William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement espoused the idea that you should strive to own nothing you considered neither functional nor beautiful. Generally speaking, I’m inclined to go along with that and the next area I’ve got lined up for editing is pockets.

I’ve got absolutely no patience for false pockets. I have occasionally come across garments that use apparent pockets as a decorative motif, breaking up the flow of the surface but being merely decoration and providing no storage. Possibly it looks good and I suppose it prevents you marring the garment by overstuffing them but, frankly, I think the idea is stupid and I’d count it as marker for “do not buy or wear” unless the item is deliberately designed as a costume.

I’m also growing increasingly dissatisfied with shallow pockets. I’ve got several pairs of trousers that suffer this flaw. They were okay when I used to wear them for cycling to work (very quick drying material so it didn’t matter if I got rained on) but that was before I picked up the affectation of linen hankies and the necessity of carrying a face mask. Having lost several of both in the past couple of years, I’m increasingly torn between trying to wear them out and passing them onto a charity shop so that someone who doesn’t need pockets for anything other than a small, heavy set of keys can benefit!

Hurrah for the purple ‘pants’ I’m presently wearing (don’t worry, I mean trousers in the less alliterative English) which accommodate a full hand along with a mask, a hanky and room to safely retrieve whichever I want.