How to win the Best Dressed at the trot up

As Badminton draws ever closer, we wanted to share some of our top tips for how to win best dressed at the trot up.

This is the second year that we’re sponsoring the best dressed at the Mitsubishi Motors Badminton Horse Trials first horse inspection – also known as the trot up. As per last year, our very own King Of The Road, Andrew Ransford, will lead the judging panel. This year, he’ll be joined by newly announced Hiho Brand Ambassador Alice Plunkett, and the incredibly stylish Lady Alice Manners.

Andrew’s currently finishing work on the Badminton stand, but he wasn’t too busy to share a few tips for those looking to win best dressed in this year’s trot up… here’s the inside scoop… you ready?

Before we even get into the pretty bits of trot up style and fashion – we always keep a couple of things in mind. First – the whole point of the trot up. The whole point of the trot up is to make sure the horse is sound and fit for competition. Any clothes and style is secondary to this. Always. And this means that any clothing picked MUST allow the rider to trot the horse up and do anything else the ground jury request. Why does this impact on clothing? Well, impractical clothing is going to seriously hinder you. Secondly – clothing and footwear has to be safe (and stay on!). If you ‘throw a shoe’, it’s not good. If you have killer heels and struggle to walk let alone run – you’re not going to win best dressed. If your cape/coat swirls around when you run and covers your eyes (I know, we’re going for the extreme here!!) or worries your horse… you won’t win.

Yep- we love equestrian fashion and style, but for us it has to be fit for purpose too. It’s how we design our jewellery. It’s that important to us!

Last year’s winners wowed us with the attention to detail in their outfits. Paul Tapner’s ensemble was just spectacular, from his shirt to his shoes. Danni Dunn, won best dressed female rider, did incredibly well in the attention to detail stakes, with the piping on her bespoke jacket matching the colour of her hat and shoes.

We like to see something a bit different… we don’t mean crazy different, but standing out from the crowd. We know that white jeans and boots are a go-to for many at the trot up, but it’s really hard to pick from lots of people wearing very similar clothing. If you do opt for this on the bottom half, think of doing something different with your top half.

If you see us taking pictures, don’t worry – ignore us and carry on! We’ve found that taking pictures is really useful as the trot up is so fast moving that it’s good to be able to reflect and go through these pictures with fellow judges and talk about what we liked and what we saw. There’s usually a few stand out people by the time we get to the end, and we’ll look at these and chat over the looks.

Obviously we love seeing Hiho clad people at the trot up, but don’t feel you need to wear Hiho or, in fact, any jewellery at all. You don’t get extra points for this! If jewellery complements your overall look and you’re comfort, then go for it, absolutely, but we do look at the overall picture and how everything fits together, not if you’re wearing a cherry roller bangle!!

This year’s trot up is a 4.30pm on Wednesday 2nd May . Keep an eye on Badminton’s social media (and ours!) for pics and video as well as their timetable for all upcoming events!