Live webchat with Mary Portas on Monday 10 May (1-2pm). PLUS, if you're over 40, a chance to take part in her next C4 series

[HelenMumsnet]

Retail guru and television presenter Mary Portas will be joining us for a live webchat on Monday 10 May from 1-2pm to discuss shopping, style and her brand new fashion crusade for women over 40.

As a mother of two, Mary juggles a television career and writing a weekly shop review column in the Telegraph with running Yellowdoor, her successful retail-branding and communications agency.

Mary's about to start filming a new Channel 4 TV series that will follow her quest to fill the gap in the fashion market for fabulous, forty-plus women.

She particularly wants to know:

• Do you think your fashion needs are served by high-street retailers?

• When you shop for fashion, is it as fun and easy an experience as it was when you were younger or do you find it a trial?

• Is there a brand on the high street that gives you what you want?

• What are the brands that are failing you?

• Would you rather see a picture of a woman your own age marketing the brands you buy or are you happy to see youthful, perfect faces?

Mary knows shops and shopping better than anyone and she'll be ready to answer all of your shopping quandaries, from where to find the best service to where to shop for the best one-offs.

Television cameras will be following Mary as she takes part in the live webchat. Your comments may be used in the television show but we won't identify you.

As part of the television series, Mary is also looking for opinionated women who will be part of her focus group, advising her on anything from where to buy the best-fitting dress to road-testing whole fashion collections.

This will involve a number of days filming in London over the next six months and will cover travel expenses for these days.

If you're interested in being involved please email [email protected] with your name, your MN nickname, your contact details and why you think you should be part of the show.

Thanks, MNHQ

On style icons: The ones we still talk about are mostly from yesteryear and they've not been replaced because marketing is obsessed with youth. The average age of the Burberry shopper is 53 but their cover girl is 19 - BUT it's working - so hard to persuade them to change it.

BoffinMum: I am so with you - I am printing this out to take to Clarks with me.

1. Style icons: Grace Kelly, the 'French Women Don't Get Fat' author Mireille Guiliano, Kate Winslet, New Look Dior, Audrey Hepburn.

1. I love beautifully cut gamine clothes in navy and cream wool crepe with soft Italian leather ballet pumps and dramatic silk scarves, silk Chinese-style jackets and floaty but understated chiffon skirts. But this is not currently a Permissible Look.

1. High street shopping makes me lose the will to live. Assistants are either rude or apologetic, the clothes all look the same, it is a case of me filtering through the rubbish to find something that makes me look adequate rather than me actually selecting clothes and expressing myself through fashion. The irony is I am quite a normal size and shape and reasonably attractive. If they can't cater for people like me you have to wonder if all this stuff is actually ending up in landfill half the time.

Mary in that case tell clarks from me i want a pair of knee high boots and have done for years, my problem? my calfs, I've been to evans though great bound to find something in here, no they were too big [argggghhhhh]

On sofas: I really want to create a shop that's about space - rather than just about the margin. The high street has to turn over stock to make profits and therefore they compromise your comfort. I am trying to create a slower, more sociable environment and allow people even to socialise.

Wouldn't it be nice if you could have your feet measured in Clarks like kids do, and then end up with designer shoes in different width fittings that really worked well with your feet?

More on style icons
It's true about the fact that it's icons of yesteryear that we want to be

But also because I don't really wanna look like the "youth" of today - and we see them SO often with the "circles of shame" in the gossip rags - ooh look, cellulite, crow's feet, sweat marks, mangled feet from wearing heels (insert body criticism here)

Who've we got?
Catherine Zeta Jones - gotten too skinny of late
Posh - ugh no thanks - too "affected"
Kylie - botoxed to the hilt see also Dannii minogue
Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton et al - I don't want to see your ladygarden thanks

Only filmstar of roughly my age I even vaguely aspire to is Reese Witherspoon

Lovebeing - you have to get to Duo.

nearly every year i get one or two pairs of stylish comfortable shoes from Clarks.When people ask me where i got them I am embaraased to say .......their image is so frumpy.I am scared to mention these shoes purchases on the S&B threads on Mumsnet

you are right mary, they make comforatble quality shoes at high street prices. please help them sort out their styling

I secretly look at old ladies in their comfy shoes and clothes and 'don't give a shit attitude' and think god it'll be so much easier when I'm 80yrs old .

DavidHameron - you make me laugh. I like these ads - but the fact they had to put a daughter in meant they were hedging their bets. I agree you don't want to see fatties in the ads, you want to know that that dress is available in your size. I want to celebrate fashion in the same way the youth market celebrates fashion

i know that taking kids shopping is a HUGE pita, but sometimes, it is not possible to do it without them...i am far more inclined to go and mooch round a shop that i can push a buggy round than go in a shop where all the womens clothes are upstairs...not everyones problem, but i know i'm not alone..take a look around any high street...buggies galore!

thanks squeaver

OK, no 'muffin top' discussion allowed. But there is a massive problem for those of us with apples left after having lots of babies: trousers that fit properly. You either end up pulling them up all the time or you have to use a belt (and then end up with lots of capacious baggery) or they don't go any further than yer arse...

And we really CAN'T wear hipsters: some of us have had C-Sections for god's sake!

The dove campaign but for clothes.

biggest problem for me is that I have boobs and am not pear shaped, can be awful to find trousers and tops that fit have pretty much given up on dresses

style icons anyone with boobs who does not look matronly or tarty

I make Mary laugh...

BoffinMum What you're describing is what I call Paris chic and interestingly Parisian women of all ages are celebrated and we don't do it here. They know what classy styling is, they're grown up women, not dressed as girls. And if that's ghettoising then so be it. Even Louis Vuitton put Catherine De Neuve in their ads - we have 16 year olds who have achieved nothing. Look at Carla Bruni etc

I think size 12 models are a good compromise - got some curves but don't make you think you have joined a New World of Fat People's Clothes.

Is high street shopping boring? Yes when you have to wade through so much stuff to find anything you might want (M&S).

Or find nothing that comes close to what your looking for. At the risk of being boring - what's wrong with SLEEVES?!

Or when the whole high street slavishly follows a trend which suits only a very few - e.g. nudes, right now.

Not boring when you find a shop where you can be pretty much guaranteed to find something you want to buy. And then you'll wander round the store desperate to find something, anything... Banana Republic fills this need for me, at the moment.

As a working mum, not long returned full time, I find I need smart work clothes - now have a wardrobe full of wrap top dresses, as bigger busted - as well as trying to look yummy mummy at school events etc. Don't seem to have the money to spend to get either wardrobe just right - including shoes.

Don't even want to think what I am going to wear through the summer or on holiday, as I am also overweight and out of shape.
God I sound attractive!!

Mary, how about taking a few of us to France to be dressed by nice friendly ladies in ordinary boutiques and seeing how we end up looking compared to our 'English' selves? I ahve always thought that would make grest telly.

Boring boring boring YES! It's an international problem too. I live in Dubai and guess what, Debenhams, M&S, Clarks, Next, River Island, Zara, Gap, Top Shop, H&M etc, variations on a theme in EVERY mall. Nice to see familiar brands away from home you'd think, but it is monotonous and interchangeable.

The quality is becoming noticeably sloppy post-recession as overheads are obviously being squeezed in order to deliver more affordable goods to what they think is a cost-conscious public. This is not how to retain custom. Be interested to hear your view on this.

i'd like a shop that had really well made basics. i quit like esprit at the moment but their sizing is very small. even a perfect black t shirt is very hard to find on the high st.

God Mary, you're gonna clean up with this project.

Johnny Boden is going to take out a contract on you.