Until recently, the only people who wore head-to-toe white were nurses, gurus and ghosts. Presumably that’s why it acquired a reputation for being something of a spiritual colour. And a high-maintenance one. The two can’t be compatible, surely? Er, yes. As well as wildly decadent and minimalist. That’s what makes white so special.

In the era before Miele, even brides tended to wear a mishmash of colours. Naturally white became a way to stand out. Tom Wolfe wore a white suit every day – a beguiling, leisured, Southern Gent cover that belied the actual wolf beneath. Leslie Kenton, a 1980s writer who worked on Harpers & Queen, became a well-known figure because she always wore white.

Point is, white was emphatically not for your average Jo or Joe, and all kinds of rules, both unspoken and very much spoken, sprang up around it. White made you look fatter. It was hopeless unless you had a Jackie Collins tan. It was unacceptable at a wedding, unless you were the bride.