Column regulars will know that I believe fervently in experimentation. The key to growing up gracefully lies not in clinging pathetically to the rickety liferaft of the tried and overly tested, but in strengthening one's own swimming strokes by discovering and maintaining a balance between classic and forward thinking. Sometimes they even turn out to be the same thing. Isn't life thrilling?

Which brings us with a pleasing neatness to trousers. In particular, this winter's trousers, which are turning out to be somewhat shorter than last winter's. To get technical briefly, they are cropped at or (if you have long legs that can take it) just above the ankle.

This, as the alert among you will already have surmised, leaves quite a bit of naked ankle exposed. Suffice for the moment to say that these cropped trousers are a very easy and economical way to update a wardrobe (see main piece).

The thing is, once designers start fiddling with lengths, it's almost impossible for them to stop tampering, and before you know it, they've moved the waist, the pockets and the crotch. While I've no objection to the former relocation, I must strongly protest the displacement of trouser crotches. They are where they are (at crotch level) for a good reason. But that's not enough for some, and we're beginning to see crotches at the thigh, the knee and, I regret to tell you - as of the YSL show last week - the ankle.

Some women are even buying them. They are the last word at French Vogue. This is troubling me, because whenever I see a pair, I see incontinence, when I obviously should be seeing insouciant glamour. It could just be me, but they conjure up soggy. That can't be a good look at any age. Can it?

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