Top 5: Sex and the City Ready Cocktail Dresses

With all eyes turning to New York for the first fashion week of the season, it seems appropriate to look back to a phenomenon that captured the essence of the city that never sleeps.  Needless to say that in six series and two feature films, Sex and the City catalogued a vast collection of clothes and some looks have remained more infamous than others.  Inspired by the New York style icons Samantha, Miranda, Charlotte and Carrie, these dresses can be picked up on the high street today and all for under £50.

1. Samantha  – £45.00

Lauded for opinions and sex advice as colourful as her wardrobe, this dress is a modern homage to Samantha’s penchant for power dressing and block colours.  The bright yellow and black contrast detail makes this dress an inevitable talking point in any room; as Samantha was on numerous occasions in the Big Apple.

[image missselfridge.com]

2. Miranda – £38.00

Miranda’s slender figure and more tomboy tastes epitomised the iconic 90s supermodel style.  Sometimes graceful, sometimes questionable, Miranda’s preferred loose-fitting and often vibrantly-patterned clothes are reflected in this Warehouse dress.  The T shirt style combined with the graphic floral print offer a flattering and contemporary twist on Miranda’s look that is inevitably back with vengeance in the recent 90s revival.

[image warehouse.com]

3. Charlotte – £32.00

The most girly of the group, Charlotte’s pastels (wardrobe, house interior, etc…) are very prominent in all high street shops this spring.  Sweet and sugary, pale colours and floaty fabrics will hopefully make you feel more romantic and chirpy, even if the weather is a bit more Manchester than Manhattan.

[image topshop.com]

4. Carrie – £39.99

In the six years Sex and the City aired on TV, countless LBDs featured onscreen; a look synonymous with 90s New York chic.  This Zara dress characterises the minimalist 90s LBD trend.  Notorious for some questionable outfit combinations, to wear it à la Carrie, you could opt for a fluffy shawl, a diamanté duck-shaped clutch bag and some clumpy 90s sandals to complete your look.  If you’d rather not, that is understandable.

[image zara.com]

5. The tutu  – £45.00

At the start of every episode, there is Carrie in that infamous pink tutu.  Braless, in Times Square, and soaked as a passing bus turns a puddle into a tidal wave, this disaster would make it up there as the worst moment of anyone’s week (all too familiar for those who make the treacherous walk down Oxford Road on a rainy day).  This look, however, became synonymous with the series as a whole.  Apparently only bought for $5, the dress inadvertently became a huge success and even on the high street today there are tutu dresses imitating this legendary look.  NB – just remember to avoid any puddles.

[image misselfridge.com]