X Factor Frock Watch: Week 9 Beauty Care

Forget about howling that Mary wuz robbed or hissing that Cher wuz just turning on the waterworks to grab a sympathy vote or hatin' on Cowell for changing the rulez at the last minute in last night's X Factor semi-final results show. 

Let's focus for a minute instead on the truly important issue, on what X Factor is really all about: the judge's frocks!

Dannii rocked my favourite look of the weekend on Saturday night, in a full-length nude dress by fellow Aussie Aurelio Costarella. I wasn't mad keen on the zip-through front and thought she was wearing half a fox across her shoulder when she arrived on stage initially, but once I realised it was a supersized gauzy corsage I was sold. 

No prizes for guessing that Dannii's earrings were Annoushka (well, Selim Mouzannar for Annoushka)...

source: Annoushka via Facebook

 source: Christie's

I also really liked Dannii's hair; that quiff thing that I can't pull off for love nor money, much to my despair, looks so good on her.

Cheryl, meanwhile, opted for a white smushed origami mini-dress yoke by Stéphane Rolland on Saturday night - she still has legs, I see - which is actually a pretty nice bit of kit if worn properly and not crushed into oblivion. Still, her hair is so much better since she got rid of that manky plum colour. She appears to have ditched some or all of the extensions, too, and I think the shoulder-length length suits her so much better than extreme Rapunzel-stylee locks. She has a petite little face and it's inclined to look a bit swamped when she wears her hair mad long.

Sunday night was, frankly, disappointing, as both ladies went back to black. 

Dannii's dress wore her: what should have been a sexy little black number veered dangerously towards mumsy despite its corset-style bust, peekaboo cutouts and sheer lace overlay simply because it was too long for her petite frame. On the runway, the hem of this Jasper Conran dress hit models right on the knee rather than mid-calf as it did on Dannii.

Cheryl's Zuhaid Murad dress kind of looked like it'd been hacked at by a 5-year-old, with its one shoulder and multiple trains, but I didn't completely hate it. 

Probably because it's precisely the kind of dress I used to draw aged, well, 5 years old, when I imagined I might be a fashion designer.

Must try harder, ladies.