what’s something that absolutely ISN’T posh but you thought it was?

[WrSad]

I would say

Having 3 bathrooms

I had never used hair conditioner until I left home at 18.

Pesto.
Kale.
Gin and tonic
Avocado.

@Rupertbeartrousers

Napkin rings

Napkins, let alone napkin rings, are something i still consider posh! I use paper towel 😂

@draughtycatflap

Lube instead of spit... 😂

😩

The Grand Hotel in Scarborough

@Bangable Thank you.Thought I was going bonkers for a mo. I mean I did think people with gold taps in their bathroom and bidets were posh!
No moving onto hotels the Norbrek in Blackpool (could have got the spelling wrong) and there was another one in Torquay!! We used to have to wear a long dress to an event one night!

The first time I went to a friends house when at high school, I couldn’t believe that she had matching curtains and bedding and a sink in her bedroom. We not only had strawberries and ice cream for pudding without it being a special occasion, but the ketchup was in a squeezy bottle and was Heinz.

My DD came back from her friend's house when she was little and announced that her friend was "soo posh". When I asked why she said it was because she had a mantelpiece. We'd only lived in houses without fireplaces. We have one now and I still look at it and and smile and think how posh I must be

Lladro ornaments
The Natural History Museum
Crocheted doilies
Pickled silverskin onions

The weirdest one was that I believed that being Catholic was a definite marker of poshness. The only reason I can think I believed this is that I went to a CofE church school and only knew two Catholics who were both quite well to do

And I always thought the exact opposite Anglicans are posh.
I'm of Irish Catholic background. Everyone I knew who was posh in my eyes was CofE. Even the royal family is CofE so I associated CofE with poshness. Even their words for services seemed posh to me - still do really "Evensong" "Holy Eucharist" and some hymns being called "anthems" when we Catholics had Mass and hymns and that's it!
The church music seemed posh to me too - choirs with children in robes and all that.

As I've got older I've realized that there are Anglicans from all groups in society!

When I was a teenager I thought it posh and aspirational to own a white BMW .

I didn't to to uni but managed to get a really well paid job and by the time i was early 20s I was earning 30k a year. I decided to get a BMW but my friend's boyfriend had one and he let me have a go. I was so disappointed. My car at the time was a top of the range Ford Escort with alloys, CD player, electric windows and his BMW looked fab on the outside but the interior was awful and plasticky. Manual windows, a tape deck and normal wheels. I was so put off. I stuck to my lovely Escort and have never since been tempted by a fur-coat-no-knickers car

Meant to explain- I realise the interior stuff and alloys were added extras and was appalled that you would pay out so much for a "luxury" car and then be expected to pay more for what I considered quite basic fittings. I like to get my money's worth (I now drive a 19 Suzuki Balerno and it's white, posh or what!!)

first thought was a tidy house.

Eating in a restaurant - remember going for Chinese food on NYE and feeling really posh.

Staying in hotels. We never did it, but our posh relations did. Ditto flying and foreign holidays.

Having games and puzzles all neatly stacked, with all the pieces there. We had cousins who lived like this and I thought they were super posh.

@Frodont least glamorous hobby ever. I came home stinking of piss, having lifted my own body weight in pellets, mucked out, made haynets, got wet filling up his bucket. The mud is shocking currently, despite being at the top of a hill. I remember coming out of my wellies numerous times, tiger crawling across a very slippy wet patch in the field. So posh!

Broadsheet newspapers
Houses with names instead of numbers
People with jobs that didn't involve either getting dirty or cleaning up after somebody else

In the same vein as Vienetta

Ferrero Rocher.

Ambassador you are really spoiling us...

Prawn cocktail with a Rose Marie sauce.

The day I found out that was just made out of ketchup and salad cream I was amazed. I thought that was the height of sophistication as a kid.

My friends mum had a hostess trolley and a lazy Susan as well.

They were terribly terribly posh and took some delight in my bafflement at their ways. I remember when she told me off for putting my hand in the cereal packet 'in our house we pour it from the Tupperware container' and for putting my knife in the jam jar 'do you not have jam spoons!'

I once met someone who thought Scarborough was posh, god knows why

This is a great thread, and has really made me reflect on how I thought/felt as a kid.

I vividly remember 2 outfits I got for upcoming weddings. They were put in the wardrobe (otherwise empty if my memory serves me right!) and looked at multiple times a day. It could have not have been a very common occurrence to have new clothes. Yet every time I saw cousins (on both sides) they were dressed impeccably in matching outfits, all of which looked brand new to me.

We went on caravan or chalet holidays to a seaside town, which was most exciting. As an adult I googled it and it is only 33 miles from our home, yet felt exotic. Other, older relatives stayed in a hotel, and I swore when I grew up I would go there and stay in one too. I haven't yet done it, but I will.

Having a toaster

@ThePluckOfTheCoward

A couple of things listed by other posters has reminded me of a couple of other things that I considered posh: real butter - we used large tubs of the cheapest margarine Mum could find and when we made sandwiches the rule was to "spread it on and scrape it off". Real cream was a luxury and a treat which we might have a couple of times a year, usually when my richer aunt and uncle visited in the summer and bought fresh strawberries and cream with them for all of us - heaven. Also ski yoghurt was far too expensive for us and therefore "posh?

Someone upthread mentioned Piat D'Or wine😲. I'd completely forgotten about it until now.

Are we related? That's exactly when I first tasted fresh cream and real butter. Our aunt had married a senior officer after the war and they had afarm, she had a fur coat. They used to visit bringing their year's worth of Reader's Digests (Thank you, Improve Your Vocabulary) and cast off clothes which I as a teenager wore. We were also confused by her expectation that my younger siblings should have a bath every evening and it would be fun to bathe them.

I never knew that toasters existed until I left home to work in hotels. But we did always have one of those plastic lemon juices because it kept without a fridge and we only used it on Pancake Day. When else would you need lemons or have pancakes? So fresh lemons still seem quite posh to me. Oh and when I went to University as a mature student and met people who drank wine every day Piat D'Or seemed very sophisticated. Still don't eat pancakes.

Which sparks another memory as a mature student I was asked by a tutor what to order in a Chinese restaurant because I had mentioned working in hotels previousy. I had no idea. Had never been to one or an Indian or had any takeaway. Pizzaland was the height of sophistication to me then.

New clothing (the only new things I had as a child were underwear and shoes) , having dessert , eating takeaway food , restaurants , holidays , fizzy drinks , owning (and not renting) a television , fresh fruit , salad , shower gel rather than a bar of soap.

It's only as an adult that I realised that the reason we were poor was due to my dad's alcoholism. My children have all of the things I have listed above and we don't have a high income.