Are you more stylish or less stylish than your children?

[BedHog]

I'd always assumed that a sense of style kind of ran in families, you'd see some family groups looking fashionable and immaculate, and others all looking a bit dishevelled in fleeces and ill-fitting jeans.

Lately I've noticed that it seems to be getting more mixed up. On several occasions recently I've noticed uber-cool dads - you know the type, Superdry jacket, low-slung jeans, designer haircut, with an awkward, gangly, bespectacled youth stumbling along beside them. Or a beautiful young girl looking like she's stepped out of a Boden catalogue accompanied by a stout woman in sensible slacks who you suspect cuts her own hair and hasn't worn make-up for months. Families don't seem to 'match' in the style stakes anymore.

I suppose what I'm asking is, if you put a lot of effort into your own sense of style and your own appearance (I'm guessing you probably do if you're reading this topic , are your children the same? Or conversely, if you or any of your friends just shove the first thing you find on in the morning, is this also what your children do? Are you more, or less, stylish than your children?

[Freddiemisagreatshag]

Less than DS2 and DD1

More than the rest of them.

DS2 is a sharp, natty dresser.

[novelsituation]

DD and I love clothes, design etc. DH and DS don't give a monkeys.

[exexpat]

Well, DD (10) certainly thinks she is more stylish than me, and has started telling me what I should/shouldn't wear. She may well be right.

[Ledkr]

Dd is ten and dresses like me only she's thinner
Dd2 wears a tutu and wellies everywhere so I'm more stylish than her for sure.

[scarlet76]

DD8 and I both like clothes and shoes and accessories. I think we are as stylish, or unstylish, as each other! She wears similar things to myself - slim jeans, stripy tops, fitted cardigans, stylish dresses etc...
DS10 and DH have far less interest in what they wear. However, they are both handsome, long and lean and can carry anything off!

[MamaMary]

My Mum is way more stylish than I am. Gets her hair cut and coloured regularly, spends way more money than I do on clothes ( though to be fair she has more money than I do), has a better figure than I do. I think she sometimes despairs of me

So far it looks like DD1 is taking after me, not her grandmother, as she shows no interest in clothes. Mind you, she's only two

[Startail]

DD2 (12) is far more style conscious than me or her older sister. both of us, half jokingly seek her approval before going out.

DD1(15) sometimes is more fashion conscious than me and recently has taken to wearing makeup more often, but often she's skinny jeans, Hoddie, long boots like a thinner longer haired version of me.

DH? DH is a style free zone, DDs and me buy his clothes and tell him what to wear.

He still manages to tuck in rugby shirts, wear sandal in winter and generally be scruffy.

[FarleyD]

Dh doesn't know that such a thing as fashion exists, and has never knowingly worn anything that matches, unless by a happy accident. I'm pretty average I think, not too bothered, but not too much of a car crash in terms of clothes.

The three elder dc are all obsessed way beyond what is healthy (well, certainly healthy for their budgets) by fashion and how they look, and although I'm biased, I do think they look fab. Youngest dc is only 8 and unfortunately still subject to his mother's fashion choices!

[deleted203]

I have no style, nor interest in one, TBH. I wear whatever is nearest, mostly. DH is unaware that there is such a thing as fashion.

DD1 and DD2 (20 and 17) are tremendously stylish, have wardrobes full of clothes, put the most amazingly odd selection of garments together and always look wonderful.

DS1(19) is dressed by his sisters mostly. Left to himself he will not manage things that match. He isn't in the slightest bit bothered.

DS2 could not care less. (12). Mostly hand me down T shirts and jeans. Mostly faded, mostly slightly too small.

DS3 (7) is the 'coolest dude in town' he tells me. He likes clothes, likes to look trendy, and likes to have his sisters' opinion (rather than mine) as I don't know what's fashionable.

[TheBiskyBat]

ds (5) always looks good. That is because I ruthlessly edit his wardrobe and make sure I pick out his clothes. He doesn't care therefore he will wear what I tell him to wear.

dd (8) has an...um...eclectic taste in clothes. She wears some
wild combinations and inherits piles of hand me downs from older cousins, which she loves, so her wardrobe is really out of my control.I wouldn't say she is unstylish, as she manages
to pull it off, but it certainly isn't classically elegant or worthy of Vogue. Saturday's outfit was green tights, pink shorts and a blue floral smock with a furry gilet over the top. Go figure...

[WallyBantersYoniBox]

DS is 8 and a complete clothes horse. He looks great in everything, long lean and suits those skinny jeans in H&M and Zara, will wear hats too, so he has a straw trilby which is adorable, cute baseball caps etc.

I probably am a bit more "fashionable" than anyone else in the family (my husband seriously needs to be weaned off his fleece addiction), but I kind of have to be, as I work in fashion, so a level if fashion ability is expected.

DS definitely more stylish, and has better quality clothes and more labels than me. This is because of work again, and I've found I get better wear and can pass them on to last longer. I get great discounts at Ralph Lauren for example, through work colleagues, so all his Polos are RL because they work out cheaper and better value than H&M.

I also have mahoosive boobs which never fit in with haute couture and holds me back there sonewhat.

So i am "rocking" Primark.

[redmayneslips]

OP I know what you are getting at, when dd was smaller I was thrilled to have a daughter to dress and literally spent ALL my spare money on her, she was so cute and I got her some of the most gorgeous clothes. I had had a very busy and reasonably high-powered job at a very senior level before she was born. It was in a creative field so I never needed suits etc or a 'corporate' look but I spent a lot on clothes and was often complimented as being stylish etc. Then I became a sahm for 5 years and I struggled to dress myself in a way I was happy with for my new role. It was easier to dress dd iykwim? So there were many, many days where she was immaculate and often stupidly expensively dressed and I was a lot more 'thrown together' looking. I realised this one day when she was about 3 & we were walking along and I caught a glimpse of us in a shop mirror. She looked like she ought to have been someone else's daughter. Someone far more groomed than I was.

Shallow though it may sound, that was a sort of catalyst for me to get out of the rut of very casual skinny jeans and converse etc and I saved a bit of money and that Autumn I treated myself to a sort of capsule winter wardrobe from Jigsaw - it was amazing - I felt like I had re-found the 'old, stylish me' but they were all things I could wear casually as opposed to work type things.

I was very happy for the next couple of years and really saw the value in investing in a few items for myself each season and building on having a nice sahm wardrobe and in sales etc adding to some 'nice going out' outfits so when I did go out I wasn't put off by not having anything suitable to wear. Funnily enough, in all of this, finding shoes / footwear was one of the biggest challenges. I was so used to buying shoes for work!

Then dd got bigger and more interested in selecting her own clothes and she discovered H&M and my influence weakened over her. It is very sweet in some ways to see her emerging personality, buy my god I have to bite my lip over some of the more 'creative' looks she comes up with.

I was literally just thinking this morning that I need to get her some new spring / summer clothes as she is looking very dishevelled these days.

I recently went back to work, as a director of an organisation and need ot dress for this - smart causal is perfect but I have been buying a lot for myself over the past few months and I am looking very smart so now, again she looks like she ought to be someone else's daughter, but for the opposite reason!!!

It's hard to dress a 9 year old though.