To think boys clothing in high street shops sucks?

[Squareroot]

Two boys, 10 & 7. Am a firm believer in using our high street shops - use it or lose it and all that. But on a trip to Exeter this week (John Lewis, H&M, Next, Debenhams) I couldn't find anything COLOURFUL for my boys. Everything is drab - black, grey, brown, grey... there is NO colour. Contrast that with the girls sections and it just seems wrong. Girls get pink, red, yellow, blue, green, multi colours! I want to support our high street retailers but really struggled to find anything fun and just ended up coming home & going online. A friend recommended Five Boys & St Berts. Anyone got any other suggestions - apart from Boden, which I love but can't justify...

I completely forgot, my favourite one because my USA friend sends stuff across and I have ordered from them myself. OshKosh...

www.oshkosh.com/home?id=oshkosh

Absolutely agree!👍🏻
I have boy and girl and it's a struggle.😖
The clothes for boys is colourless and depressing...navy, grey, green, dark red and the pattern is usually hideous too...🤷🏻‍♀️😣
On the other side girls clothes is very colourful with a lots of gorgeous pattern, ruffles, bows etc...Almost in every single shop.🤷🏻‍♀️
But there are some places which selling a lovely and colourful clothes for boys- Next, Boden, Jojo maman bebe, Pumpkin patch. These are my favourite, but it may be a little pricey, depends on your budget.🤷🏻‍♀️

I also love Boden but it's unaffordable for us to regularly buy new from, so I buy nearly all of our childrens' clothes from the Boden preloved fb group. The Jojo preloved group is also fab.

You can be picky with the condition and only buy 'EUC' stuff. Better ethically and better for my purse strings! Plus it all gets posted to your house thus saving time.

It's ridiculous how expensive Boden is, isn't?😣

I like fatface for my Ds who is 8.

He's got a lovely vibrant green hoodie amongst others, bright tshirts and tops with glow in the dark on them.

It washes brilliantly and lasts really well. DS says is very comfortable to wear.

I find a lot of the Zara next and h and m stuff for boys this age is too grown up and too fashionable. I don't want him looking like a mini teenager.

I find that the under 6's section in shops like next, asda and sainsburys is lovely and colourful but the older boys range is all sludge colours. I have a 5 year old who has SN and wears 6-7 clothes. He doesn't want to dress like a teenager.

Po.p kids wear mostly has fun prints / good colours

www.polarnopyret.co.uk
Above average prices (same as boden?) But amazing quality.

20% off at the mo so a great time to give it a try

I'm with you OP.
The colourful, fun stuff definitely disappears once you get into the 8 above age group

This is bob on. All the posters saying supermarket stock is lovely and bright aren't realising that their boys are still 3 or 18 months and clothes are still mostly okay at that age. It's when they're older and leave the cutesy stage, suddenly all there is are sludge colours and images of dinosaurs, electric guitars/skateboards or skeletons/skulls.

The only exceptions seem to be character t shirts, and not everyone's got the budget for Minecraft...

Frugi! 90% of my kids wardrobe is frugi. tge rest is scandi (eczema means polyester is a no go)

So whilst I wholeheartedly agree that choice in boys clothes are limited and super dull....my 9 and 7 year olds WANT sludge and camo. And sports brands. They absolutely wouldn't be seen dead in fruigi or Boden. They want Nike and football strips. Now that's depressing!!

I do like uniqlo though for a few brighter bits

I agree OP.

Boden has colours but super expensive...

I actually wrote about this to a children’s clothing company (which has since disappeared from the high st) some years ago, about the dull colours and the fact that the boys section wasn’t equal in size to the girls section.
They replied saying it was something they’d take into consideration and in the meantime would I accept a £10 voucher. When I went into the shop to spend it the manager was called to the till and she banned me, saying that if I wasn’t satisfied with their clothing then they didn’t want me as a customer.

What noodles said. The supermarkets and high street are fine up to age 8-10, in fact I have plenty of friends with girls who’d buy boys T-shirts etc as they were a lot more neutral. But beyond that... it’s all street-style, black / grey / sludge, with fluorescent graffiti or skulls. Both my DSs are really tall for their age, and wearing clothes a few sizes up: I don’t want to put my 7yrold in a black hoody with “Street Punk” scrawled across it!

Primark actually has bright coloured long-sleeved tops, but the quality is dire - a couple of washes and they shrink upwards and stretch outwards and go all boxy.

I recently got some lovely bright things for DS in age 6-8 at h&m. Notably the bright orange tiger jumper and the blue jumper with brightly coloured sharks and sequins. I'd look harder in h&m, it did take a little while to find them. They're good for plain brightly coloured hoodies too.

I find outdoors shops best for my sons. Their t-shirts still tend to be quite fun and colourful and the ranges cover the whole children's age group rather than being split with younger/ older. I am buying less and less from the supermarkets. This season the age 5+ row of Nutmeg looks like the Berlin Wall. I can't remember the last time I bought in the High Street stores.

What irritates me with a very sludgy look, particularly for coats, is that it's dangerous for children walking around in the winter when their clothing blends in to the road and bush colours. I want traffic to have its best chance of being aware of them.

If you're in London head to
Reserved on Oxford St (where BHS once was) or check out their online store. They're a polish brand that's just opened in the U.K. and does kids clothes in a range of bright colours and prices are around the George mark. Some of the boys clothes are so colourful that DS looks rather Euro in them! Their adults' clothes are good too.

Ah just seen you're in Exeter so it'll be the online store in that case!

OMG check out smallable.com its a family concept store and has the most beautiful, non-black, non-"cool" boy clothes! its pretty pricy but sales and discounts you know. service and delivery are good and quality is great. maybe a nice treat once they stop growing every day or if you have youngers

This is why I buy Ted Baker whenever there’s a sale.

Almost 100 posts on this subject, and although I didn't read all of them completely, I only noticed one that actually mentioned anything about what the boys in questions actually might want! That's you @chalkyc2

These companies aren't making clothes for parents, they're for kids. Why not start by showing your sons what's there and asking them? My son only ever complains about ridiculous sizing, not about colour.

There's certainly many times more choice now than there ever was when I was 10!

A lot of the girls stuff are those colours at the moment as well. What’s with all the GREY? But H&M, Zara, Next, Jojo, Sainsburys, M&S all have nice coloured stuff in atm.

Boden and montslon both have nice stuff for older boys

@nornironrock I imagine most posters are saying that there isn’t a lot of choice for their sons because the colours are mostly sludge!

Finding clothes for men is hardest. I can name loads and loads of clothes shops that are solely for women and there are plenty of shops where there is a far greater range for women than for men (yes, White Stuff, I'm looking at you with 10% of your space in our local for men's clothes). The only "men only" clothing shops now appear to be places that only sell suits and shirts. Where I live, and there's a pretty good high street, the only place to buy men's clothes unless you want a suit is M&S or John Lewis or Next. In M&S, the women's clothes take up about ten times the space the men's do, the kids about four times.