It started on the festival circuit, with countless gorgeous young girls running around in whimsical little dresses and stompy boots. As we head towards autumn, they’ve added ripped tights and leather jackets to the look. Come September, be prepared for a full-on grunge revival. The grunge look first emerged in the early 1990s and saw off the glossy 1980s aesthetic that had preceded it. Grunge searched for beauty in the imperfect. It had its roots in music — Courtney Love accessorised her tattered vintage dresses with tattoos, a tiara and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. But the grunge girl everyone really wanted to look like was Kate Moss.

Back then, she was a doll-faced, 5ft 7in ingénue from Croydon who had just starred in her first Vogue photoshoot (shot in 1993 by Corinne Day, Moss posed in mismatched pants and vests in Day’s appropriately scruffy apartment). She began dating Johnny Depp, and the pair, with their razor-sharp cheekbones, matching lank, anti-coiffed hair, were the It couple on the scene (Kurt Cobain and Love its tragic love story).

Moss’s own take on grunge — a grubby parka thrown over a petticoat slip, a laddered jumper worn as a party dress, a distressed leather biker jacket, a white Calvin Klein vest —- was everywhere. And it is a look that forms the DNA of her signature style today.

It is fitting, then, that the grunge aesthetic has been a key inspiration for Moss’s latest Topshop range. One of her favourite pieces is a black leather pencil skirt. “The shape is really lady, but the leather gives it a real grungy, cool, rock’n’roll feel, especially if you wear it with shredded tights and lived-in leather army boots,” Moss says, neatly summing up the grunge approach to styling.

“This season’s grunge is all about being creative about how you put your look together, and not necessarily spending a fortune. It’s about being a little bit surprising and very creative. I love the glamour of adding some vintage to my look, and have done for years, as it keeps things original,” she counsels.

Accessorised with laddered tights, black nails and a healthy-looking glow, grunge circa 2009 feels more grown-up and glamorous than its 1990s predecessor. This feeds our need for escapism, and keeps it relevant for women who might have tried the look the first time around, too. See Moss’s boxy, knitted tartan cardigan, gold sequined tea dress and full-length leather overcoat.

And the stompy boots are also back, although this season they’re by Giuseppe Zanotti for Balmain, Alexander Wang and Camilla Skovgaard — and they’ve got 4in glamazon heels attached. Times have changed, but the grunge spirit is the same. These are clothes for the real world, with all its uncertainties and flaws. Only, this time, we’ll be wearing them with much better hair.

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