UNLESS you have been living in a sand bunker, you will know by now that Kylie Minogue has brought out a lingerie range. Cue wild stampede to Selfridges - if only to gawp at the tantalising window display, which features a giant Kylie looking devilish.

A sample of the lingerie landed on my desk last week: tie-sided white cotton panties with the word "Lucky" emblazoned on the bum, accompanied by a packet of red heart-shaped sweeties tied up in ribbon. Perfect for all you 34-year-olds out there whose bum hasn't changed dimensions since it was 16.

The Love Kylie range is destined to do fabulously well, swelling the lips - sorry, coffers - of Ms Minogue even further. The undies themselves are not without their own trashy kind of panache: Kylie is notoriously careful about licensing her name to any products, and the input of her close friend and stylist William Baker has ensured that quality has prevailed.

2003 looks set to be the year of the pop label. Libertine, a small range of clothing designed by Casey Spooner of electropop band Fischerspooner (and a collaborator with Kylie, coincidentally), also makes its debut in Harvey Nichols this spring. Anyone who saw Fischerspooner on Top of the Pops in diamante-studded underwear will be surprised at how sober the Libertine label is - and it's well made.

Would that all pop stars had the same high standards.

Hold on to your wallet, mum, because later this month, your teenager will be begging you for a pair of S Club studded denim jeans. The S Club range goes on sale in Tesco, where, for pounds 10, you can pick up an S Club T-shirt alongside your salmon en crote.

Hot on its heels is AK, the imaginatively-named range of girlswear from Atomic Kitten, which will feature velour track pants embroidered with the word "kitten" and jailbait hanky tops. Anyone thinking that Jenny, Liz and Natasha are the last word in style should head to that other last word in style, Bhs.

We can't show you any pics of the range because the tabloids are "battling it out" for exclusives, apparently.

Which kind of says it all.

With singles sales in freefall and the music industry in turmoil, it's only logical that record companies should be looking to the clothing market to make a fast buck.

I'm amazed they didn't think of it years ago. Pop stars are the perfect ad campaign for their own clothes: with their solid fan bases, hardly a penny need be spent in marketing them. The Gareth Gates menswear line can only be a whisper away.

Of course, there is one pop star who has always been way ahead of the game.

Sean "P Diddy" Combs set up his Sean John label back in the mists of 1995: with sales currently nearing the $200 million mark, it earns the rapper even more than his Bad Boy record label. Saturday sees P Diddy debut his Sean John range of womenswear at New York fashion week - a level of success that other pop stars can only dream of. And let's hope it stays that way.

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