All zipped up.

There is a lot of sartorial love for Fities/Sixties fashion and sexual glamour at the moment. Blame Mad Men, or The Hour, or the sexy old school-with-a-touch-of-fetish on the Autumn Winter 2011 catwalks at Louis Vuitton and Prada, but it's certainly there. Banana Republic have dedicated an entire capsule collection to the Mad Men silhouette, and every glossy September issue I've read this month has pronounced pencil skirts, sheer blouses and shoes with a touch of the kinky about them as the It Things for the new season. With really good underwear.

Now I like this look - it suits my figure even though it is extremely high maintenance. After all, you can't jump out of bed and straight into a full Joan Holloway look without effort, good hairspray, sheer stockings and a wiggle, but many women will be trying. My answer is to find one aspect of the trend that you love the most and work it, plus remember - pencil skirts don't suit everyone, and even if they do can be darn uncomfortable for a day at work, but there are other things that imply sexiness without being overt or too try hard about it.

My favourite example for this effect is actually a piece of hardware instead of an item of clothing: the humble and often overlooked zip. Or rather, the not-so humble zip if you see how it has been revolutionised to raise a few eyebrows with its sexual connotations recently. The visible tram line of a zip fastening is possibly one of the sexiest things to me - it says that something is being kept together, kept inside, kept hidden, but that can be tantalisingly revealed, often with someone else's help, which adds to the appeal.

Victoria Beckham's beautiful collection of dresses more often than not focuses on the seen zip - no longer is it hidden under panels of fabric or at the side of a skirt. It is there, running down the backs of skirts and dresses and catching the eye of those who want to know what lies beneath. I have recently purchased the above pencil skirt from Zara - it's not the most interesting of skirts, in fact it looks plain and fitted in an understated shade of burgundy, but turn around and the golden stamp of the back zip is there, out and proud. Plain black dresses are given a whole new lease of sexiness not from any out there cleavage or super-short hem, but from statement zips running the entire length of the dress, not to mention the draw of a pair of tight black trousers with zips running up a few inches up from the ankle. Those zips are trying to tell you something - they are hinting to the person inside whilst being the closure, the way in and keeping the modesty of the wearer all wrapped up, until she's ready.

So embrace whichever aspect of the glamour, fetish-inspired and 1950s silhouettes that fashion lets us have fun with. But remember that sometimes the least obvious things can say the most.

Pencil skirts and zips galore at www.zara.com