It’s Time To Stop Shaming The Women Of Liverpool On Ladies’ Day

Scouse Bird was sick of the women of Liverpool getting shamed every Ladies Day at Aintree. So this year she's fighting back...

Aintree

by Scouse Bird |
Published on

Ladies Day at Aintree is a Liverpool institution. Never mind The X Factor, a Scouse bird’s dream is to win the best-dressed competition. After all we pride ourselves on being glamorous and fashion forward, so what better accolade is there than to be crowned queen of the fashionistas on the most eagerly anticipated day of the social calendar?

Drinks
 

Scouse women like to go all out on a Saturday night, anyway (certainly compared to the rest of the country), but for the races we take it to a whole new level. And we’re not shy of spending some money on it. Shoes, bags, dresses, hats: we’ll spend hundreds of pounds, and it’s all in the name of fashion and a great day out in the spotlight – which, FYI, we’ll start preparing for as soon as Christmas is out of the way. The days leading up to the races are a military operation filled with spray tans, nail appointments and crack-of-dawn hairdresser visits. The point is: we feel great and we’re just out to have a good time, what’s wrong with that?

FYI, we’ll start preparing for Ladies Day as soon as Christmas is out of the way

Clearly someone’s not happy about it, because year after year we do battle with the gobshite pap photographers who hang around like a hangover fart, doing their best to make us all look abominable. They’re briefed to purposely look out for women who are rocking unsuitable ensembles – a picture of a fat bird with a streaky tan is the ultimate prize – and we’re fuming. No not even fuming, we’re FEEWWWWWWMIN! We like to be recognised, but for the right reasons and we tired of all being tarred with the no-taste brush.

I’m not entirely innocent, last year I created the tag #CircleOfSheow on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, highlighting a few fashion faux pas I came across throughout the day, but in hindsight I’ve realised the error of my ways. So before this year’s Ladies Day – which happened last Friday – I made it my mission to try and start tipping the scales the other way, because enough is enough. We are fabulous not ridiculous! I created the hashtag #CircleOfFab on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to showcase women looking fantastic in their races garb. (I even teamed up with Scouse girl’s fave River Island to take the tag national.) And it wasn’t difficult to do because everyone I saw looked amazing.

I created the hashtag #CircleOfFab on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to showcase women looking fantastic in their races garb

In true Liverpool support-your-own-style, local designers featured heavily amongst the women I circled as fab. I saw several Ku by Spendlovedresses, but the main man was definitely Mark Melia (a favourite among Carol Vorderman and Claire Sweeney) – almost every other person was wearing one of his creations, no doubt because he’s the ‘elegant’ choice of the city and you can spot his dresses a mile off. Despite the long day (and the recent pox upon the country that is the return of the kitten heel) six-inch heels were de rigeur, naturally. The free flip flops provided a welcome break for the journey between the racecourse and the city centre, but the heels went straight back on when we got to bars and restaurants. Just because the balls of your feet are burning, that’s no excuse to spoil a good outfit where I come from.

 

I attended Aintree on all three days of the Grand National meeting this year, and everywhere I looked all I could see was head-to-toe glamour, not that that stopped the pap trying to get their shot. I’m so proud of our city and the girls in particular. On Ladies Day, I wore a very large hat and I couldn’t walk more than two steps without getting papped or being asked to give an interview. But despite being very much in the thick of the crowds I didn’t see anyone worth ending up on the Daily Mail’s list of horrors. OK, not every single person got it right, but everyone was having the best time – and that’s what counts, right?

Poor uncultured, ridiculous northerners eh? It’s like we’re just there to be sneered upon by southern newspaper bosses

In fact, when I checked their website the next day that I realised they’d photographed some of the stars of Big Fat Gypsy Weddings, and let’s face it, their fashion is a little ‘outré’ isn’t it? But they’re not Scouse, and that’s the point: the media make out like they are and it gives us a terrible terrible rap. Poor uncultured, ridiculous northerners, eh? It’s like we’re just there to be sneered upon by southern newspaper bosses and it’s totally uncalled for. We’re fearless when it comes to fashion and we’ll try trends out before anyone else – does that make us inferior? (Answer: it does not.) In fact, it should be celebrated, not mocked.

Within an hour of starting my mission, #CircleOfFab was trending in Liverpool, and between Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, it had thousands of shares, likes and comments from around the country, as together we celebrated Ladies Day, fashion, Liverpool and women in general. And I loved every minute of it. The response from the city was fantastic and everyone really got behind it. Take that paparazzi! It’s the return of girl power. Same again next year?

XOXO

Follow Scouse Bird on Twitter @ScouseBirdProbs

This article originally appeared on The Debrief.

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