Dawn O'Porter

BOB is a luxury brand. The prices are lower than designer prices but higher than high street. We sit on the cusp of paying proper money for excellent quality without having to charge thousands for a dress.

Chuck away all of those unsightly wire hangers that damage your clothes, and invest in some thicker wooden ones and some padded fabric ones for your more delicate pieces.

Got a zip that is catching and not running smoothly? It often happens with old metal zips but it doesn't always mean you should change it. Try running a candle along the teeth.

A lot of sites offer free postage over a certain amount and are pretty cool with you sending stuff back, if you do it within a particular time frame. However, occasionally some sites don't accept returns on vintage items, so make sure you know that before you spend your cash.

One thing you have to accept with vintage clothing is that is has very probably been worn before and will, by nature, be quite old. So small signs of wear and tear are normal, and that's just the way it goes.

Online vintage shopping is the best way to find something really unique with minimal effort.

If you can't afford the prices at one store, go to a store you can afford. There are plenty of options for all budgets in the vintage world.

Selecting what gets sold in smaller shops and online is a long and artful process, it takes precision and care. The people who stock the successful vintage shops are great buyers, and you pay for their skill as well as the quality level at which they sell their clothes.

I just want to clear something up... vintage doesn't mean cheap.

It was Yves Saint Laurent who realised the high-end design houses could make a lot more money if they sold more accessible clothing than the usual couture, when he opened his pret-a-porter store, Rive Gauche, in 1966.

Couture is also a term used for top-of-the-range, to-order clothing - but not to the level of intricacy and expense as haute couture. And without the 'haute', the word 'couture' itself isn't protected.

It really is the very top of the fashion world; nothing comes above haute couture. But not any old designer can create something magical and call it haute couture; the term is strictly protected for a very special few.

There are two things that I really love; vintage clothing and books. Mash the two together and I pretty much peak on personal joy levels.

If I buy anything for personal use or for BOB that has even the slightest hint of moth damage, I put it straight into the freezer for a few days. This might sound odd, but its the best and most efficient way to kill moth eggs.

My aunty used to dress windows on Bond Street in the 60s and my family were furriers by trade, talking to me about dress making, quality, the 60s and shops in general throughout most of my childhood.

Women of the 60s revolutionised fashion for us. They took the hem lines up so we could feel young, and free, and do things like run for a bus.

When someone has told me they have the 'world's worst knees' I've done all I can to find them a hem line that hides them. Luckily, as my shop is predominantly vintage, I have clothes from all decades and therefore pieces of all length.

Working in the shop has taught me how utterly ridiculous the female fear of knees is. It's a bloody knee. It's bone. We can't control our knees, our knees are not our fault. We cannot let this continue, we have to abandon this ridiculous new obsession and set the knee free.

More women have come out of the changing rooms slagging off their knees than any other body part. I recently developed a complex about my own knees, so I totally get it.

The British fashion industry had major players, Mary Quant and Biba to name but a few, who were making incredibly stylish and youthful clothing for a generation who didn't want to emulate their parents.

After the baby boom of the second world war 40% of the population were under 25, and it was London that realised they needed to be dressed for their age and state of mind.

Wiggle dresses today are certainly around, but variations have been made to make them more practical. A genuine wiggle really does make walking a challenge, so often you find them with a vent in the back so you can at least move your legs, or cut more like a pencil skirt.

So when people tell me that dressing curves is hard, I tell them to look to the 50s as there is an entire decade dedicated to it.

One of the big things that I have realised since styling people is was how many women, size 14 and above, think that covering up in lots of fabric is the best way to dress. I literally could not agree less.

In my opinion the essence of the 'wiggle' shape is one of the most flattering styles a woman can wear, and I urge you to give it a go even if it terrifies you.

When you lose your parents when you're a kid, you kind of get this freedom and sense of independence way younger. And obviously I wish my mum had never died but I like the way my life turned out because of who that turned me into.

There's a lot of criticism of brands getting involved with political messages, people sometimes don't like that, but I think it's really important. They have massive audiences and they have a huge reach.

I do think a lot of brands shy away from politics, and that's a shame. I want BOB to be political, despite us being a small independent company.

Love is something we should all be saying yes to. If you're willing to love someone then people should support that. In a world full of such hate and so much negativity, it feels like love is something we should all just be sharing.

Not every woman thinks that their mother is a nice person. I feel like when you really examine a woman's relationship with her mother, any child and their mother, you can really get to know them, because it's such an important relationship in your life and if it's not positive, that's something you definitely carry with you.

They are wild animals that live in your house - that's the only way to describe a toddler.

When you're writing in first person you have to be honest about how people think.

The older I get, the less I care, but when I was a teenager and throughout my 20s being liked was very important - exhaustingly so.

It's really important for women in the public eye to be open - these pop stars who don't look, behave, speak like real women - that's not fair on women. Being real, honest, authentic - too many women in the public eye are afraid to be authentic because they are afraid they will be judged.

We exist in a media that's obsessed with feminism, but as soon as there's an opportunity to bring down a woman at the top, we'll do it.

How lovely for a woman to feel her husband fancies the pants off her.

Cooking and writing were my two forms of personal therapy and when I was doing over one or the other, I was in control of my day.

When lockdown happened, and I didn't have that focus to sit down and write a novel, which is what I was supposed to be doing. I still found myself having to write: It was a really interesting thing to learn about myself, that this is a part of who I am, and without it I get frustrated.

The 60s was nuclear for women. New laws gave them stronger standing in both marriage and divorce. They went back into the workplace so had their own money, and the pill spurred a sexual revolution that they needed to dress appropriately for.

I think the fact that all women get branded as the same, desperate for love, desperate for children, is just a really unmodern attitude.

I have ended up with quite a conventional marriage and family. But I still hold on to my younger self who didn't know if that's what I wanted to do or not.

I love winter fashion like woolly coats, hats and boots and being cosy by the fire. Autumn and early spring walks in the park are lovely, but rainy walks with our dog Potato every morning are just too much.

I hold Twitter completely responsible for why I always just make deadlines. But at the same time, as someone who spends most of my working time alone, I couldn't live without it.

I write well in LA, because the pressure is off and I'm surrounded by ambitious people who are really encouraging.

At school, I had academia shoved in my face, but it was just stunting my creative development.

So my advice is always buy essentials, like jeans, on the high street or designer if you are willing to invest. Get a pair that fit you perfectly then put together the rest of your outfit with vintage finds.

The vast diversity of looks from the 80s are why we mustn't ignore it completely, there is plenty to build a modern and relevant wardrobe around, and I am enthusiastically kicking my leg warmers in the air in its defence.

There are many wonderful things about 80s trends. The clothes were emulating what was going on in society at the time, women were elbowing their way into the work place, earning big cash and being boss.

I love 80s fashion. I love it because it's what my mum and aunties looked like when I was a little girl. It's what I imagined myself looking like when I was a grown up.

Delicate fabrics should not be ironed. But if you don't have a steamer, next time you take a hot shower hang the item in the bathroom with you. The steam from the shower will help get the creases out.