Please. Even Twiggy looks embarrassed in that paisley kaftan
Back in 2008, I hit the shops with an unlikely style guide: Stuart Rose, the then boss of M&S. I had taken him to task over what I saw as the shop's lack of stylish clothing; he, with inimitable panache, proved me wrong. I left the central London store a convert. But were I to take M&S's latest campaign as my guide, there's no way I'd be stepping back through those doors.
Shot in Miami, in lurid Technicolor, it features the "M&S girls" (as they are chummily known) ? Twiggy, Lisa Snowdon, VV Brown, Dannii Minogue and model Ana Beatriz Barros ? vogueing all over the place in a series of horrible outfits.
Twiggy has been dressed in a garish paisley gown that looks as though it comes from the Benidorm costume department (plus she has a slightly terrifying look on her face ? perhaps she feels the same as me about the clothes); VV Brown is in a shapeless jumpsuit with an unflatteringly low crotch. If she can't pull this look off, there's no hope for the rest of us. Many of the M&S ranges have much better stuff on offer ? especially the Limited Collection, where I found a fantastic graphic-print shift dress just last week ? so why use these ones?
The "M&S girls" ads have been part of the store's "Your M&S" rebrand since 2004, and they have generally been astonishingly successful: in 2005, three items worn by Twiggy, Erin O'Connor and Laura Bailey sold out in three weeks. But in their increasingly irritating quest for quirkiness (Peter Kay as a long-haired dance teacher in the Christmas 2010 clip was just plain disturbing, while seeing Twiggy throw shapes by a swimming pool in the latest one is like watching your drunk Aunt Doris at a family wedding), I'd argue that the ads have lost sight of what they're meant to be showcasing: clothes you'd actually want to be seen in.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/apr/03/marks-and-spencer-adverts-stop
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