I was embarrassingly underdressed

[Peridotty]

We had a Christmas photo shoot for our class (I am a graduate student). We had photos done in front of a nice building. I turned up in an old jumper, black jeans and converse shoes whereas everyone else was dressed in corporate gear (suits, ties, nice dresses and heels or brogues). I stuck out like a sore thumb and I am so embarrassed! I saw the photos and because I am wearing white and everyone else was wearing grey, navy, black I was also very eye catching. I keep cringing inside. The memo was to dress nice but I thought wearing a suit would be overkill for the Christmas photo so I wore a jumper and jeans instead.
Do you think you would be cringing ?

You should have worn a Santa jumper, and maybe a Santa hat, you would have been colourful. and all the others quite boring.

Oh come on OP, it wouldn't kill you to get a few smartish tops from Primark. It is very unusual for an adult to own so few clothes.

Your outfit looked ok except for the Converse shoes
Quite possibly - but what kind of nerd studies a christmas group photo to examine what shoes people are wearing?
Assuming that OP is in the front row AND peoples feet are included in the photo.

She say herself that she has seen the photos and that she stuck out like a sore thumb in her class of five students.

@ddl1, smart casual lies somewhere between what the OP wore and what someone might wear to an important interview.

I’m always surprised at how corporate US medical students look on twitter. I think every day of med school is a job interview from their perspective.

MY DS is a US medical student.
For lectures and labs he is required to wear certain types of clothing. He has scrubs for some classes and for others he has to wear his white coat with smart casual trousers, shirt and tie.
For all his rotations so far he has had to wear dress shoes, trousers, belt, starched shirt, a dignified tie, and white coat over that. The exception so far has been psychiatry, where belts were forbidden. There are also personal hygiene requirements.

Every day of med school is indeed an interview. This is because nine out of ten medical students in the US will not end up doing general practice (family medicine). There is intense competition for residencies in specialties other than pediatrics and family medicine because they pay more and many med students have taken out significant loans to go to med school ($250K and up for some over the four years).

@DameFanny, dressing 'nice' means dressing formally in American parlance. It's akin to 'scrubbing up'. The idea is not to look as you do every day.

Well it's done now 🤷🏻‍♀️
Forgive yourself OP & move on.
Life is too short.

If you do care - and you must, or else you would not have posted here, then you might want to buy a couple of outfits that give you more options. They can be cheap and drab, used or new, but they give you choices. There is a lot of room between a wrinkled dress and a formal suit. The outfit you chose is not going to do you any favors if you are entering the workforce. It does not qualify as 'work casual' or 'smart casual' but it is fine for home sloppy.

Clothes maketh the man is bullshit, but they certainly maketh an impression. You need to decide what that is for you.

Agree 100% @2018SoFarSoGreat

Clothes are not just for keeping you warm.

Are you comfortable with getting ahead in your career, @Peridotty?

I've made similar mistakes in the past OP, now if in doubt I always go by the rule that it's better to be overdressed than underdressed!

Well,it happens and although trainers and jeans was a bit inanppropriate, it sounds the rest of the group was dressed going to a funeral.Britain is very very conservative when it comes to clothing.Other countries are much more colourful,cheerful dressers.forget about it,its not life threatening.

Come on don’t use the I have a baby excuse. Most of us on here have babies. I still dress nice when the occasion calls for it (I’ve been up since 4am and when I go out for dinner later I’ll be dressed appropriately) You can’t use a baby as a get out of jail free card for everything!

[quote Peridotty]@Chickychoccyegg the problem is that I really don’t own much in between jeans and suit. I don’t go out to nice places, I live in scrubs every day. I only own 1 dress, 2 jumpers and 3 pairs of jeans.[/quote]
Sounds like you need to go shopping then, sales are coming up so make sure you top up wardrobe of yours.

@Cowpad the rest of the group are not British. They were dressed in black, grey, burgundy...

@ThinWomansBrain

Your outfit looked ok except for the Converse shoes Quite possibly - but what kind of nerd studies a christmas group photo to examine what shoes people are wearing? Assuming that OP is in the front row AND peoples feet are included in the photo.

Nice language there thin. I'd suppose the type of person who is responding to a thread with a query about an outfit to an event, would study a photograph of said outfit at the event?

* You wore old, very casual clothes and did not participate in all the photos. I would not be impressed by your behaviour if were your boss.*

^This

Oh come on OP, it wouldn't kill you to get a few smartish tops from Primark. It is very unusual for an adult to own so few clothes.
Yes, never mind the environment – buy some cheap cotton tat from Primark to satisfy a random on Mumsnet. OP already has a smart option, she just didn’t wear it.

[quote mathanxiety]@DameFanny, dressing 'nice' means dressing formally in American parlance. It's akin to 'scrubbing up'. The idea is not to look as you do every day.[/quote]
But she's a medic not an office manager, not in the US, and office clothes are mostly naff unless you can afford decent fabrics and are in the ~20% of the population that's the same proportions as the manufacturer's fit models. Why do that to yourself if you don't have to? And she already said she saw it as a prompt to those who hadn't been there last year. If anything, they overdressed.

And why should students at Oxford dress for an interview at Wernham Hogg?

@drpet49

* You wore old, very casual clothes and did not participate in all the photos. I would not be impressed by your behaviour if were your boss.*

^This

What's her boss got to do with it? This isn't a work thing, and bosses shouldn't be rating people on their appearance unless a. they've made a clear dress code and b. they pay enough for decent clothes within that dress code without compromising other living budgets

No worries OP, it is just clothes, nothing important.
It is a shame it made you feel embarrassed.
Most people in my field would not dress up cocktail or party style for a Christmas photo. More casual-smart would be it. Possibly Christmassy jumpers in UK, in my generation. But younger ones seem to give more importance to how they dress. I think they enjoy the change from old comfy sporty gear to some suit and smart dresses.
I think you need to add some bits to your wardrobe. An office style shirt with smart black or blue trousers would have been nice. Maybe a blazer if it is cold. It is quite a code proof outfit. It will fit with almost any range of smart to casual.

@SummerHouse

Who cares. You are the casual Christmas angel promoting kindness to feet and comfort in the workplace. You are a message that it's not about what you dress in but how you do your job. You are a lesson in everyone being different, inside and out. Own it baby!

@SummerHouse Love this!!

You wore a dress last year so you knew exactly what the deal was. Don't know why you're pretending otherwise. You literally said the only reason you didn't want to wear the dress was because you wore it last year, so instead you wore an old jumper and converse? Okay.

Can’t do anything about it now, so stop beating yourself up about it OP.
‘Dress nice’ is a vague instruction, to me that could range anything from smart casual to cocktail and everything in between. Next time ask them to be more specific!!

I’ve attached a little pic of what I was wearing in the photo.

Looks alright to me. It probably only stands out because it is very light coloured. You’d have also stood out if you’d worn a beige suit.

If I saw this I’d just see someone who stands out from the crowd, ploughs their own path. That’s never a bad thing.

@Cheerbear24

Can’t do anything about it now, so stop beating yourself up about it OP. ‘Dress nice’ is a vague instruction, to me that could range anything from smart casual to cocktail and everything in between. Next time ask them to be more specific!!

The guy who sent the instruction is literally not the boss of her or anyone else, just another medical student. Why should anyone think that it's a choice between scrubs and office wear? Clothing has been getting ridiculously prescriptive recently - like how wedding guests are shunned for not wearing cocktail dresses, or picking a floral something with a white or pale base (not you do not look like a bride ffs).

It's ridiculous, and encourages overconsumption of clothes - mostly non-biodegradable plastics that'll then turn up in your sea salt - made by people on slave wages that don't even look nice most of the time.

I'm all for a capsule wardrobe - and yes I do have a funeral dress because there's been a spate of them recently - but the idea of having to have an outfit for every occasion dreamt up by an indoctrinated idiot who mustn't be able to recognise decent fit our they wouldn't be suggesting that more people make themselves feel fat not because they are but because half an inch more or less back length makes everything else hit in exactly the wrong place...