Michelle Obama’s rise as an international fashion plate has been a lifelong work in progress, as illustrated by the Times of London’s 10-stage analysis of her evolving style. The gushing critique begins with the first lady as schoolgirl in the 1970s with a fondness for bright colours, through her choice of a “curvy but classic” wedding dress in 1992 to the bold choices she made as a senator’s wife. A rare misstep—a poorly cut pin-stripped suit she wore in 2007—is included, but the retrospective reveals a woman who has figured out what to wear to flatter herself—and to burnish her husband’s message of “change.”