to think you can tell when someone is 'very' wealthy

[nothingbutsnow]

.....more due to how they behave, a sort of self possession than actual money signifiers like clothes, jewellery, etc?

By wealth I mean perhaps more than just well off.

It's something i thought about a few days ago in a garden centre, a family passed by us with teens and there was just something obvious yet not easily described. Clothes were sort of 'anti-mumsnet', like skinny jeans, bright tops, nothing remarkable visually. It made me realise I had observed this before but never thought much of it.
It was more a sort of looming self confidence, not especially pleasant, but noticeably interesting! Not rude or ignorant but disconnected from their surroundings enough to tread on your toes.
I've seen discussions on MN about such things in the past, and the difference in my experience has been they are rarely thin, but more buxom, tall, strident. The teen girl was in skinnies, tshirt and trainers (nothing remarkable) but she had an expression that I can't describe.

There doesn't seem to be an interest in trends at all, especially fashion.

People on here always say it is battered up old Barbour jackets, moth eaten cashmere and dog hair, but I think this is a stereotype rarely seen outside of the rural eccentric.
To me the give away is posture (not so much elegant as assertive), air of disinterest and a certain way of existing in/taking up space differently.

None of this is important, but it's something i noticed. Anyone agree that it is indefinable yet obvious?

Not sure what you count as super wealthy but my DH is in the top 4-5% of earners and I guarantee you wouldn’t spot him as such! He does have a disinterested air about him and is very likely to stand on your toes if you are not careful but that is more down to him being autistic.
I try to dress nicely but only standard high street. Never owned a Barbour or designer bag etc. But due to a lot of childhood/ early adult trauma I do not have a confident air about me.

What does it matter? What do you do with that information that someone is 'wealthy' ? !

I don't know a single wealthy woman with lash extensions.

We were waiting in an airport departure lounge to fly to America and there was a large, loud family, not causing trouble or anything but I remember thinking 'please don't be sat near us'. Well they weren't. We passed them as we walked through first class and they were getting comfortable in their individual bed/chairs. Served me right for judging.

good god calm down, im just throwing thoughts out, it cant be helped if you dont get my meaning. i refer to posture, confidence. Just breathe...

Exactly. I love a bit of whimsy, I do.

There is a difference between being extremely wealthy and being a high earner, although you can be both of course. Extremely wealthy is in my mind people who have inherited great wealth, like estates, multiple houses etc etc. Or the select band of footballers, musicians etc who have vast fortunes. I think those people do tend to look different. I am not one of those people, but I am a very high earner (top 1%). I dress like a bag lady when not at work. I used to dress nicely when I was young (not designer, more M&S, with some vintage bits), but now I am older and work nearly exclusively from home I dress like a bag lady. If you saw me in Tescos you wouldn't even notice me. I don't swish! (don't have the height or figure for it).

I was once in first class on a flight (long story, I wasn't paying). The people were the classic mix of very smart and a few men who literally looked like tramps.

Totally agree. It's an inner confidence. I've seen it.

“Very wealthy” people wouldn’t be in the garden centre. They’d pay a company to buy plants and maintain their garden and indoor plants. Even if they liked gardening, they’d send someone else to get the plants and equipment.

I once met a woman who was friends with the parents of one of my university friends. She asked me where I had bought the present that I brought along with me. I told her “Debenhams”. She looked at me quizzically and said “ah yes, I think I may have seen that shop once, I must try it one day!”

One of the parents at my son’s school is an international celebrity, with a vast fortune. The thing that makes her stand out is that you can tell all her clothes are dry-clean only. She often looks quite scruffy/normal hair and makeup-wise, but there is no mistaking the expensive threads.

If you are posh you don’t take your family to a garden centre

That's not true at all. I think you'd be surprised.

I can often tell when someone has upper or umc confidence. Whether they are wealthy or not is a different matter - sometimes yes sometimes no. Often I have no idea. Sometimes it becomes apparent.
Those who spend a lot - in whom I can see conspicuous consumption, again this doesn’t mean anything about whether they are wealthy or whether they are mired in debt, living way beyond means, etc.
I tend because of all this not to make any assumptions about wealth or poverty. Who knows ?

Most wealthy people I know are very ordinary, not flashy, you would never guess.

Actually yes, wealthy people do go to garden centres, what an odd concept to think they don’t. My neighbours are incredibly wealthy, think 11 cars, five million pound house, several acres of land, tennis courts, swimming pool, lots of expensive holidays, gardener, house keeper etc, and she loves gardening, loves it. It’s her passion. She’s always at the bloody garden centre, and will even drag her family to one if there’s a good one nearby and they are away for the weekend. She also buys lots of gardening stuff on line, goes on courses, gardening is her thing. The gardener does the heavy lifting, but she’s out there planting, pruning, potting, repotting, she grows everything, every kind of flower you can think of and her garden is beautiful. From the mass of lavender to the dahlias to the sweet peas and everything in between, the whole house is surrounded by potted plants and potted small trees all the way around it, and the patios crowded with them, and she must spend an absolute fortune every year on them.

I also know becayse she often comments when she’s been to a good garden centre, plus if they are away the postman often pops up with “live plants” for them which I take in and open up till they come back.

I definitely know wealthy and posh (different concepts) people who go to garden centres and with family in tow. How odd to think they don’t. ??

What do you mean by super wealthy? Annual family income of 200k or 5 mil in the bank?

We’re the former and we look rough as old boots as a family at times.

@CounsellorTroi

You can get loads of really nice clothes from charity shops, though. I've got a few bits from Comptoir des Cotonniers, including a cashmere jacket and a silk blouse. Cost me less than mass produced tat from H&M. I wear these with a long skirt (Whistles, fiver from a charity shop) and nice leather boots (I've had them since 2014) and floaty scarf. I think to get that sort of stuff from a charity shop you have to live in a pretty posh area to begin with.

I live in a very not posh area of London, but we do have a thing called public transport! There are also second hand apps so anyone living anywhere in the UK can buy nice clothes for hardly anything. Nobody would look at someone dressed head to toe in H&M polyester and think they were posh but I guarantee their outfit cost far more than mine.

@HeronLanyon

I definitely know wealthy and posh (different concepts) people who go to garden centres and with family in tow. How odd to think they don’t. ??

I think your concept of “very wealthy” and mine may be different. I assure you that the people who live in the 20 mil houses on the edge of Hampstead Heath (when they are not in Dubai or the Caribbean or the Soyh if France) or are not hanging out in the garden centre and are unlikely even to know where it is. Their gardens will be magically done by a company that is managed by their housekeeper. A five mil house is not what I’d call “very wealthy” in these parts. It’s “reasonably successful in the City”.

Bluntness100

I agree. There is a Duke that lives in palace in a huge estate just a mile from me- one of the largest landowners in Europe with massive wealth.
He is a familiar face in our local small town and is often seen in Greggs buying himself a steak bake or a couple of sausage rolls.
No airs or graces about him, chats to Greggs staff with ease.

@HaveringWavering a lot of those people are 'new money'. Believe me, I know some old money types, the type to live on country estates, and they absolutely do go to the garden centre, do their own gardening and walk around in muddy jeans and wellies.

The imagined lives of posh people according to mumsnetters sound absolutely wank. I love going to the garden centre!

But havering that just means we know very different people. I know people living with their front windows full of the Heath in multi million houses and they certainly spend a lot of time in garden centres. These are ‘serving’ judges/barristers not yet retired for whom the garden is a de stress time. I myself live very central on a street with eg 9 mill pound houses and garden centres are definitely a thing. We’re all different.

Lol at posh people don't go to garden centres

Isn't the point that posh/rich people can go wherever they choose, and do it with an air of confidence in the knowledge they have the time, money and basically (no matter how lovely they are) the god-given right to be there?

@MiddleParking the people I’ve worked for don’t have to go to garden centres because they have teams of gardeners that grow everything from seed. They used to occasionally potter down to the garden but fresh produce was brought up to the house for the cooks and flowers bought to the cutting room for the florists to arrange. Didn’t have much need for a garden centre!

It is why I am grateful I have an American accent. People can’t place me. We are not wealthy, but well off, but I do think some of it is confidence.

@nothingbutsnow so you saw a family in a shop. You invented that they were wealthy in your head and then posted about how you can tell people who are wealthy by their demeanour. I mean can you??? You’ve no idea if those people are wealthy at all… you just decided they were