Mothers of style

Fashion has conquered the final frontier: the school run.

The jam-smeared, tooth-grindingly repetitive yet endlessly chaotic routine of delivering children to school — surely, and this is saying something, one of the least glamorous moments of family life — is having a Fashion Moment.

Magazine features explaining how to wear the latest trends frequently offer photographs of Elle Macpherson rocking the of-the-moment look while dropping her sons at school while some of the first sightings of this year's hot Balenciaga patchwork tote were of Claudia Schiffer sporting it on the morning school run. The hot-mummy-on-the-school-run snap is to 2010 what the celebrity baby bump photograph was to 2005.

Lessons in style

At this point, I should admit that I am entirely unqualified to write about school-run chic. I canvassed opinion from friends inside and outside the fashion industry in an attempt to define the rules of engagement that apply to fashion's newest playing field.

School-gate fashion is very much an arena in which women dress to impress each other. Just as you would be hard-pressed to find a single man with an opinion on whether tunics or wrapdresses are the more chic choice for a third trimester, the school gates remain an overwhelmingly female world.

I am, as I mentioned, barely fit to comment on this topic but I have noticed that wearing gym gear to the school run will often attract comment, usually of the self-effacing, "Oh-you're-going-running-aren't-you-good-I'm-so-lazy" ilk — even from women who regularly run half-marathons.

There is, it seems, a natural female tendency to compare and contrast, and to find oneself lacking. My friend Annabel Boyde, who recently moved from London to Oxfordshire, says her west London school run was "a complete nightmare. Everyone made friends only with other people on their fashion level — so if you didn't wear the uniform of Seven jeans and a gilet, no one really took any notice of you, except for the other people wearing the wrong clothes and without decent highlights."

Marker of status

At the school gate, as elsewhere, clothes express your tribe and your status — where you fit in, in other words. Another friend, Juliet Kinsman, editor-in-chief of the swish Mr & Mrs Smith hotel guides, finds that "if you look too groomed, you alienate the stay-at-home mums and miss out on the morning-coffee camaraderie. But I definitely get taken more seriously by the nursery staff on days where I'm dressed up for work. So if I've got something to discuss, I save it for when I look smart."

My friend Frankie was 37 when her first child started school "but it was still a little like I was the new girl myself and wanted the other cool girls to like me and want to be my friend. I did get to know one mother because I complimented her on her jacket and could identify the label — and we still enjoy a fashion chat."

Highlighting a divide

As another friend, a very stylish and high-powered fashion executive, put it to me, "what the dress code does is highlight the divide between stay-at-home mothers and working mothers. It's a visual representation as to who does what — high heels versus Converse. But really, who cares? Being a good mum is what matters and those come in all kinds of packages. We should give each other a break."

Wise words. But the fashion police, it seems, is everywhere. Jodie, who lives in a small town well outside the M25, categorises her playground cliques thus: "The most obvious is the working Yummy Mummy [YM]. She's just that little bit slicker and expensive-looking with a designer court shoe and a ‘proper' handbag.

"Then there's the gym-bunny YM, kitted out in the most recent Stella for Adidas pieces. There is Boho YM, although these days it's less about Uggs and tasselled scarves than Isabel Marant suede booties and Edun. And finally there's I'm-not-a-YM-YM, who is really playing it down in boyfit jeans and sweatshirt-style tops. But don't be fooled — the jeans are Made in Heaven, the top is double-faced cashmere."

Nor is school-gate fashion the territory of the private-school mummy. The school Jodie describes is in the state sector but she recently attended an open day for her son's next school, which is fee-paying, "and suddenly, trends were not evident at all.

"Most of the mothers looked like a ‘before' makeover pic — old-jigsaw-style floral bias-cut skirts and baggy cardigans."

Comfy crowd

Not every school culture has fashion rules. Nicola Rose, creative and fashion director of Red, says there are "no fashion fireworks at my school gates. I am in the minority, being a working mum, so all the other mums look relaxed and comfy while I hobble in a Marni ensemble."