To think so many middle-class clothes are ugly?

[RoyalFamilyFan]

I admit I am hardly a style guru. But when I joined Mumsnet people talked about lots of companies I had never heard of like Toast. So I followed links of clothes posted and looked at the websites mentioned. And was shocked at how ugly so much of the clothing was.
Shapeless grey dresses. Black loose trousers teamed with black tunics which make the model look like she is a member of a cult. Shapeless brown t-shirts.
They are just so ugly. AIBU?

This has made me laugh too! I actually like Toast, though I haven't bought from them for a while. They are beautifully made, though often tend towards oversized. I certainly would pair their wide trousers with something more fitted and style them differently. I also really like the Plumo Plum trousers and was looking at them this morning, though I appreciate they are not to most people's taste . They are also £££.

Toast seem to use a lot of fabric in each garment, maybe that contributes to the high prices. I ride everywhere & if I wore their clothes I reckon I'd be airborne pretty quickly.
I went in to the shop once and realised within about 2 seconds it really wasn't for me. 3 staff watching me and me the only customer. Rather than make a quick exit I felt I had to have a really good browse of all the racks, making all the right faces and looking at the labels before I could legitimately scarper. Bit gobsmacked at the prices tbh.
I can imagine some of the stuff looking good on some people but at the age of 48 I'm a total mish-mash when it comes to clothes and don't really have a style other than 'doing the garden' with matching hedge-hair

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow

I think Cos and Toast are minimalist in terms of design. So what people call shapeless, someone else might call architectural.

I love my Cos clothes. I was a design teacher though not an art teacher. There are huge differences.

I would describe Cos clothing as shapeless because the items are frequently badly cut and poorly made, as you would expect for the price.

@JaneJeffer Would you really wear that cult look? All she needs is a shaved head.

@BarbaraofSeville

If you want drab and shapeless at Matalan prices well here you are.

Really good winter dress.

@MrsWalrus

As I suspected there would be, there is plenty of wide eyed ‘clothes? Class? I don’t know if there is such a thing.’

A bit like people who insist they never even noticed that suchabody was Asian / black / in a wheelchair

I used to live in an extremely expensive city and the streets were littered with Toast, Monsoon, White Company, Seasalt, Sweaty Betty, Joules. Also a Whistles, Jigsaw, Hobbs.

Of course, there was a New Look and a Primark there too. But it’s daft to think if you go shopping in Blackpool or Bradford or somewhere the shops will be the same as in very affluent ones.

*I used to live in an extremely expensive city and the streets were littered with Toast, Monsoon, White Company, Seasalt, Sweaty Betty, Joules. Also a Whistles, Jigsaw, Hobbs.

Of course, there was a New Look and a Primark there too. But it’s daft to think if you go shopping in Blackpool or Bradford or somewhere the shops will be the same as in very affluent ones.*

The city doesn’t have to be “extremely expensive” for those above named shops to exist. They are merely high street brands.

I completely agree about most of those brands. I've no idea who Toast/COS is supposed to appeal to tbh, it's all Frumpy Mcfrumpface. I'm not a fan of Boden either, I agree it's too patterned. Jules is OK some of the time, but I wish they'd stop stitching "Jules" so obviously everywhere. I find it so difficult to find good quality, stylish brands, with some elegance. I pretty much live in Baukjen now I'm over 40, with a bit of Whistles thrown in.

@kitkat151, thanks,

There's more to it than that surely. Could I be more proletarian by getting my clothes from certain retailers?

Most of what I wear is bought in charity shops so I have no idea

I love my Lucy&Yak style clothes

[quote steff13]Here's an example of stuff Target had last year:
www.boredpanda.com/target-dress-challenge/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic[/quote]
I love those dresses. Genuinely. And I'm def not MC

I hadn't heard of most of the mc brands mentioned on this thread (and I do live near a supposedly mc town - its got joules and the white company!)
I hadn't heard of toast til I came on MN.

Everything In Wallis and Coast!

@OneTC

Pretty much everything you've linked in here is fucking awful.

However I very rarely see anyone dressed like that and I live in one of the wankiest places known to man.

Lol, I'm dying to know where you live now @OneTC!

I live in a very middle-class town that has a pronounced wanky tendency. It also has a branch of Sea Salt, and every other woman seems to be wearing a Sea Salt Janelle coat.

Including me.

@CaliforniaDrumming

Is Pretty Little Thing middle class or working class? The clothing in their ads is beyond tacky.

Tacky is usually used to mean working class. Is that what you mean? It is aimed at young working-class women who want to look sexy. It is not aimed at women my age or weight. But more young women of the age whose mothers would say - you are not going out dressed like that!

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow

Pretty Little Thing is young and lowish class.

Fatafce and Whitr Stuff are middle class mum brands

Ditto Biden and Joules, aiming at a slightly different market.

I am not British, hence my puzzlement. Been WFH for two years so cant justify spending a lot on clothes. I usually buy Uniqlo, Joules, M and S, and John Lewis. I don't buy Hush or Toast or Cos or Whistles because it seems a lot of money to pay for stuff that only DH will see.

I am def middle class and not working class though.

BarbaraofSeville I like the Matalan dress! I'd probably take it in a bit and make it more fitted around the top half. But I wouldn't buy it anyway because it's synthetic. That's maybe one factor with class and clothes - expensive natural fabrics vs polyester and acrylic. I avoid buying anything synthetic because I don't like the feel of it and it's bad for the environment – but I can afford to choose. Natural fabrics like linen and cashmere have become associated with wealth and "classiness".

[quote RoyalFamilyFan]@JaneJeffer Would you really wear that cult look? All she needs is a shaved head.[/quote]
I would wear that. Looks so comfortable and simple.

Timothy Mallett made me laugh.

I don't 'get' the appeal of Toast either. However I have just got back into reading the Cadfael books so might actually be converted to the villein aesthetic.

The op is right, companies have target demographics.

So they will have a profile like this:

Our customer is Jane, she’s a forty two year old mum of two, she socialises once a week and has a job in PR, she spends time with her dogs, friends, roller skating and running her kids around. Jane has a slighr weight problem and wants her clothes to be flattering but to look expensive and be comfortable, , she doesn’t have time in the morning to over think. Her husband is a banker, and her children love judo and horse riding,,,Blah blah blah

Janes ideal wardrobe will be this…

[quote RoyalFamilyFan]@JaneJeffer Would you really wear that cult look? All she needs is a shaved head.[/quote]
It's a black shirt and trousers! If it's good enough for Catholic priests it's good enough for me I mostly live in black though.

I'm loving this thread . And enjoying OP's forthright opinions.

I really like these sorts of clothes - not the purple trews or the floral jumpsuit thingy though. I have gravitated towards them as I've got older, don't want to be seen and want to be comfortable. I don't want people's opinions or comment on me in the way I may have done previously. They're like a sack-like shield! And I actually feel more confident within myself nowadays. I think it's also because I don't want men to notice me. I do make an effort, but in a different way to how I did when I was younger.

@RoyalFamilyFan

Or this shapeless dress. It doesn't look good on a model, it isn't going to look on good on someone without model proportions.

@RoyalFamilyFan - to be fair to that dress, the model (also DB has worked as a fashion photographer) - Toast will have had a brief for the exact look they're going for, it doesn't necessarily have to look that good on the model but shows off the dress and appeals to the target market. The poses I've seen of him and some of his model mates in stuff e.g. for Woolovers are laughable!

But I do agree that a lot of middle class clothes are frumpy and ugly. Joules though, a good friend of mine of a certain size looks good in and wears their floral print tshirts, blouses, and nautical dresses. Boden is vile, used to be nice, but now - you do get the odd gem but extremely overpriced. I did used to see someone who I think worked in fashion (she was Spanish) on the bus to work in some colour block suede shoes, but no idea if she worked for them or not. She wasn't a mum either...

Thanks for this thread, OP. I quite agree. I've been known to buy clothing because its ugly to make a statement, but not if it's also boring as hell.

But those purple trousers and the jumpsuit are just too much. Why would someone do something like that to themselves?

Oh I only buy natural fabrics so that rules out a quite a lot of stuff which is not wanky. That rules out Primark.

I have an Italian friend who is a stylist. She is upper middle class Italian. She can literally make anything look good with the right combinations. She has been like this since she was 14 and now in her 40s, well known blogger too.
Give her any of those dowdy things to work with and she will make them look great with the right hair, has amazing figure and skin and multiple high quality shoes and accessories, jewellery/scarves/belts. It is never just about one item of clothing, if you combine it properly.

She would pull off that play suit in a joint photo with her beautiful daughter.

My point being that yes, clothes can look rubbish if you have a greasy mum bun, the wrong figure etc - but if the point is just being comfortable and happy, who cares. Maybe people who happily wear them and just happy to be comfortable because they don’t care how they look? I have tons of friends in this category. However, most will scrub up for an event. Not everyone cares what they look like day to day. More focussed on comfort and materials eg linen, pure cotton etc

[quote steff13]Here's an example of stuff Target had last year:
www.boredpanda.com/target-dress-challenge/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic[/quote]
I think some of those people look really great. All the photos are good but there are several which are really stylish.