I’ve read the first few pages but not (yet) the full thread and am loving this nostalgia-fest. I miss 90’s River Island so much. I think White Stuff have sort-of filled the gap for people of my age in terms of the vintage look of the shops but the clothes aren’t the same sort of style. I was devastated with RI went all shiny and modern, rather than the dark wood fixtures, old suitcases and lovely lacey dresses.
Agree also with all the comments re Body Shop. The stuff was both aspirational and relatively affordable as a 90s teenager. I was definitely a dewberry girl and my best friend was white musk. One of the branches near me had one of those amazing perfume bars that a PP mentioned. Little jars with droppers and pipettes – I’m sure you could create your own scent there but I might have misremembered. I remember saving money for a body shop T-shirt which had the brand name and “against animal cruelty”. My parents didn’t understand why I would pay so much (I think it was around £14) just to give a shop free advertising whereas I thought this was the coolest thing I had ever owned. My parents certainly couldn’t understand why I aspired to wear this but refused anything to do with The Sweater Shop, which I found far too trendy and mainstream for my liking.
Apologies if I’ve overlooked any posts but wondering if anyone has yet mentioned the Waverly Market in Edinburgh. This was 90s shopping heaven – the water and mechanical fountains and the little carriage type stalls dotted around selling lots of arty-crafty stuff. The centre itself also had Kookai, The Natural World, The Body Shop, Bay Trading and Athena. There was a Coda Music shop which was really expensive compared to other record shops but had a great bargain bin where you could often pick up cassette albums which were a few year old, or band T-shirts very cheaply. There was a section downstairs just off the food hall with individual stalls selling things like lava lamps and fibre optic ufo lamps, grassheads and plants in vases filled with a sort of gel – we used to try to stick our fingers in until getting told off by the sales assistants. There was also an amazing shop which had a tree in the middle and sold lots of wooden items – lots of stamps and stencils but also beads for jewellery making and those pens and pencils which looked like tree branches. I bought loads of tiny clothes-pegs from there and would braid my hair into tiny plaits at the very front, fastened with the pegs.
Aside from Waverley Market (which is utterly soulless and corporate now), Edinburgh 90’s teenage shopping heaven also involved Cockburn Street – Pie in the Sky (still there but in a different and much smaller outlet and not the same at all) for hippy/grungy clothes and loads of other shops selling candles, incense sticks, tapestry wall hangings, nail polish and hair dyes in loads of different colours. I also fondly remember Foreign Affair on Rose Street for more of the same and Helios Fountain on the Grassmarket for beads/jewellery making, incense, worry dolls, and all sorts of amazing stuff.
Back on the High Street, I agree with those who miss 90’s Boots. The third floor on Princes Street had the lovely gift and homeware stuff and also a café which had the very best baked potato in town. Whenever I went shopping with mum, that was our favourite lunch spot.
Lastly, yes, the loss of The Pier is something I still haven’t gotten over. There really is nowhere like it now. I wanted to have a house filled with wicker furniture, huge chunky wine glasses with coloured rims, mosaics everywhere and wooden screens to divide rooms into sections. I’m lucky in that I managed to get my dining table from there in around 2003 and have kept it (lovely big chunky dark wood) and I still have some candles going strong.