Emma Watson is Glamour’s Best Dressed of 2011

Harry Potter Star Jumps 9 Places to Beat Cheryl Cole to 1st Place

It is that time of year again, the June issue of Glamour magazine has hit the shelves and with it the 2011 best dressed list and it seems that, this year, young women in the UK have fallen out of love with Cheryl Cole. The Girls Aloud singer whose star ascended when she became a judge on the X-Factor has been knocked off the top spot by Harry Potter actress, Emma Watson.  Some might argue that as Cole attempts to take on the US it is a case of out of sight, out of mind, but perhaps Watson’s  laid back college girl style, favouring jeans and trench coats in her downtime, is something that young women in the UK find easier to identify with and to imitate.

With no surprises on the worst dressed list, Katie Price and Lady Gaga topping the poll, the other big story this year is the inclusion of six year old Suri Cruise at number 21. Cruise, who caused controversy again this week when she was spotted boarding a plane in high heels, is just another example of an increasing trend of children being marketed as style icons for adults.  Earlier this year eight year old Romeo Beckham made number 26 on the GQ magazine best dressed list, while website Fashionista has developed somewhat of an obsession with ten year old Willow Smith.

Some might argue that is all just harmless fun, while publications such as the Daily Mail point out the potential harmful impact it may have on the children concerned being ‘sexualised’ at such a young age. What no one is saying, though, is what it says about the adults who are voting children on best dressed lists and the obsession with youth in 21st century society.  A lot has been said in the media in the last ten years about the pressure on young women to conform to an unrealistic body ideal, but how more unrealistic can you get than the 21st best dressed ‘woman’  being six years old?

To a certain extent the blame could be laid at the door of the luxury fashion industry and its focus on the extreme youth and the extremely thin.  Despite consistent public outcry, and a number of highly publicised anorexia deaths, there appears to be no sign of change and indeed the idea of the very young and the very thin as inherently stylish has become normalised to the extent that when in 2007 Marc Jacobs ran an ad campaign featuring, then thirteen year old, Dakota Fanning swamped in women’s clothes it passed by virtually unnoticed.

A lot of focus has been placed in recent years on the size of fashion models, but perhaps it is time consideration was given to their age, and that of media proclaimed ‘style icons’, and the fact that they are selling an unattainable ideal to a market of women decades older than themselves.