Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen on finding your signature style over 50

Famed for his ability to transform suburban semis into Versailles-inspired havens, Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen’s extravagant style has long stretched beyond wallpaper and soft furnishings.

The interior designer’s fascination with fashion started at a young age, noting, “since I was quite a small child, I loved dressing up.

“I had a very indulgent grandmother who was very good at sewing, and she used to make me tiny little uniforms – some of which I’ve still got and I keep trying to force onto my grandchildren, but they’re deeply disinterested.”

At school, Llewelyn-Bowen continued to experiment with avant-garde fashion choices. “I was always mucking around with the uniform, but art school was more complicated. I got very buffeted by what everybody else was doing at the time. I tried out some disastrous, kind of grungy moments.

“There was an awful Sloane incarnation,” he recalls, “which was a lot of tweed and corduroy, I was doing it just because it was a look at the time. But in the Eighties is where I found my own style.”

Before the world of eBay and online shopping, Llewelyn-Bowen sourced vintage brocade jackets and leather trousers wherever he could.

“I remember going with [my wife] Jackie to places like Kensington Market, jumble sales and thrift stores. But now, there are a lot of more accessible ways to get the look that you want.

“Having said that, I’m not necessarily advocating the fast fashion sites, but there are a lot of young designers and bespoke suit services on the internet that can do stuff for you.”

When looking at what men’s midlife fashion currently has to offer, Llewelyn-Bowen notes he is often dissatisfied.

“I am constantly surprised by how diminishing and infantile the clothes that most men my age wear.

“They are more or less always very unpowerful fashion statements – based on sportswear or children’s wear. They’ve got far too few seams,” he laughs.

While his idiosyncratic style rarely misses, Llewelyn-Bowen is not ignorant to fashion faux pas.

“I’m sure everyone is sort of sucking their teeth with a whole list of things they remember me wearing,” he laughs, “but that was then. And although it might have been a tad excessive, or too fluffy, too flouncy, or the wrong cut – it still innately expressed who I wanted to be at the time.”

For Llewelyn-Bowen, having a well-fitting suit is and always has been an easy way to elevate your wardrobe, as he believes it shows you still care about how you’re perceived.

“Smart means you’re in charge of who you are,” he says, “and when you’re in control of you, it means you’re very good at controlling situations.

“You are also controlling how you’re read by other people.”

A suit is the one item Llewelyn-Bowen believes everybody should have in their wardrobe. “It sounds really snooty, but actually have a suit made,” he says, “it’s not stupidly expensive anymore.

“My guy – The Cotswold Tailor – is about £800-900 for a suit.

“When I say it costs £800 to have a suit made from a tailor, people will spend that on a pair of trainers – those are mass-produced objects that have absolutely no right to be that expensive.

“Oh, my God, get me. I’m like a male Karen!” he laughs.

While his views on sartorial style is perhaps unsurprising, Llewelyn-Bowen’s aversion for sportswear is hardly startling either.

“What I find really difficult, is people wearing sportswear because ‘it’s comfortable‘. Sports shouldn’t be comfortable at all. Sports should be pushing you to the the limits of your physicality.

“But just putting on something because it’s got an elasticated waistband and can stretch doesn’t necessarily work for a 60-year-old fella.”

When it comes to pieces that no man should have in his wardrobe, Llewelyn-Bowen says anything that started its life as underwear should not be worn out of the house.

“Whether that is a T-shirt or far, far worse, a [vest] or baggy shorts – they’re all starting points for a look,” he says, “they’re not the destination in the fashion journey.

“When you see someone extremely unathletic wearing sportswear, you can tell that that person doesn’t know who they are at all, because that guy at the back of his head may think he looks like Ronaldo or David Beckham, but actually, he doesn’t.

“When you see a guy that looks good, that’s because he knows what to do with what he’s got – and that’s a guy that I think a lot of people want to know.”

Of course, for Llewelyn-Bowen of all people, style isn’t just about what you wear, but how you live.

As the Ideal Home Show returns this March for its 117th year, the interior designer is making an appearance to offer his tips on finding your signature style within the home.

“I think in the Sixties and Seventies, the Ideal Home Show was the real barometer of the optimism and energy that British householders wanted to express.”

As he approaches 60, Llewelyn-Bowen’s interior and dress style show no signs of dialling down, and he refutes that age should be a conflicting factor of style.

“To celebrate 25 years of brand LLB this year, I’m doing a full wrap around of collaborations to say, here I am at 60, but I’ve not gone beige and neither should you,” he says.

“As you age, you should be coming to a stage of much greater stability and security about who you are.

“Let’s stop being vulnerable old people, let’s be the people we are, who saw the Sex Pistols live, that were in the mosh pit at Glastonbury. We did all of those things. That should mean that we don’t stop doing those things when we’re 60.

“Jackie said to me a couple of years ago, ‘whatever we do, we’ve got to make sure that we don’t stop being brave,’ and I think that that’s something that I will always take with me.”

“If you look back at everything I’ve ever done – everything I’ve ever worn – brave has always been in there, at least a little bit.”

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen will be appearing at the Ideal Home Show, on hand to offer lots of top tips, live Q&As and demonstrations throughout the 17-day event at Kensington Olympia. Laurence’s fun insights can all be learned about at this year’s Ideal Home Show.