Change the 'Speak'

If you follow me on twitter @MakeDoStyle or fashion journalist doyenne Hilary Alexander @HilaryAlexander you will know we have a pet hate at the moment mainly the use of cliches. Hilary has for years been a real hoot when tweeting about Strictly Come Dancing and the X Factor. Many a Saturday night I have had to send her a tweet simply saying 'Hilary!' when she has shown appreciation of good looks and muscles of the male dancers or contestants.

The lovely Hilary Alexander

After enjoying Skyfall on Saturday evening I managed to catch up on the Strictly tweets having missed it and caught the end of X Factor when low and behold one of the judges uttered the immortal words 'you owned it' in reference to a contestant's song choice. Ugh, in fact triple ugh!

Of course I tweeted my disdain and right back at me Hilary added 'you nailed it'. There are so many X Factor speak cliches it is untrue. Last year when I still loved X Factor and the year before lots of us used to play hashtag xfactorbingo (I haven't completely mastered the Mac yet and don't know how to do the hashtag symbol!).

But the real point of this post is to out dreadful fashion speak. Hilary tweeted me the next day to suggest that while we are on the subject of appalling X Factor speak maybe it wouldn't harm to bin a few fashion speak horrors as well, namely 'statement necklace', 'hero jacket', and 'power cardigan'. Let's face it fashion journalism is awash with tired lazy cliches and many fashion bloggers ape the speak too.

Top of my list  of fashion speak to go would be 'versatile' (I am guilty of this one), 'team with', 'modern twist' and  'off duty' plus a whole host of adjectives like playful and decedent preceding the garment concerned. It would require a lot more thought to write a piece!

What fashion speak would you bin?