It's the last full week of campaigning and yet another campaign micro-trend is emerging. Yesterday Sarah Brown upped Labour's sartorial ante in a cropped trench in an unashamedly vibrant house red. It successfully commanded the middle ground between classic and modern.
Meanwhile, Miriam González Durántez opted for a more classic neutral trench. Buttoned up and knotted tightly, it was intentionally unreadable. Damn her.
The unexpected trendsetter on this issue was Lord Mandelson, who was first to showcase the look.
However, the strategist's mac has a completely different agenda. Downbeat and unbelted, Mandy's mac is unstructured and flasheresque. Worn with jeans and a shirt-and-jumper combo, the look could be read as weekend Euro-chic, or Mourinho lite.
But the more likely style hero for Mandelson is Peter Falk as Columbo – the detective with the keen eye for detail and a lackadaisical approach to his wardrobe. Is it meant to signal to his spin rivals that his team have a keen eye for policy details and are unconcerned about matters of style? Whatever the business secretary's intention, the odds of him paraphrasing Columbo are shortening by the hour – "Just one more thing, Clegg ..." could well be the gist of his next campaign memo.
