I wanna be on top

As I begin to write this, you should be watching the new series of Britain's Next Top Model. And if, at 9pm on Monday 5th July, you're not, why the hell are you sat here reading this when you could be? Step away from the laptop and switch on Living TV! I have no vested interest in publicising the programme by the way, I merely, from my reluctant erm, TV critic stance, think the new series, hosted by Elle 'The Body' Macpherson, is hilarious.

Note the word 'hilarious' instead of 'brilliant.' Of course it is brilliant in its own way but brilliant is a dangerous word, I'm not going to get into a debate about brilliance. Brilliance suggests a masterpiece. Brilliance suggests uniqueness. There's nothing unique about this series of BNTM, because it is so obviously modelled ('scuse the pun) on the American counterpart. Before Elle came along, the UK version was flat, it had no big name hosts or judges (sorry, Lisa Snowdon), it paled in comparison. The whole point of the Top Model franchise is that it is as funny, over-the-top and fabulous as possible. In short, it's so bad, it's (and there's that word again) brilliant.

Anyway, I'm digressing - this will be dress related if it kills me! - one addition to the new series that guarantees the show hilarity is designer Julien Macdonald. He's so welsh, so dry, and so bitchy, you'll love him. I interviewed him for TVT a few weeks back and he had something to say about everything – short models, fat models, ugly models... It was one of those interviews where I knew he was trying to be provocative so by the end I wouldn't have flinched if he had told me I was fat and ugly.

Instead, when I asked him who he'd love to dress, he replied: 'Well, I haven't dressed you yet, you can be top of the list!' If anything was going to melt away my steely journalist facade (not that I have one but I like to pretend I do). Sigh.

Respect to Julien for bringing high end to the high street all those years ago with his 'Star' collection for Debenhams, and respect to him for believing we should all have a little bit of glamour in our lives.
'I think that old kind of glamour is coming back into fashion. Now women can be whatever they want,' he told me. 'You see more realistic women on the runway, more real women, more real clothes, much more dresses, the trouser suit has gone, thank God.'

Erm, Julien, the trouser suit is alive and well! Well, it is in my book. As my relentless pursuit of the perfect Ossie Clark two-piece continues...