The weather is unpredictable and driving can become unpredictable too … whether we’re a passenger or a driver, it’s vital to be prepared for changeable weather and poor road conditions, particularly because traffic police suggest that during bad weather the majority of collisions would have been preventable with better preparation.

The first thing is to remember that speed limits on road signs are maximum ones, set for ideal road conditions when the surface is dry and the temperatures are warm. Slick surfaces require a longer stopping distance and poor visibility can result in collisions.

Top tips for safe driving include:

1. Checking road and weather conditions before departure and, if necessary, postponing travel.
2. Ensuring the vehicle has enough fuel to reach the destination with some to spare for detours.
3. Taking a mobile phone, blankets, food and water and sensible clothing is essential – remember that you may need layers to keep you warm and then allow you to cool down as temperatures change.
4. A winter jacket in a high vis colour may be a life-saver in poor weather if somebody has to leave the vehicle to put out a warning triangle.
5. If you do have to leave a vehicle, and it’s never recommended, then keeping warm and dry is vital: warm hats, high visibility clothing and gloves and socks with good thermal properties will allow people to keep their body temperature at appropriate levels while out in the weather.
6. Take a clockwork torch so that you can use it if you have to leave the vehicle, and remember to pack a first aid kit in the body of the vehicle so that any small problems can be taken care of without having to pull off the road and open the boot.

Hoodies don’t work for everyone. Your gran might not be comfortable in something that she associates with heavyweight fighters clambering into the ring for televised boxing matches. Your teenage nephew may have strong ideas about what a hoodie should look like: and given how easily kids become mocking or outright hostile if clothing doesn’t fit perfectly into the current style, he may be right to worry.

On the other hand, a sweatshirt is uncontroversial. From cute girls, to crusty elders, it’s eminently wearable. It’s warm and comfortable and the elasticated cuffs and snug hem ensure that cold winds don’t invade the garment to cause chills and discomfort. But because it’s not bulky, a sweatshirt still looks good under a jacket or fleece. And when you head indoors, the weave radiates heat away from your body so that you can cool down rapidly, unlike a wool sweater that can remain uncomfortably warm and sweatily prickly.

When choosing a sweatshirt for another, the colour is really vital. Blue works for almost everyone; black is good for teenagers and if you’re confident about colour, you can push the boat out and choose something that enriches winter skin, such as a rosy red shade for pale redheads, a rich tangerine for brunettes or even a fuchsia shade for those with greying hair.

The party season is here and whether you love or hate it, you have to show up and show willing with your colleagues. It’s becoming more and more popular to offer the clothing guidance ‘business casual’ – but what does that mean for a party?

For men it means trousers, not jeans. Chinos are acceptable with a formal shirt but not with more casual clothing such as a jumper. A jumper can be worn with formal trousers though. Polo-shirts and T-shirts are not usually acceptable for men to wear for a ‘business casual’ party or dinner, but ties are not necessary and shirt sleeves can be long or short. Jackets are usually formal, not casual, and worn with scarves and gloves and overcoats if necessary.

For women it’s a huge problem because it can vary between a casual (cotton) dress and leggings to formal dress and pearls, from suit with silk blouse through to smart black jeans with a sparkly top. A skirt can be worn with a T-shirt and either long boots or enclosed shoes but not sandals or peep-toes. Clever women will put a dressy scarf, pashmina or shrug in their handbag along with hairpins and a sparkly hair accessory so that if they arrive and feel underdressed they can run straight to the ladies and smarten themselves up with an up-do and posh wrap.

Women’s jackets for business casual events should be fitted or fun-fur, more casual jackets are not considered acceptable. Of course if the venue has a cloakroom you may be able to get away with your warm but casual fleece.

Budgeting for clothes is difficult: one person may feel it’s worth spending half their income on new garments, another may think that less than 10% of their take-home money should go on clothing. For some people it’s important to have a lot of clothes and always look in fashion – if you work in retail or the media, for example, it’s really vital to look like you have a fashion pulse! For a geek, a classic wardrobe of jeans, T-shirts and a polo-shirt for visits to grandparents may be the entire outlay … and that’s cool too.

What’s important is that clothing be durable, comfortable and pleasant. That means pleasant to wear and pleasant for those who see you wearing it: saggy, baggy, stained and smelly are not pleasant, so clothes that lose shape, hold stains and odours or are too expensive or complicated to launder really don’t fit with a limited budget. Cotton clothing, whether in the form of smart collared shirts or simple plain T-shirts, is an ideal choice.

Cotton garments are easy to wear and always easy to wash and dry – whether you’re a fashionista who presses everything with starch or a casual dude who simply takes stuff off the line or airer and wears it, creases and all.

Cotton clothes are also very versatile. Shirts can be teamed with contrasting T-shirts to get a wider range of clothing choices and hoodies can be worn over T-shirts to give a soft, relaxed feel.

Starting today and running until 30th October 2011, the British Ski and Board show is taking place at the Birmingham NEC. It includes an amazing amount of interactivity, including an indoor skill slope with expert instructors and a climbing challenge on two specially constructed climbwalls with fake ice. There will be a winter film festival, several trick shows and a fashion show too.

If you’re looking for bargains in ski-wear, you can balance fashion with frugality by investing in base clothing that supports winter-sport outerwear without breaking the bank:

1)    Thermal underwear is vital because it transfers moisture out to the next layer of your clothing and keeps your body warm and dry.
2)    Ski socks – like other work socks, have two functions: to keep the feet warm and dry and to protect feet against hard impacts such as knocks and bouncing. The thicker and more padded the better as far as socks are concerned, as long as the socks fit comfortably inside your ski boots.
3)    Fleeces, whether jackets or jumpers, are the second layer of protection after thermal underwear – they need to be lightweight but a tailored fit so that they are snug against the underlayer and don’t bulk up between the thermals and a specialist ski jacket or salopettes.
4)    Ski boots need to be specially designed to work with bindings or boards – getting them specialist fitted at a ski show is a good way to make sure you have boots that work well for you and keep you safe.

As Gok Wan produces the ‘perfect’ flattering dress for Sainsbury’s and M&S claim theirs is even more perfect, spare a thought for the many women who don’t get to dress in a particularly feminine fashion at work. It’s still possible to look great and dress for practicalities, with a few tips on how to choose casual clothing:

1.    Buy the best jacket you can afford – a badly fitting one looks like you’re wearing a sack. If you work in an environment where you have to move around a lot, choose a jacket with sleeves that can be zipped off to make a gilet for warmer moments. Reversible jackets allow you to ring the changes on your appearance at no extra cost.

2.    T-shirts make a work wardrobe special – stick to bright clear colours and set them off with antique brooches if you’re allowed to wear jewellery – this gives an impression of class without cost.

3.    Where possible, colour-coordinate your scarf, hat, gloves, belt and shoes. Brown leather is the absolute gold standard for classic dressing, and can be teamed with a bright scarf, hat and glove set to give a fashionable look for little cost.

A recent show at Imperial College, London offered vanishing dresses (using a blend of polymers that dissolve when exposed to H2O), hoodies that actually clean the air as you walk through it, thus leaving the street cleaner than when you found it, and special underwear that makes you fitter.

Within five years we may see full-body compression underwear that allows even ordinary gym goers to run faster, lift more and punch more strongly. Also on the cards is a sports bra that shapes itself to the wearer, and most interestingly to many women, ‘clever’ undies that use the body’s own heat to generate tiny electrical pulses that activate the muscles so that you become slimmer the more you wear the garment. This technology could also be used in socks to help frequent flyers and those who stand all day, by returning blood to the upper parts of the body, thus reducing the risk of clots, thrombosis and varicose veins.

Photo-catalytic clothing is already being tested. It involves cotton clothing treated with a chemical layer that reacts with light to break up water in the air and create radical molecules that neutralise pollution – fitted into the jogging bottoms of running groups or the jackets of street workers this layer could actually make our cities cleaner and safer at no cost to us.

England fly-half Jonny Wilkinson may be the only bright note on the current England squad. Not only is his behaviour impeccable, his clothing has become a focus of attention too: he’s working with his brother to create a fashion brand that combines sports clothing with smart casual elements.

The line is called Fineside and is particularly designed to work with the mesomorph body type that the Wilkinson brothers typify: large boned and well-muscled with a low waist and chunky legs. This body type generally looks good in casual clothing as long as it’s not too tight-fitting. Polo-shirts and tops with a back pleat work well for men, and for women, wearing a hoody with a zip front can help give a defined shape to the larger-boned woman.

Casual clothing also works well with the modern lifestyle that moves from office to gym to bar via a commute and maybe a noodle lunch. Picking clothing with flat seams that’s crease-resistant and can be dressed up or down quickly is a great way to making the urban active lifestyle more streamlined.

If you think you’re one of those who looks fantastic in sportswear, JD Sports may be looking for you. They are searching out “real people with real style” to replace their usual models for their next promotional campaign. Using Facebook and an app that allows people to log in, enter themselves, or friends in the contest, and vote on the winners, they will choose a top twenty potential models, who will be whittled down to the final eight winners.

To look good in sports clothing, it’s important to wear items that are properly weather-appropriate. Clothing should keep you warm, but not trap sweat, allow you to move freely and – to look really good – be in colours and styles that make the most of your features.

Consider the winter sports look by layering. A bright-coloured polo-shirt looks great worn under a fleece and allows good arm muscles to be revealed without the goose bumps marring the appearance of the would-be model. Pink, orange and bright green are good colours to wear, although if you have an excellent tan and good teeth, a pure white polo-shirt or T-shirt may give an impression of extra health.

For women, wearing long shorts with trainers is a good move, as this is considered to be one of the hot looks for 2012, so showing how well you can work the look may move you into the shortlisted twenty.

According to Richard Sutcliffe, writing in the Yorkshire Post last week, chat in Sofia city’s bars after the England match covered three topics, the match, the price of beer (dirt cheap!) and ‘the mess the new away shirt looked’ with complaints suggesting the watching fans thought it was ‘more like a polo shirt rather than a team shirt’.

Really?

This came as something of a surprise to me, given that the last time I stood on the terraces (admittedly, back in the days when Alan Shearer had hair) men did not discuss fashion. Even sports fashion.

So I went looking for some evidence of this new discussion subject, and found it almost straight away: Nick Carbone writing in Time magazine points out that the language used to discuss men’s fashion is not very masculine. The idea of a ‘murse’ as seen on the catwalk this year (man+purse = murse) is apparently cringe-making to the average chap.

He also points out that market research group NPD claim that men’s clothing spending rose 4.6% in the first half of 2011, while women’s spending dropped 0.8%.

So it’s a subject of discussion (vocabulary allowing) and a big share of the market, but what are men really focused on?

Clothing that makes them look fit is the key requirement, apparently. Which is why the new football strip was such a disappointment. Each time there’s a new strip, it give the average man a change to wear some new styles without admitting to fashion interest. V-necks for example sell in much greater quantities whenever England are in the World Cup, as it legitimises ordinary men to wear a long-sleeved, v-necked top without feeling embarrassed. Similarly, long socks, snoods, gloves and short shorts all get purchased and worn much more readily when Beckham, Rooney, Ferdinand etc have demonstrated their usefulness on the pitch.