Today's
Telegraph had an article on the wearability of turbans:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fashion/main.jhtml?xml=/fashion/2007/01/17/efturban17.xml
Heads you lose…
A turban might work on the catwalk, but it's harder to pull off in the real world, says Bryony Gordon
There are times when it seems that fashion is playing a big joke on us. Boiler suits, puffball skirts, dungarees – it's hard to imagine that designers actually believed mere mortals could look good in these.
Now it seems there is another strikingly odd – but very "in" – item to add to that list: the turban. Yes, the turban. Now I love hats, and even the silk-headscarf look, but I have my doubts about this one.
Did Miuccia Prada, whose Italian design house is responsible for this new "trend", sit down on a particularly dull day last year and think: "What preposterous item can we try out on the lemmings next season?" Perhaps not, as the turban appeared on Prada's spring/summer catwalk as part of a multicultural theme, with other eastern and oriental references.
But, cruelly, it seems to be the accessory that stuck out. Even Ralph Lauren, who is renowned for preppy clothing, has produced a version of the turban for this season.
The look is also on its way to the high street, with H&M including turbans in its spring collection. And the news last week that Elizabeth Hurley has ordered all of her male guests at her upcoming wedding to wear the headwear has surely served only to fuel the turban's fashion moment.
Let us give Prada – whose satin creations, priced from £255, I have been loaned to try out – the benefit of the doubt. A turban could potentially lend me an exotic quality that I am otherwise sadly lacking. It could be very Biba, very Paris circa the 1940s, very Grace Kelly.
Alternatively, it could prompt my colleagues to sing the Smurfs theme tune, while squealing with laughter. To be fair, the blue-purple version doesn't look great with blue jeans, pumps and a blue T-shirt.
"How about teaming it with clown shoes?" sniggers a colleague.
"Or an apron and a rolling pin?" guffaws another.
Infuriated, I retreat home to survey my wardrobe. Clearly, to carry off this accessory a little more outfit planning is required. I decide to keep things simple, wearing a black tunic dress over skinny jeans with a black mac – and I dump the blue Smurf turban in favour of a bright crimson version.
But my problems are far from over. How should I wear my hair? The back of the Prada design has a cheap and chavvy-looking baseball cap-style piece of elastic. Does this mean I should wear it with a ponytail? Surely that's just too silly. I decide, in the end, to wear my hair down.
My next problem is getting to grips with turban etiquette. Is it rude to keep one's turban on indoors? Is the turban, when stripped of religious significance, a practical item for keeping one's head warm, or a glamorous style accessory that should be shown off at all times? I plump for the latter, but end up feeling like one of those morons who wear their sunglasses in nightclubs.
Then I discover that with the turban pulled down over my ears, I can't hear anything. I am not so much blinded by fashion as deafened by it.
But the biggest problem of all is the fact that I look completely ridiculous.
In my own social circle I am a renowned attention-seeker, but even I am not looking forward to stepping out in this giant Marge Simpson-style headpiece. I will be laughed out of town. I will never be able to show my face in polite – or any other – society again.
"Nobody will notice if you walk confidently with your head held high," advises my flatmate, not particularly helpfully, because even if I wanted to walk with my head held high, I couldn't. The thing is too heavy, and the fact that my head is not turban-shaped makes wearing it uncomfortable. It is like having a towel wrapped around your head all day.
Yet on the Tube, not a single person bats an eyelid. I put this down to Londoners not engaging with each other, and being used to seeing crazy behaviour every day. However, my luck runs out on the escalators on the way out to the street.
"I really, really think you should take that hat thingy off," says an old man, and my cheeks burn with embarrassment.
At Oxford Circus, doing a spot of shopping, I am laughed at by tourists. This is not me being paranoid – they actually point and laugh at me. Ordering a latte at a coffee shop, the barista fails to hear my order because he is hypnotised by the shiny beacon on my head. At work, nobody takes me seriously.
Walking back to the tube in the evening, I take the scenic route, through darkly lit back streets and passageways – putting myself in danger seems preferable to putting up with the humiliation of being sniggered at again. Indeed, I actually start to fantasise about being mugged for the pricey turban. Alas, even muggers will not come near me.
I begin to pity the poor turban, wondering if it will have more luck when I meet my friends – some of whom work for style magazines – for a drink. Surely they will be impressed by my fashion-forward look?
But no. They ask me when Hilda Ogden became my style icon and why I'm in fancy-dress. And then – the icing on the cake – I'm told I look like "a vamped-up char lady".
The only good thing I have to say about the turban is that it might be useful to hide the effects of a bad hair day.
On balance, though, I think I'd opt for the bad hair. It might look good on supermodels and Sikhs, but for the rest of us – attention-seekers included – I feel the turban is a fashion trend best left alone.
I remember when I was a kid in the 90s' and everyone wore those jeweled "bindis" I would go to Toronto and there would be real Indian women with real bindis next to mini Gwen Stefanis, it was like huh? 
)
I just can't imagine my boss in his D&G t-shirt and a turban.
Karma
