Anyone want to come and mourn the reality vs expectation of new purchases with me?

[Swimminguphill]

I bought this beautiful jacket online. In my mind I'd look like Blondie in the 80s, very rock and roll and all round awesome. In reality I look like a giant angry teddy bear/yeti. I have broad shoulders and a bust although slim in general, and it doesn't do me any favours. I wanted it for ages and it's now sold out, and so the joy of getting it in my size just in time is sadly wasted. It is a beautiful jacket - just not on me! Anybody else want to come and mourn reality vs fantasy with me?

Love this thread

Mine - leopard print trainers from H&M. Expectation - cool, toddler chasing appropriate footwear. Reality - I have size 8 feet, so I just look like a safari themed golf club, with blisters

I remember getting a perm in the eighties and tottering off to meet my boyfriend in town. I thought I looked like Cher in Moonstruck. Until boyfriend clapped eyes on me and started singing 'Hello ... is it me you're looking for?'.

He still calls me Lionel from time to time .....

*Covering up at weddings needs it's own subthread. Get a pashmina they said, so versatile they said.

I ordered it in cream. I looked like the only steerage passenger to make it off the Titanic*

This is my all time favourite post

These are brilliant descriptions. If only.we had all taken photos. I have a small chest - so how come any crew neck makes me look like a monoboobed matron? Frills or ruffles - wrestler in drag.

See, I can’t be trusted with on line shopping. I do it, but only from stores so that I know I can banish the offending articles once I’ve seen the light. No eBay for me

Pmsl at green snake that swallowed a plate!

I have thick, curly hair and have had my own share of hair disasters when younger (particularly in the 80s, when I tried to ignore it's curliness). Early 80s, Princess Diana flick, fine when blow dried by the hairdresser, any sign of humidity and nanny with a perm. Also, late 80s, trying to do punk/goth spiky with an undercut, Dustin in Stranger Things 2 at the Snow Ball . Now, I just go for long and curly, it makes the most of it and the weight holds it down with some control.

With regard to my green dress/snake ensemble , I'm sure people must have been whispering 'Does anyone know why John's brought Hissing Sid to the party?'

@quirkychick also have very curly hair. Hairdresser went for Farah Fawcett look in around 1980, I could never never replicate this at home. I tried layers and looked like a puffball of fluffy frizz, I cut it short and that was worse because I could not tie my curls back.

It still looks great straightened by a hairdresser, but I wear it long and embrace the messy bun.

This just about works if it is coloured, I look like a granny if I embrace me grey unfortunately.

PS no offence to grannies, it is just nicer for my 5 year old if people think I am her mum!

Another one with terrible 80s perm regret. I thought I'd look trendy and gorgeous but in reality looked like the bastard lovechild of Jimi Hendrix and Mad Lizzie from breakfast tv. Worse still, it featured on my passport photo and I was stuck with the memory for ten years!

herecomesthesun I think I went for that kind of Farah Fawcett/Dynasty flick but long at the back, looked great at the hairdressers but unless blow dried and toned, poodle mullet city a la Europe The Final Countdown. The 80s were a bad time for curls, despite the popularity of perms, not great products and lots of style that really, really don't work with curls. I have actually embraced my grey silver, but find the trick to not looking like a granny is not to have frizzy hair. Long silver curls, good, long grey frizz, bad.

Ah! More 80s hair regret!

Expectation: Lisa Stansfield-esque gamine crop with kiss curls. To be sported with red lippie and a hint of glamour.

Reality: several people asking if I'd been inspired by Ruth Madoc as Gladys in Hi di Hi (apart from my mum, that is - she just stared wildly for a seconds too long and declared it was 'very ... umm... butch'

@quirkychick
poodle mullet city a la Europe The Final Countdown

@MNHQ can this be put in classics ? Just for all of us poor victims of fashion to refer to in the future when we make another cock up fashion error!

I think someone needs to stage an intervention. Thanks to the attached article, I suddenly want a pair of black DM boots, like the ones I used to stomp around in twenty years and two stone ago.

Something tells me I'd be more Millie Tant than Dolores O'Riordan these days...but...but...

Don't do it !!!! You know you'll look like a dustman !!

Nnnnngggnnn

Oh @TossDaily Please don’t taint the DMs! 😱 I live in my cherry red 8 holes after recently giving birth 😳

Given a bottle of Anais Anais, DS wanted to know why anyone would call a perfume Anus Anus
Result? Donated to church tombola

I have a couple of shockers, but the ones which really stand out are the rose-gold pleated midi skirt (undercooked Turkey), and the bottle green corduroys (Buttons).

I also have a pair of cropped tropical print black and white trousers which my family loathe and I love. Comments about them have ranged from "oh Mummy, not ANOTHER pyjama day", "uh, love, are you going to get changed before we go out then?" And "oh, I didn't think LBOCS2 was ready as she's still in her pyjamas". I am ignoring the haterz.

I've only read half of this and I'm going out in an hour so this is a shameless place mark as I've been making strange whimper/snorts at my desk. Hilarious!

my mum took me to the hairdressers in the late 70's for a Mia Farrow-esque gamin waif haircut despite me having very thick wavy hair.

I looked like I was wearing a woolly hat for 2 years. Grew it out into a German helmet Purdey cut that wasn't much better.....

I once bought a pair of purple patchwork dungarees. I was a teenager and can't even imagine what I thought I would look like.

The unsurprising reality was I looked like a fat toddler that got lost in Glastonbury and fell in with a gang of stoned hippies.

I can top that PurpleStar with a hippie patchwork jumpsuit (with sleeves) bought from a market stall in Amsterdam. Doesn't help that I'm very short, the jumpsuit was both very baggy and considerably too long, and the sewing together of the patchwork had been very half-hearted.

I looked like a stoned lost toddler dressed in rags.

I should point out that this was about thirty years a long time ago. These days I have a little more sense