Office discussion - what was your high school uniform and how was it worn?

Black blazers with gold stripes, matching ties. We looked like bees.

We had quite a flexible uniform (early 1980s).

We could wear either the school skirt or a real kilt in any tartan. Tights and socks could be green or fawn (all specific uniform items).

We could wear either a shirt and tie or a polo neck (September - April) or checked summer blouse (May - October). In addition, you could have a V-neck jumper or cardigan.

I usually wore the polo neck, v-neck and cardigan (because it was always freezing), then the summer blouse plus cardigan. I wore the skirt most days, but my kilt on AF days (just in case ). I really only wore my shirt and tie for more formal occasions or going out somewhere.

When I wore my tie, I just wore it normally, but there were a few girls who went to extremes. The swots wore their tie in a peanut, the cool gang super big.

Grey skirt (changed to black in year 4...sorry year 10)
White blouse
Bright red jumper or cardigan. (often managed to accidentally leave red jumper in the washing machine and wear a maroon one instead).

Boys wore black or grey trousers, white shirt, tie in house colour and grey or red jumper.

Uniform changed the year after I left to black skirt/trousers, black blazer, white shirt and house tie. To think I hated my uniform, but I was glad we could purchase the items from fashion shops and didn't look like clones in the renewed uniform!

Girls- Blue checked blouse, 'French' navy skirt and 'gold' cardigan in first and second year. No tie.

The boys had a white shirt, black trousers and grey jumper with a French navy and gold striped tie.

Black blazers were optional (and only worn by a select few, poor buggers.)

Third to fifth year

Girls blue or gold blouse, navy cardigan or v neck jumper, french navy skirt. No tie. (As girls don't wear ties to work, seemed sensible)

Boys, blue or white shirt, royal blue or grey jumper, black trousers and same tie.

The change was supposed to mark our progress through the school.

No uniform in the sixth form! Whoopee, except we all wore jeans and a jumper!

Fucking maroon.

This is over 20 years ago now but I still shudder at the sight of fucking maroon.

Maroon polyester skirt, with maroon v-necked polyester jumper and blue or white blouse. Maroon and grey tie optional for girls. No above-the-knee socks, even when it was snowing outside (now that is a human rights abuse, in retrospect).

Christ it was disgusting.

It wasn't smart. It wasn't nice. It was an infantile attempt to treat teenagers as prepubescents by forcing them into clothes no sane adult would wear.

I went through a hippy phase in the lower sixth and got told off for having a skirt that was too long! Hell there was no pleasing those teachers!

Sometime after I left the school sensibly abandoned its maroon insanity in favour of black, with trousers optional for girls.

My DC don't have a uniform, it's unheard of in the country where we live, and the situation is so much better. Treat kids like individual human beings and they're so much more likely to act like mature people. The idea that kids should wear uniform because it gives them something harmless to rebel against is frankly pathetic. There's a school t-shirt/sweatshirt which can be worn on a voluntary basis, and is encouraged for photos and events, but surely kids are going to feel so much more positive about their school if they're comfortable in what they're wearing. By the way, the kids without uniform are much less likely to wear outrageous make-up and obscenely-high skirts, because clothes are just not an issue. Most of the time they wear jeans and a top/jumper.

No uniform - 1970s, well no jeans till 6th form but that was it.

And yknow what- I was a dorky un fashionable swat, but was never bullied for my clothing at least.

The thing about children - especially teenagers - is that some of them simply have to bend the rules about something. So, if you have strict uniform rules, they have something that can be bent a bit without causing real harm - ooh, look at that tie, ooh, my skirt is rolled up 2". If they don't have this sort of rule, they'll have to break one which matters such as smoking.

Ours was black and white. It was a "new" school when I joined in year 7 and they did start by having lots of school logo embroidered sweatshirts and stripey ties which we were all encouraged to buy. Nobody did, so by year eight my uniform was:

Black cord trousers
White polo shirt
Black jumper
Black boots

By year 11 I'd funked it up a bit and wore:

Black pleated skirt (so short but I had good legs so hey!)
Black opaques
White sweater shop roll neck
Black Fruit of the Look sweater
Clumpy heeled Kickers

This was early nineties.

Green v-neck jumped with school badge
White blouse
Green pleated skirt (knee length)
White socks/white or black tights
Black shoes

I never thought it was too bad for a school uniform, as there was no tie.

follyfoot - that's almost exactly how my school uniform was too, without the purse belt or a blue shirt option - either white or cream in our case. Plus in the winter either red or green knee high woolly socks! Grim. Urgh - I never wear bottle green now either.

Primary school the uniform was optional (grey skirt/trousers, grey blazer with purple trim; shirt and grey/purple striped tie.)

Secondary - an A-line v-neck tunic made of some sort of polyester in a blue somewhere between navy and royal, worn over a nylon blouse - pale small blue checks. The 6th formers had a grey tunic in a slightly nicer fabric. socks or tights - which in those days (70s) were brown 'nylons'. The tunics looked dreadful at regulation length, pretty bad after you'd grown an inch or two, and then most girls tried to keep them for as long as possible so they'd get really short (no possibility of hitching up a tunic). To complete the look, this was the era of clumpy platform shoes.

Harris tweed brown skirt
Beige shirt
Brown jumper
Beige socks and Emily shoes ( until age 16, yes really !)
Brown clock on weekdays and coat and boater on Sundays

Red, grey and black kilt supposed to be below the knee.
Red and black tie
White shirt
Grey jumper.

I used to wear my skirt rolled up but my tie was always tied properly!

We had a navy polyester skirt and then a spotty cotton shirt that wasn't too bad but was sadly replaced by a pale blue polyester blouse. I expect it looked OK on the 11 year olds but as soon as we all got hips you got this lovely bulge around the middle and my blouse was too short to tuck in for which I was always being told off. AS the teachers wore whatever the hell they liked this was extremely annoying. I think we had blazers too but I can't remember (obviously not so annoying!)

So in short it was worn badly. I only really rebelled with my choice of shoes, going for shoes stuck together with tape for quite a while and then when a fuss was kicked up opting for huge DMs.

My poor big sister got to wear bright pink!

I am so glad my children can wear whatever they like to school with no stupid arguments. dd wears jeans, a t-shirt and hoody mostly. Much more comfortable mainly because they actually fit.

Very formal and very strict Catholic school, we had to walk past 4 teachers every morning, two on each side who pulled you up on any uniform issues

It had to be all from the school outfitters, our uniform was of a colour that wasn't fashionable or available in any high street shop.

No make-up or hair gel etc, if you dared, and you would have to be crazy, they made you wash it off/out in the cold water from the school sinks, and used that awful soap so you smelled bad all day.

Some people tried it on with the ties but were soon dealt with.

In a way I am totally grateful for that because it meant we were all the same, so there was less for bullies to pick on. And any bullying was dealt with very fast and effectively because all the kids were crapping themselves over being punished. The Nuns and Priests were particularly scary

My DC attend the secondary school I went to, the uniform was less formal when I went (late 80s). We wore grey skirts any style, plue shirts or blouses, and royal blue jumpers or cardis. Boys had to wear ties, I remember them tying them the wrong way round, so the skinny end hung down, and tucking the wider end in.

I remember wearing a knee length pencil skirt and a huge baggy cardi, I thought I looked fab!

Did anyone else get sent to the toilets to wash off their make-up?
We were only allowed 'natural' make-up, but I had a thing about bright eyeshadow.

Grey skirt (you could have a black skirt in the fifth year)
White shirt
School tie
Grey cardigan or jumper.
Blazers were optional for girls but compulsory for boys.
Grey or white socks or tights (Grey or black socks for boys)
Black shoes

First year it was maroon or black jumpers, black or maroon or white t shirts, black trousers.
Second year it changed to nothing - this was in 2004, mind, when that wasn't common!
Third year onwards it changed to black and white - anything you liked, as long as it was black and white in colour. So girls would come in wearing gypsy skirts or shorts or dresses etc, boys came in wearing trackies and white hoodies..
In sixth year (agd 17/18) we had to wear black trousers or skirt, plus a black or white blouse, plus a maroon blazer and tie for posh days..

They have apparently changed the uniform now and 1-5th year have to wear a school sweatshirt plus smart trousers/skirt. Sixth year have to wear tie and blazer get up every day..

None of the schools I went to had one (60/70s freedom )

Knee length bottle green skirt, White blouse, Green v neck jumper, Fawn knee socks or tights, Brown lace up shoes. Also a blazer with green & brown stripes.

Yuck.

Navy blue knee legnth skirt, white socks, black or brown shoes. Navy blue cardigan or navy jumper with red stripes around the neck and cuffs.

White shirt with navy and red tie.

Navy blazer and navy coat.

Summer uniform - pink gingham dress.

BUT

when you became a senior (what is now yr 10+11) you had a different tie and you could also wear an open necked shirt in summer instead of the dress.

Summer uniform could only be worn after easter until the summer holidays.

They got rid of the hats a year or two before I started.

Navy long skirt, white blouse, navy and maroon tie, maroon jumper, navy blazer, white terry towelling ankle socks and a boater. It was an all girls school but just as i started the boaters started to disappear thank goodness. In the fifth year it changed to navy jumper. And we were supposed to have navy school pants. Yuk. This was the 80's and i can still remember those socks. There were no trousers allowed in those days, but towards the end a lot of Asian girls came wearing trousers and any old tie (we were sure they were their Dads) and obviously a lot of girls wanted to wear trousers but was told no. Just after that the uniform included trousers but i had left by then. Primary school was worse - uniform wasn't compulsory then but if wanted it was brown and gold. Lovely.

Black trousers, white polo short, maroon sweater. Ingenious in that there was literally no possible way to customise or adapt it