I've dressed the Princess of Wales and Daisy Edgar-Jones – here are my style tips

Telegraph

17-05-2025

Although she's sponsoring a garden at this year's Chelsea Flower Show, Clare Hornby, founder of Me+Em, doesn't have much time to plunge her hands into the soil.
However, she knows a thing or six about dressing for al fresco events and the UK's rich and varied summer season in general. That's why a growing number of high profile women have come to rely on the brand for exactly this, among them Lady Starmer, Claudia Winkleman, Ruthie Rogers, the Princess of Wales and her mother Carole Middleton, the Duchess of Edinburgh, Lupita Nyong'o, Katie Holmes, Gugu Mbatha-Raw (in her black tuxedo on several occasions), Phoebe Dynevor and Daisy Edgar-Jones.
As someone who almost always wears trousers, but has a business selling clothes to women who want (plenty of) other choices, Hornby has adopted an analytical approach to dressing up. Not coincidentally, occasionwear – once considered a fuddy-duddy concept – has become an increasingly important part of Me+Em's business – quite the evolution for a label that began 15 years ago as a source of loungewear but grew by offering a more sophisticated repertoire of designs. Perhaps we're not such a nation of sloppy dressers after all.
She's an obsessive cruncher of data, not just the hard numbers of what's selling and what isn't, but of the more intimate, nuanced feedback loop from customers who come into her stores. I'm intrigued to discover how she's cracked some of the more subtle demands baked into our social gatherings. 'Dress codes really throw a lot of people,' she says.
Weddings and Royal Ascot can be particularly intimidating because of ideas around propriety. People want to look the part without feeling they're cosplaying. Arms are a great bugbear. 'Some women really want to hide them. Others want to show them off.' One of Hornby's answers to all these conundrums is to play with transparency – just a hint. 'Lace or chiffon, or a sheer sleeve can all look very demure and pretty without being too covered.'
Lace blue shirt, £175 and Lace blue A-line midi skirt, £225, Me+Em
A grail of modern dressing, it seems to me, is an air of effortlessness. No one wants to look overdone – the blowsy blowdry, obvious make-up, trussed up, ill-at-ease discomfort are the antithesis of everything many stylish women aspire to. Yet some interpretations of effortlessness seem ridiculously effortful.
'Playing with different textures is a big part of putting together an outfit that looks elevated but not overthought.'
Not wearing heels if you don't want to is another key to effortlessness. 'I've broken both knees over the years, so I'm obsessed with footwear comfort,' says Hornby. 'We're playing with the fancy flat – a square-toed ballerina because it's flattering and doesn't squash the toes – and a comfortable heel in cork.'
Suede square toe ballerina flat, £295, Me+Em; Cork platform heel, £295, Me+Em
'Spend time pinning down those understated but perfect pieces,' says Hornby. Get them right and they're a library you can repeatedly go back to without too much thought.
'Everything has to be spot on. The jersey T-shirt that drapes just right, the sleek tan bag that you can wear with everything, the blazer that's only slightly oversized so it doesn't look silly, the jacket with sleeves that will actually stay up when you push them up your arms.' To this end, she has a jacket for autumn with 'scrunch' built into the sleeves.
A former ad executive, Hornby is a dab hand at coining a tagline. Terms like 'Intelligent Design' and the three F's – flattering, functional, forever – are stitched into descriptions on the website. Forever is a particularly bold promise, especially when you're essentially mining fashion – but an important idea when people are spending a major chunk of their budget on occasionwear.
So, I'm curious to know whether she thinks brown – traditionally a winter colour (when it isn't being completely ignored, which it was for three decades) – is a keeper or a fizzler? Last year, Max Mara mixed it with white for summer, which looked both earthy and sophisticated. But now it's everywhere, including Me+Em, where it repeatedly sells out.
Jersey knot detail dress, £350, Me+Em
Linen blend trousers, £250, Me+Em; Leather crossbody bag, £325, Me+Em
'I reckon it's become a classic already,' she says. 'Once you start to explore the chocolate shades, you realise how great they are at grounding other colours. All those fashionable sorbets look beautiful with brown. Chocolate brown holds so many colours. Honestly, it's a game changer. We've contrasted it with orange, purple, black… For evening, it's lovely with gold jewellery or shoes. There's a shade for everyone, and obviously it's much less harsh than black or navy.
Jersey off the shoulder top, £85, Me+Em
'Also, fabrications have finally stepped up to meet it. In the past, unless you worked brown with satin or silk, or high-quality yarns, brown tended to look muddy or flat. We've been working with silk velvets, brushed cashmere and fabrics that have a subtle sheen to them. It's beautiful. I've got a brown jumpsuit that I'll wear to weddings with a brown velvet blazer. One of my other wardrobe anchors is a brown trouser suit which I enjoy wearing with matching nails.'
We were bound to get to tailoring sooner or later. It's the cornerstone of Hornby's own wardrobe after all. 'I love the idea of one suit you can wear to everything. If I were building a capsule summer event wardrobe, I'd always start with a suit, because it's so easy to build out from there. You can wear the blazer over dresses and the trousers with a crisp white shirt for a cool, evening look, or with a floral silk blouse.' She thinks she'll wear a flared trouser suit in poppy red – with a brown top.
Even in the early, more casual days of Me+Em, Hornby and her design team consistently tweaked the trousers, essentially becoming a lab intent on making trousers as flattering for as many body types as possible. That you would never know she has short legs is testimony to their success.
What works for her? Raised waistbands. 'They're generally good on most women, with or without a bust.'
If you examine many of Me+Em's dresses through the seasons, you'll notice they too have slightly raised waistlines. One of the many reasons for the brand's success is that once perfected, the same shapes reappear each season in different fabrics. And yes, florals are still selling, but the prints this summer are more botanical.
Silk hydrangea print dress, £495, Me+Em
Peach is proving phenomenally popular both as a background colour and as a solid. This may surprise you if you had it down as a no go for most Caucasian skin. 'In fact,' says Hornby, 'peach is one of those unicorn universal colours that suits everyone. It's unbelievably popular this summer' – possibly because customers are taking advice from the Me+Em sales advisors and teaming it with brown.
Tailored front pleat trouser, £225, Me+Em; Lightweight tailored waistcoat, £195, Me+Em
Finally, I want to know her biggest challenge to getting dressed up? 'I'm a northerner. I have a big fear of the cold,' she says. 'It bugged me for years.'
Then the solution came to her – a cropped shearling cape that elongates legs, works over any silhouette, and doesn't crush your sleeves. 'It's an on-off piece,' says Hornby, meaning it's easy to flip in and out of. The slits allow you to show off the sleeves of whatever you're wearing underneath. 'I wore it to my stepson's wedding last year and sold about ten that day. We've brought it back for summer. It looks cool whether you wear it under tailoring or something.'
Shearling cape, £695, Me+Em
It's one of those high-priced items that Me+Em keeps in the mix because its customers recognise a piece they'll return to for years.
For autumn, they'll be doing another version – in none other than chocolate brown.