Dear Annie...

Send your fashion problems to: Dear Annie, Independent on Sunday, 1 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5DL, or fax them on: 0171 293 2043. E-mail: annie@independent.co.uk

Do you have any ideas on what to wear in a convertible car to stop hair flapping around? I see other women looking very groomed but if I go at more than 30 mph my hair flies all over the place. Any tips?

Amanda, London

My husband drives Triumph Heralds and one of them is a convertible. (In case you all think we are rich, we are not. You can pick these up for a couple of hundred pounds and then spend every evening and weekend doing them up and searching for "double lens indicators" at Triumph fairs instead of helping with the housework and helping to raise the five children you have sired.) It is impossible to look well-groomed in a convertible unless you travel at no more than 12 mph. A scarf is the thing. Of course you will look like a poseur but who cares? Don't tie the scarf under the chin (Queenie style); tie it behind the neck, (under the hair) or cross it over under the chin, around the neck and tie at nape of the neck, under the hair (like Grace Kelly). Or buy some very trendy and attractive floral headscarves (that tie behind the neck) from Johnny Loves Rosie (mail order tel: 0171 375 3574) or Top Shop (tel: 0800 7318284), from pounds 10.

I am lucky enough to own a diamond solitaire ring, but I do not like the setting. I would like to have a custom-made ring and possibly some earrings.

Kathy, London

I can highly recommend the jewellers Jess James (which holds a Dear Annie Gold Star for all-round excellence). It does this sort of work all the time, but will only be able to make a new ring from your diamond - it is not physically possible to cut up your diamond without ending up with three pipsqueak diamonds. But you can also purchase diamonds from JJ that can be made into matching earrings (and if your original diamond is an antique, it can source matching antique diamonds too). It really is worth doing for a piece of jewellery you would otherwise not wear. (Tel: 0171 437 0199)

Firstly, can I state that I think I love you, and have done for some time? Okay, now that that is out of the way, can I ask whether blue jeans are totally passe? I'm considered a bit "Hugh Grant-ish" in appearance, size, demeanour but not wealth, and I am single (no Liz Hurley types for me). I tend to wear chinos to work, but feel that cargo pants would look utterly foolish on me. I like jeans, and feel quite comfortable in them: should I go for a different colour, other than my standard black, or well, frankly, what?

Andrew Johnstone, via e-mail

Blimey. What some men will do to get in this column. You are charming Andrew, but I believe your love for me could be better expressed via flowers (wild ones, picked from the Patagonian mountains), cars (Aston Martins or Range Rovers), or houses by fishing rivers. I await further declarations with a packed suitcase. Anyway, black jeans are fine, so are blue (and, as Style Police reported two weeks ago, faded blue, frayed denim is most in of all). And of course cargo pants won't look stupid on you. Go to Gap and treat yourself to a pair. And if you need some extra wedge, join a lookalike agency and cash in on your similarity to Hugh, most in demand now due to his new movie. PS: readers, I swear I did not make this letter up.

Annie regrets that she cannot enter into personal correspondence. Dear Annie is a registered trademark. The book Dear Annie, a fully updated compilation of past columns plus all the directories, is on sale priced pounds 9.99, published by Faber and Faber.