If the Choo fits wear it in style

Source: Agencies  |   2008-6-20  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

THIS was no time for sensible shoes. Or sensible anything, for that matter.

So Georgina Owen Rafferty decided to rise to yesterday's occasion - Ladies Day at the world-famous Royal Ascot race meeting - and have some Jimmy Choo shoes specially made to match her eye-blasting pink ensemble.

"They are incredibly comfortable," Rafferty said before striding into the Royal Enclosure to mingle with Queen Elizabeth II and other horse-mad dignitaries on a sparkling day with long spells of bright sunshine. "They were made by the man himself, from the couture side of the business, so they fit like slippers."

She was not the only one preening.

In a world of casual Fridays, where dressing down has become a depressing fact of life, Ladies Day at Royal Ascot is the one day in the year when people who like to dress up can exact revenge on slackers who prefer track suits and leisure wear.

It was a time for breaking the rules. No one seems shy about ordering a first glass of chilled Bollinger or Veuve Clicquot at 10:55 in the morning, or about placing a bet on what color hat the queen would wear, or donning a top hat that spends the rest of the year in the closet.

When the gates opened precisely at 10:30am, it started a parade of men in morning suits and top hats and women in pastel-colored dresses, the most spectacular and elaborate of hats, and heels normally seen on the TV show "Sex and the City" - not at racetracks.

It was a no-holds-barred battle for attention from the creme de la creme of British high society.