to don a Christmas jumper.

Having crept up the style stakes in recent years the humble Christmas jumper, be it detailed with reindeers, snowflakes or an eye-catching Fair Isle motif, is now a covetable fashion purchase. Once saved for computer geeks and boys plagued with the misfortune of being dressed by their mothers, the Christmas jumper found fame in the film adaptation of Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones's Diary and, in the years that followed, became a must-have for yuletide fancy dress parties. Now a staple item in the wardrobe of every Dalston hipster worth his Barbour jacket, festive sweaters have shaken off their novelty status this season and are all over the shops. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a store that isn't offering its own interpretation.

At one end of the spectrum there's D&G. Sending an Alpine-themed collection of reindeer and snowflake-detailed sweaters and knitted dresses down the catwalk earlier this year, Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce laid the foundation for this winter's biggest knitwear trend and guaranteed that even the most po-faced of fashion folk found themselves fawning over Fair Isle.

Similarly, Ralph Lauren included a rather eye-catching navy sweater bearing an oversized moose motif in his autumn/winter collection, while Tommy Hilfiger has created a host of snowflake-covered cardigans. On the high street, Zara and H&M are ahead of the pack when it comes to affordable festive sweaters, while the likes of Cath Kidston and Aubin and Wills have a number of more luxurious options.

Understandably a tricky trend to master should you not wish to spend the whole of Christmas Day as the butt of Uncle Whathisname's jokes, Christmas jumpers should be approached with a moderate level of caution. Teaming a printed sweater with an elegant skirt is a good way of ensuring that your look retains an element of sophistication — this season's leather minis look lovely worn with cropped sweater styles, while an oversized cardi works well with a pair of thick tights and shorts. For boys, a worn-in pair of jeans is a good option.

A word of warning, though. While wearing a Christmas jumper may now be thoroughly acceptable, it does come with its own set of restrictions: steer clear of anything that features appliqué or added sequin details and avoid like the plague anything that jingles — musical sweaters, my friends, have never been en vogue.

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