to think this nursery is the very embodiment of gentrification in London?

[roundaboutsroundabouts]

I won't name the group of nurseries as I don't know if that's allowed (is it?) but I've just seen them referenced on instagram by a scandi toy brand. They are all in vair gentrified hipster parts of London and the fees are fcking EXTORTIONATE - £90 a day for the under-threes. I know that isn't unusual in London (although in my much cheaper part of London I only pay £55 a day). It holds a "curated" "programme" of monthly "events" (including pilates). The children get a daily smoothie - tomorrow's is beetroot, banana, ginger, berry, lemon and hemp. It describes itself as "design-led" and it's all vair tasteful scandi wooden toys in neutral colours. Design led?! Why does a NURSERY need to be "design-led"?!

You just know that everyone who sends their child there is going to have an ombre "lob", wear clothes from Arket, carry a fjallraven kanken backpack, own a bugaboo or a babyzen yoyo, dress said children in varying sludge colours from Mini Rodini, and have linen bedding in their Victorian Terraced house with white painted floorboards and scandi style planters.

I am BVU I know. But it is so irritating. I grew up in London, the child of an immigrant, and I feel like it's just an endless line of artisan coffee shops and overpriced farmers' markets these days.

It's lovely if you're one of the ones in the high income bracket...I am not and can understand it living in Peckham. However, London has been getting like this for the last 10-20 years!! They really just want inner London for the rich and well off and outer London and beyond for everyone else. Those places are filled with bugmen and hipsters, awful places!

Why do women always get shot down with the 'jealous' label when they have an unpopular opinion which includes some criticism?

And bitter. Women who question things are jealous and bitter on MN.

@JQBased outer London for those that want massive houses and garages to hide their fancy rides ;)

Onestep

I see nothing wrong with that clown dress, provided that you are the child wearing it and unable to see what's on the front! It's the other kids that you need to worry about when the little girl wearing it innocently chases after her friends. Come to think of it, I might get one for my DD. Sat at a noisy overcrowded play place. We could do with emptying the place out a bit.

This is an interesting thread. I haven't been able to find the nursery (in fairness I haven't tried terribly hard).

I would see your point but the repeated use of "vair" has put my back up. I am probably the sort of person that you describe but I don't know anyone who would say "vair" - I'd think of that as a more Kensington / Chelsea / Knightsbridge thing. However, it's quite possible that people who live there wouldn't say it either.

I wonder if the emphasis on "design-led" and a "curated programme" means that they don't have a lot of outside space (and aren't going to get more outside space). Therefore they are doing the best with what they do have - you notice unattractive, plastic toys and furniture a lot more in a smallish space.

The people who have written that in their children's nurseries, the children get to muck out pigs / play with chickens / build dens in the woods are missing the point a bit. These things all sound lovely but are not available to children living in central London, any more than the museums in south Kensington are available to children in the Isle of Wight. So instead they get the children who go to the nursery to do yoga and learn some Mandarin (it's possible that a few children already speak at least one language at home - most of the children at my daughter's school speak a second language).

£90 a day is not extortionate for London. For the most expensive nurseries, you have to book a visit to be given a price list.

If I was going to buy my children fancy clothes, I'd go to Bonpoint.

Why processed food I wonder? But scandi and wooden toys are probably in most nurseries, you have heard of brio right?

When people post things that sound jealous and bitter, is it surprising that people suggest they might be jealous and bitter?

Ah OP YANBU

but this is the kind of daft shit I miss now I’ve moved from SW London to the friggin boonies

DS goes to a wooden toy/organic food/forest schooly nursery...lots of the little boys are dressed in George at Asda though (I know because DS has many of the same jumpers as his nursery friends)

Why would you put on nice clothes for nursery? DC come home muddy and painty everyday.

I agree that it'd be good for DC to mix more with DC from different backgrounds but in practice its hard to do. In my city there are only 2 LA day nurseries, everything else is private. Plus, people tend to pick nurseries that are near their houses don't they?

An unreasonable amount of class stereotyping going on here. I wonder how a post would be received that had a go at a nursery that looked a bit rough around the edges. We could speculate on the basis of zero evidence that all of the mother's had orange faces, were living off benefits, had four kids by five different fathers, lived in a council flat with a broken washing machine on the balcony and fed their kids and mixture of KFC, turkey twizzlers and Pepsi.

Err yes op, I do know what Instagram is, no need to be rude. I don’t look at anything on Instagram, I don’t have a Facebook account or twitter account either. You are not coming across as a very tolerant person

Haha love the ‘ombré lob’ mums description, to me that makes me think of most ‘insta-mummies’ I’ve seen online but not anything I recognise from real life. Live nowhere near London though.

Tbf you DO get a lot of unkind stereotyping of ‘lower-class’ people on here, a post only has to ask for opinions on a certain baby name or whether Butlins is worth visiting. So it works both ways.

£90 a day is not unusual. We have relatives paying £2k a month in London per baby or toddler for full time care.

Our own childcare out here in zone 5 of London cost 50% of each of net full time salaries when we had our first child in the 1980s. Childcare is just very expensive as is losing one full time wage to care for a child and often thereby sacrificing your career for life.

When people post things that sound jealous and bitter, is it surprising that people suggest they might be jealous and bitter?

That's your opinion though. It might sound those things to you. It doesn't to me. So where do we go from here? I'm right, you're wrong? You're right, I'm wrong? Or perhaps we're just different people with different views about things.

It's shitty to have a pop at someone simply because you view the world differently.

Will read the full thread later but for now I have an image of a nursery with lots of children, each with a bushy lumberjack beard.

I hear you OP.

I once viewed a nursery with artisan sausages on the menu. That was my tipping point we didn’t use the nursery!

Still paid £1k a month for not even full time care though.

as well as a plaid shirt and tiny can of craft beer @Mysterian

AppleKate: I once viewed a nursery with artisan sausages on the menu. That was my tipping point we didn’t use the nursery!

Hee hee, no rustic bread or craft (non alcoholic) beer?

Fiddlesticks akimbo, you've just described me :-)! I also sit on a chair outside the front door, smoking a fag, drinking tea, wearing a pinny with rollers in my hair under a hair net watching my kids playing loudly in the street (not really).

Seriously, the op is 'angered' because people pay a lot for a day nursery but I presume they can afford it, they and the children like it so what's the problem? It's not forever, kids aren't at nursery that long.

I doubt I'd have been able to afford somewhere like that, I earned quite well as did husband but we weren't fabulously wealthy, in fact were often hard up back in the day. However there were really good places locally so we didn't need to pay out an enormous amount, we were lucky. I have nothing against others who pay more, how people choose to spend their money is their business. The important thing is that the children are happy at the nursery.

I do know what Instagram is, no need to be rude.

Hey kettle, this is pot. You're black.

I work with young people, I don’t personally ‘use’ Instagram.

Maybe stop spending your spare time poring over fucking Instagram

Oh I totally would if I could afford it

I feel sorry for the bloody ‘hipsters’ having to live near you and your intolerance

ivestopped: Oh I totally would if I could afford it grin

What? You spend your spare time poring over f***g instagram (or even ordinary instagram)?

I didn't know it cost money to do that.
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Hipsters, when the word refers to people, are folk who are interested in new and unusual things. Hardly a crime. The op obviously isn't interested in new & unusual things. Perhaps we should encourage her to be more 'hip' or even 'woke'.